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1 Starting with 1.47, changes marked with SYSLINUX/PXELINUX/ISOLINUX
2 apply to that specific program only; other changes apply to all of
3 them.
5 Changes in 3.30:
6 * libcom32 extended to support graphics mode and graphical console.
7 * vesamenu.c32, new graphical version of the Simple
8 Menu System, see README.menu.
9 * New com32 modules by Erwan Velu do selection based on CPUID
10 or PCI devices present.
12 Changes in 3.20:
13 * EXTLINUX: New options --install (-i) and --update (-U), to
14 make it clear if a boot loader should be installed or
15 updated. For now, defaults to --install for compatibility;
16 a future version will require one of these options.
17 * New library functions to load and place files in memory.
18 * mboot.c32 bug fixes.
19 * Remove 8 MB kernel size restriction.
20 * Add "klibc" target for building unix/syslinux and
21 extlinux/extlinux with klcc (klibc-1.4.27 or later.)
22 * PXELINUX: Fail (and eventually reboot) if no configuration
23 file was found.
24 * COM32 module by Erwan Velu to make decisions based on DMI
25 info.
26 * Fix issue where going back and forth between menus a lot
27 would cause a hang.
28 * ISOLINUX: Fix bug which made "cd boot sectors" not work.
30 Changes in 3.11:
31 * MEMDISK: Fix bug by which accessing the real floppy disk
32 as B: in MS-DOS was broken.
33 * Simple menu system: allow tweaking of the screen layout.
34 * Simple menu system: better command-line editing, correctly
35 handle command lines above 256 characters.
36 * PXELINUX: revert memory allocation change that caused
37 problems on some network cards.
38 * MEMDISK: Try work around a bug on some BIOSes when no
39 physical floppy disk is present in the system.
40 * Enable the 16550A FIFOs, if present, when doing serial
41 console.
42 * New "totaltimeout" command establishes a timeout without
43 regard for any user input.
44 * Simple menu system: timeout behaviour now more in line with
45 user expectations.
46 * Simple menu system: "ontimeout" should now work correctly.
48 Changes in 3.10:
49 * gcc 4.0.1 compilation fixes.
50 * Add support for querying the PCI BIOS in libcom32
51 (used by ethersel et al.)
52 * Fix PCI handing (ethersel etc) on several old chipsets (and
53 VMWare.)
54 * Try to deal with systems with broken EBIOS.
55 * New API call to do "localboot".
56 * New API call to query features.
57 * New API call to run kernel image, a lower-level call than
58 "run command". See comboot.doc.
59 * Fix for bug in EBIOS code discovered by Arwin Vosselman.
60 * NOESCAPE security fix.
61 * Comments are now recognized even without a space following #.
62 * Fix incorrect handling of mixes of entries with and without
63 MENU PASSWD.
64 * The idle API call now harmlessly returns failure if it is a
65 no-op. That way the caller can decide whether or not to
66 bother invoking it again.
67 * Temporarily disable the idle API call on PXELINUX, due to
68 some platforms on which the idle API call seems to hang; this
69 problem has not yet been debugged.
70 * MEMDISK: the handling of DOSEMU-headered images was broken;
71 fix it.
72 * EXTLINUX: symlinks are now supported.
73 * Simple menu system: N and P now work correctly as hotkeys.
74 * MEMDISK: more BIOS bug workarounds.
76 Changes in 3.09:
77 * gcc4 compilation fix.
78 * <BEL> (Ctrl-G) in message files now causes a beep.
79 * Reduce the command line to 511 characters; 1023 caused
80 memory overflows.
82 Changes in 3.08:
83 * SYSLINUX: Fix performance regression (-s mode always
84 enabled.)
85 * Add API function for idle loop.
86 * libutil: Add do_idle() function for idle loop, make
87 get_key() use it.
88 * libutil: Add SHA-1 and base64 functions.
89 * Simple menu system: add password support.
90 * EXTLINUX: Sparse files now handled correctly.
91 * EXTLINUX: Large directories now handled correctly.
92 * ALL: At the prompt, Ctrl-X now forces text mode.
93 * Fix configuration file parsing error, that could cause
94 hangs.
95 * Rewritten advanced menuing system from Murali Ganapathy.
96 * MEMDISK: New "bigraw" mode to work around certain broken
97 BIOS flash programs.
98 * COM32 module to boot Multiboot systems, including Xen. See
99 com32/modules/mboot.doc.
