[pve-devel] [RFC pve-kernel-meta 0/5] unify boot-mode config

[Thomas Lamprecht]

On 02.02.22 15:28, Stoiko Ivanov wrote:
> On Wed, 2 Feb 2022 10:03:05 +0100
> Thomas Lamprecht <t.lamprecht at proxmox.com> wrote:
> 
>> On 01.02.22 23:03, Stoiko Ivanov wrote:
>>> patch 3 drops systemd-boot and uses grub for both boot-modes, hopefully
>>> unifying the boot-experience and causing less confusion (currently I suggest
>>> to look at the screen while booting to find out which boot-loader is used)
>>>
>>> (Sadly systemd-boot (which I would prefer, justifiably)
>>> won't get support for legacy boot)
>>>   
>> The thing is, non-uefi systems will become more rare anyhow, so why
>> bother with that? The simplicity of systemd-boot is worth the few (?)
>> confusion - I mean what exactly is there confusing anyway, if most relevant
>> actions can be handled through our tool anyway?
>>
>> I'm not definitive yet, but currently rather tending to NACK that.
> Thanks for the feedback!
> 
> Hmm - I do see your point - motivation was that it felt like a logical
> next step after adapting the config of systemd-boot to get the images
> from where grub needs them to have the system bootable in both modes -
> and having a single place to configure the boot-loader (kernel cmdline,
> pinning) seemed sensible (and less code in p-b-t should correlate with
> less bugs in p-b-t).

No, IMO the next logical step is to rather use systemd-boot for all
EFI-booted setups, not only ZFS - makes not much sense to have switched
explicitly to systemd-boot only to switch back again, grub has a real
complexity cost that only can be argued for in non-UEFI systems.

Also, we already have the code and it already works well for all setups we
know of, further the scope of proxmox-boot-tool is rather small anyway, with
that in mind I'd really hope not to expect much bugs from that part, nor
would I think that there'll be much dropped - efi and legacy boot is
different enough anyway.

> 
> Add to that my biased view (a few forum-threads where people did not know
> which boot loader they used - e.g. [0,1,2] vs. the silent majority, who
> either does not need it, or knows it) that most users expect
> /etc/default/grub to be the place for editing the kernel commandline
> (following the blog/forum/website posts only mentioning this)

Yeah I do not see that in a relevant amount of times, iff it's a documentation
problem, and if you want to make it more simpler the answer is a p-b-t command
that allows to set and reset it centrally. Some people will always ask or have
trouble either way.

> 
> But OTOH I was a bit hesitant as well (since it would mean that the
> blog/forum/website posts of the past 2 years would now become 'wrong' and
> cause even more confusion). Also (quite biased as well) - there are quite
> a few threads with grub failing to boot vs. none that I'm aware of, where
> systemd-boot fails.

Yeah switching around will definitively produce much more confusion than it
solves, there are no technical advantages either.

> 
> So - no hard feelings from my side either - I was curios if it would work
> as a POC
> 

I mean, why wouldn't it? ^^

> On a side-note - I just learned that grub in efi-mode works fine (without
> explicit configuration) over a serial terminal (a use-case I need for
> myself ;)

systemd's does too here, at least qm terminal worked with both since I can
remember.