100 * Max command line changed to 1023 characters. Note that the
101 kernel proper still can only handle 255 characters without
102 patching, and COM16 binaries can only handle 125 characters.
104 Changes in 3.07:
105 * Fix chainloading (chain.c32).
106 * Fix zlib build problem.
107 * Use a private copy of <linux/ext2_fs.h>.
109 Changes in 3.06:
110 * Fix typo that caused the ramdisk to load in the wrong place.
112 Changes in 3.05:
113 * New API function "shuffle and boot"; allows COM32 modules to
114 load or construct (almost) arbitrarily complex objects,
115 e.g. a kernel and its initrd/initramfs in pieces, and have
116 the API core reorganize memory for booting. (A library API
117 for this function will be introduced in a later version.)
118 * The initrd= option now supports multiple filenames separated
119 by commas. This is mostly useful for initramfs, which can
120 be composed of multiple separate cpio or cpio.gz archives.
121 (Note: all files except the last one are zero-padded to a 4K
122 page boundary. This should not affect initramfs.)
123 * EXTLINUX: Fix API function 000Ah (get derivative-specific
124 info).
125 * libcom32/ethersel: Support PCI Config Mechanism #2 on
126 machines still infested with that hideous old hack.
127 * SYSLINUX: Fix directory-parsing bug.
129 Changes in 3.02:
130 * SYSLINUX: The "unix" installer now sets the MS-DOS
131 attributes (hidden, system, readonly.)
132 * COM32 library: build the .lnx (test modules for running
133 under Linux) as architecture native modules, in case
134 i386 devel libraries aren't installed.
135 * EXTLINUX: Hack for systems which don't have BLKGETSIZE64
136 defined in the standard header files.
137 * Simple menu system: minor aestetic improvements, and try to
138 work better over a serial console (speed, and readability on
139 monochrome terminal emulators.)
140 * New CONSOLE directive to control output on the video console
141 (useful for dealing with some broken serial-forwarding
142 BIOSes.)
143 * New com32 module "ethersel" for searching for an Ethernet
144 card and selecting the proper version of Etherboot.
145 * EXTLINUX: Allow the user to override the detected geometry.
146 Add help.
148 Changes in 3.01:
149 * EXTLINUX, SYSLINUX: Fix compile errors on some systems.
150 * EXTLINUX: Default to zipdrive geometry (64 heads, 32
151 sectors) if no other geometry can be detected.
153 Changes in 3.00:
154 * SYSLINUX: Support FAT32 and EDD. As an unfortunate
155 consequence, LDLINUX.SYS is no longer an ordinary file; it
156 is block-mapped at install time, which means it can only be
157 written using the syslinux installers.
158 * SYSLINUX: Reorganize the source code for the installers;
159 each one of the installers (dos, win32, unix, mtools) is now
160 built in its own subdirectory. In particular, "mtools" is
161 the unprivileged installer which uses mtools; "unix" is the
162 privileged installer which uses system calls.
163 * SYSLINUX: Completely rewritten DOS installer in C.
164 * ALL: "label" statement information is now stored in a
165 compressed format, which means that a lot more labels are
166 permitted (500-1000 in a typical configuration, but depends
167 on the complexity.)
168 * EXTLINUX: New derivative, which boots from an ext2/ext3
169 filesystem.
170 * SYSLINUX: The DOS and Win32 installers can now optionally
171 write the boot sector to a file instead of the real boot
172 sector. This is not supported in the Linux installers,
173 however.
174 * ALL: New NOESCAPE command, disables the "hold down the Shift
175 key to display the prompt" behaviour.
176 * New simple menu system, as an alternative to the advanced
177 menu system already present. See README.menu for details.
178 * PXELINUX: Filenames can now be prefixed with an IP address
179 or DNS name plus :: (e.g. 192.0.2.1::filename or
180 server.domain.com::filename), which downloads a file from an
181 alternate TFTP server, or just a :: (e.g. ::filename), which
182 suppresses the common pathname prefix. See pxelinux.doc.
183 * SYSLINUX: Add an -m option to the DOS and Win32 installers
184 to write an MBR and -a to mark the partition SYSLINUX is
185 being installed on active.
186 * MEMDISK: Give a way to query the boot loader type while
187 running MEMDISK; see memdisk/memdisk.doc and
188 sample/mdiskchk.c.
189 * mkdiskimage: substantially improved mkdiskimage which, among
190 other things, can now be used to initialize USB keys as
191 zipdrives; see README.usbkey for more information.
193 Changes in 2.13:
194 * MEMDISK: Fix command-line parsing "brown paper bag" class
195 bug.
196 * MEMDISK: Add "raw" mode to support the DOS boot disk from
197 WinME/XP, which seems to deliberately crash the system
198 when someone uses the "INT 15h mover" highmem API.
199 * Make "make install" do something sane for the com32
200 development environment.
201 * In the spec file, create a separate -devel RPM for the com32
202 development environment.
204 Changes in 2.12:
205 * Simple C library, based on klibc, for writing COM32
206 programs.
207 * Fix the handling of file length in loading of COM32
208 programs.
209 * MEMDISK: Work around a linker bug by rearranging the code to
210 not use the linker for the 16-bit code.
211 * SYSLINUX: If we're building on a machine without a Win32
212 (mingw) compiler, just skip building syslinux.exe.
213 * ISOLINUX: Support non-mkisofs mastering programs, at least
214 as long as the image is single-session. For best results,
215 ISOLINUX should be the only boot loader installed.
216 * MEMDISK: Allow the user to specify that the simulated disk
217 should be write-protected.
219 Changes in 2.11:
220 * ALL: Add an API call to get the configuration file name.
221 * SYSLINUX: Fix bug in 2.10 that prevented it from working
222 correctly for a lot of people.
223 * SYSLINUX: In the installer, make mtools a bit less fussy.
224 * Make the menu system compile with newer gcc's.
226 Changes in 2.10:
227 * MEMDISK: Handle images compressed with zip as well as with
228 gzip. Some Windows-based image tools apparently generate
229 these kinds of images by default. Patch by Patrick
230 LoPresti.
231 * Major menu improvement from Murali Ganapathy.
232 * ISOLINUX: Wonderfully sick and brilliant workaround for
233 severe bugs in certain Award BIOSes; from Knut Petersen.
234 * SYSLINUX: Fix for the nomtools installed, from Frederic
235 Pasteleurs.
236 * PXELINUX: Fix handling of IP numbers in the ranges
237 100-109 and 200-209.
238 * ALL: New option "allowoptions" (defaults to 1), which
239 controls if options are allowed on the command line or not.
240 * SYSLINUX: Support building under klibc (see the klibc
241 distribution for details.)
243 Changes in 2.09:
244 * SYSLINUX: Remove residual setuid crap from
245 syslinux-nomtools.
246 * Handle video pages correctly when using the API functions.
247 * Handle compiling on an x86-64 platform correctly.
248 * Menu system from Murali Krishnan Ganapathy; see the menu
249 directory for information.
250 * COMBOOT: Allow COMBOOT programs to change screen text mode.
251 * COMBOOT: Correct the documentation of how to detect
252 SYSLINUX from COMBOOT!!!!
253 * COMBOOT: Fix "get key without echo" API function.
254 * SYSLINUX: Fix bug that affected the API open function.
255 * ALL: Improve the E820 memory parser, to work around some
256 buggy BIOSes.
258 Changes in 2.08:
259 * Add new configuration command "ontimeout" to allow timeout
260 to have a different action than just pressing Enter.
261 * Add new configuration command "onerror" to allow a custom
262 command to be executed in case the kernel image is not found.
263 * Fix bugs in the COMBOOT/COM32 command-line parsing. APPEND
264 now works with COMBOOT/COM32 images.
265 * PXELINUX: Poll for ARP requests while sitting at the
266 prompt. This makes some boot servers a lot less unhappy.
267 * PXELINUX: Actually free sockets when we get a failure
268 (including file not found.) This bug would cause us to run
269 out of sockets and thus "go deaf" after a while.
270 * MEMDISK: Add an API to query for the existence of MEMDISK.
271 * SYSLINUX: Fix loading boot sectors (.bs/.bss) from floppy
272 disk.
273 * .c32 is now one of the extensions searched for
274 automatically.
275 * PXELINUX: RFBG.exe seems to randomly overwrite memory
276 location 0x5700. Thus, don't use it!
277 * PXELINUX: Change pathname length max from 63 to 127; change
278 max vkernels from 128 to 64.
279 * Support Ctrl-U -> kill entire command line input.
280 * The "samples" directory contains a (barely at all tested)
281 chain loading example, chain.c32, which may be used to
282 chainload local floppy disks and hard disks. Use with
283 "chain fdN" or "chain hdN [partition]"; N = 0 for the first
284 drive of each type.
286 Changes in 2.07:
287 * MEMDISK: Workaround for BIOSes which go into a snit when
288 they get a RESET command for the floppy system when there is
289 no floppy in the system.
290 * PXELINUX: Add "ipappend 2", which passes the hardware
291 address of the boot interface to the kernel as a
292 command-line option.
293 * mkdiskimage: fix the generation of the end limit.
294 * PXELINUX: Fix multiple bugs in chainloading of other NBPs.
295 * MEMDISK: Fix bug that would occationally cause "ran out of
296 input data" when using compressed disk images.
297 * SYSLINUX: Updates for the win32 installer (from Lars Munch.)
298 * PXELINUX: PXELINUX-specific options are now recognized both
299 in a vendor-option-space (a.k.a. type 43 encapsulated) as
300 well as in a site-option-space (unencapsulated.)
301 * COM32: Don't crash when DS != 0.
302 * COMBOOT/COM32: Make file reading work correctly. Thanks to
303 Phung Chi Kien for submitting a test program.
305 Changes in 2.06:
306 * ALL: Fix problem that would occationally cause a
307 boot failure, depending on the length of the kernel.
308 * ISOLINUX: Fix problem that would occationally cause a
309 boot failure, depending on the length of directories.
310 * SYSLINUX: Win32 installer now flushes buffers.
311 * ppmtolss16: Be fully compliant with the PNM spec;
312 actually process comments in the header and odd
313 alignments of the various parameters, as well as
314 "plain" (not raw) files and PBM and PGM files.
315 * PXELINUX: Lower the default MTU to 1472 in order to deal
316 with systems with slightly nonstandard MTUs, and PXE
317 stacks which don't defragment correctly. Unfortunately this
318 is very hard to test dynamically.
320 Changes in 2.05:
321 * PXELINUX: Add a default query based on the hardware address
322 of the boot device. This is in lower case hexadecimal form
323 separated by dashes and including the hardware type, for
324 example, the Ethernet (type 1) address 88:99:AA:BB:CC:DD
325 would query the file pxelinux.cfg/01-88-99-aa-bb-cc-dd.
326 * PXELINUX: Fix bug involving non-IP-based config file names.
327 * SYSLINUX: New installer for WinNT-based systems, from Lars
328 Munch.
329 * MEMDISK: Fix handling of memory region overlap when
330 decompressing. Thanks to Mikhail Kupchik for identifying
331 the problem.
333 Changes in 2.04:
334 * ALL: Reclaim even more low memory by observing that
335 comboot_seg == real_mode_seg is perfectly fine, and by the
336 fact that the 1000h segment managed to get unused in all
337 derivatives...
338 * PXELINUX: Attempt to negotiate full Ethernet-sized blocks
339 (1468 bytes) using the blksize option.
340 * SYSLINUX: Resurrect the old no-mtools version of the
341 installer, although as a root-only tool. Some distributors
342 have indicated that they need a small standalone installer.
343 * MEMDISK: Fix a memory offset computation error when
344 installing compressed disks which generally would cause
345 1 MB of memory to be wasted.
346 * MEMDISK: Fix installing the E820 memory map. Calling
347 INT 15h AX=0E820h with MEMDISK 2.03 loaded would give a
348 completely corrupt memory map.
349 * SYSLINUX: Make libsyslinux a dynamic library, so that it can
350 be updated separately from client programs. The whole idea,
351 after all, is to enable alternate programs to become
352 syslinux installers.
353 * Include an rpm spec file in the distribution, so rpmbuild
354 -ta works.
356 Changes in 2.03:
357 * Actually support comment lines in the configuration file.
358 * PXELINUX: Try to resolve some problems with stack switches.
359 * PXELINUX: Handle PXE stacks with broken routing.
360 With these workarounds, the remote install PXE boot floppy
361 (rbfg.exe) from Argon Technologies should work correctly.
362 * Fix problems with Perl scripts in UTF-8 locales.
363 * You probably need NASM 0.98.34 or later to compile this
364 version. 0.98.36 is recommended.
365 * MEMDISK: Now supports gzip compressed images.
367 Changes in 2.02:
368 * SYSLINUX: Security flaws have been found in the SYSLINUX
369 installer when running setuid root. Rewrite the SYSLINUX
370 installer so it uses mtools instead. It therefore now
371 requires mtools (specifically mcopy and mattrib) to exist on
372 your system, but it will not require root privileges and
373 SHOULD NOT be setuid.
375 Changes in 2.01:
376 * MEMDISK: Fix memory sizing bug when the ramdisk crosses the
377 16 MB boundary.
378 * MEMDISK: Add a "pause" option to stop immediately before
379 booting, to read off the messages.
380 * MEMDISK: Support disk images with DOSEMU headers.
381 * Update the mkdiskimage script to handle newer mtools
382 versions, and be able to generate disk images with DOSEMU
383 headers (controlled by the -d option).
384 * Fix the COM32 sample program.
385 * PXELINUX, ISOLINUX: Fix some COMBOOT API calls.
386 * PXELINUX: Doc fix.
387 * Build SYSLINUX into a small library for encapsulation into
388 other programs (however, please keep in mind this is a GPL'd
389 library.)
390 * SYSLINUX: Make installer work with "owner" in /etc/fstab.
391 * SYSLINUX: Fix issue with working on nonpartitioned hard disk
392 devices. THIS CONFIGURATION IS NOT RECOMMENDED.
394 Changes in 2.00:
395 * ALL: Add support for "COM32" (32-bit COMBOOT) images.
396 * ALL: Add an API for COMBOOT/COM32 images. See comboot.doc
397 for details. There is a C development environment for
398 COM32 being created; it should be ready at some point in
399 the future.
400 * Fix mbr.asm so that it actually works.
401 * SYSLINUX: The syslinux installer *SHOULD* now be safe to
402 run setuid root.
403 * PXELINUX: Fix bug where PXELINUX would override random
404 chunks of the UNDI code segment! Thanks to Kevin Tran for
405 finding this bug.
406 * ISOLINUX: Fix a bug related to slashes in pathnames.
407 * ISOLINUX: Fix a bug in handling initrds over 128 MB.
408 * ALL: Make the <Ctrl-V> key print out the version; this is
409 to help debugging.
410 * Add a small script, mkdiskimage, to create a DOS-formatted
411 hard disk image using mtools. This may be useful in
412 conjunction with MEMDISK.
413 * ISOLINUX: Search for a /boot/isolinux directory as well as
414 /isolinux.
415 * ALL: Fix a bug related to very long configuration files.
416 * PXELINUX: Work around a NASM bug which would result in no
417 delay before reset if an error occurs.
419 Changes in 1.76:
420 * ISOLINUX: Remove code no longer used which caused hangs on
421 some Toshiba laptops.
423 Changes in 1.75:
424 * ALL: NASM 0.98.32 or later is now required to build
425 SYSLINUX from sources.
426 * SYSLINUX: put back in the workaround for the BIOS floppy
427 table. This seems to be a requirement for "extended" floppy
428 formats to work correctly.
429 * SYSLINUX: No longer warn if one is trying to boot on a 286
430 or older. The above BIOS workaround no longer fits if the
431 requirement to use only 8086-compatible code in the early
432 boot is maintained. It made sense in 1994, but in 2002 a
433 286 or older is a museum object.
434 * SYSLINUX: Use a downright bizarre, stateful algorithm to try
435 to guess the maximum transfer size. I am *hoping* this will
436 cut down on the number of systems for which -s is required
437 to work at any acceptable speed.
438 * ISOLINUX: Add a few more workarounds for various broken El
439 Torito BIOSes.
440 * Make sure .depend files aren't accidentally packed...
441 * ALL: Fix bugs in the extension-detect code; this caused
442 files like COMBOOT images and CD boot sectors to be
443 mis-identified as Linux kernels and rejected.
444 * ALL: Fix the return from COMBOOT.
445 * ALL: Do some of the early groundwork for supporting DOS
446 system calls in COMBOOT.
447 * Get rid of unnecessary "near" directives, making the code
448 bigger.
449 * PXELINUX: Put the PXE stack back in the init state before
450 invoking a chain-loaded NBP.
451 * PXELINUX: Actually found the combination of calls that
452 allows some (most?) PXE 2+ stacks to be unloaded from memory
453 properly.
454 * PXELINUX: Add "keeppxe" command-line option to disable
455 the standard unloading of the PXE stack.
457 Changes in 1.74:
458 * SYSLINUX: fix bug that would cause valid kernel images to be
459 labelled "invalid".
461 Changes in 1.73:
462 * Work on removing gratuitous differences between modules.
463 * Break up the source in common and module-specific files.
464 * PXELINUX: Allow chaining of other PXE NBPs.
465 * ISOLINUX: Allow loading "CD-ROM boot sectors".
466 * ALL: generalize the definition of a boot sector/NBP.
468 Changes in 1.72:
469 * PXELINUX, ISOLINUX: Fix bugs in the new core code.
471 Changes in 1.71:
472 * Fix a "brown paper bag" class bug in the new core code.
474 Changes in 1.70:
475 * Major code restructuring.
476 * Relax the conventional memory limits somewhat.
477 * MEMDISK: Set up the "version number string" pointer in the
478 header correctly.
479 * SYSLINUX: Fix, again, "the bug that won't die": the use of
480 the offset parameter with the SYSLINUX installer.
481 * SYSLINUX: Fix possible superblock corruption problem in the
482 SYSLINUX installer.
484 Changes in 1.67:
485 * Handle bug in the location of initrd.
487 Changes in 1.66:
488 * MEMDISK: Make compile with newer versions of gcc.
490 Changes in 1.65:
491 * ISOLINUX: Support booting disk image files (to boot DOS or
492 other non-Linux operating systems), *IF* the BIOS works
493 correctly; unfortunately many BIOSes apparently don't.
494 * Support Linux boot protocol version 2.03 (explicitly
495 specify the initrd address limit.)
496 * Handle small "pseudo-kernels"; images that use the Linux
497 kernel boot protocols but are less than 64K in size.
498 * MEMDISK: New subsystem; this is a driver which allows
499 legacy OSes to boot using an in-memory simulated disk.
500 See memdisk/memdisk.doc for more info.
501 * PXELINUX, ISOLINUX: Correctly handle files larger than 65535
502 blocks (32 MB for PXELINUX, 128 MB for ISOLINUX.)
503 * PXELINUX: Make a best-effort attempt at freeing all memory
504 claimed. From the looks of it, it will fail on most PXE
505 stacks.
507 Changes in 1.64:
508 * Limited support for hardware flow control when using a
509 serial port console.
510 * Support specifying the serial port I/O address explicitly.
511 * Make DOS installer hopefully behave more nicely when used on
512 recent Windows versions.
513 * Fix returning to text mode when a font has been specified.
514 * Attempt to detect missing serial port hardware and disable
515 the serial port if there is nothing there.
517 Changes in 1.63:
518 * Make the ppmtolss16 program handle color conversion more
519 correctly.
520 * Clean up "make install" target, honour INSTALLROOT if it
521 exists.
522 * SYSLINUX: Fix stack-smash bug identified by Steffen
523 Winterfeldt.
524 * Hopefully fix return-to-text-mode on some graphics cards.
525 * ISOLINUX: Bug workaround for Award BIOS 4.51, and perhaps
526 other buggy BIOSes as well.
528 Changes in 1.62:
529 * PXELINUX: Allow the DHCP server to override the
530 configuration file name and pathname prefix, using
531 "site-specific" DHCP options.
532 * PXELINUX: Documentation fixes.
533 * PXELINUX: Fix the "ipappend" option; the last two values
534 were reversed vs. what the kernel expected.
535 * Introduce a way to return to text mode once we are already
536 in graphics mode. This may be useful for F-key help
537 screens.
538 * Fix several bugs in the way return to text mode was handled.
540 Changes in 1.61:
541 * ISOLINUX: Support full pathname searches. Max length for a
542 pathname is 255 characters. As a result, only 64 "label"
543 statements are supported in ISOLINUX.
544 * PXELINUX: Max filename length extended to 63 characters.
546 Changes in 1.60:
547 * Add support for graphical splash screens.
548 * Add mode control characters, which allows you to control
549 message display output depending on output mode (text,
550 graphics, or serial port.)
551 * ISOLINUX: New program, which boots Linux from a CD-ROM
552 without using floppy emulation mode. See isolinux.doc for
553 more details.
554 * PXELINUX: Don't search for boot sector file types, since
555 they don't work anyway.
556 * SYSLINUX: Document the LOCK command for Win9x, and the error
557 dialog box for WinNT/2K.
559 Changes in 1.54:
560 * PXELINUX: Fix code for finding !PXE from PXENV+. This was
561 due to a spec bug; match the most recent spec since that
562 seems to be what implementations actually do.
563 * SYSLINUX: Add some smarts to the boot sector, which
564 hopefully should reduce the number of systems which require
565 stupid mode ("syslinux -s").
566 * PXELINUX: Document further some of the pathologies with old
567 PXE stacks.
568 * When specifying a "default" command line, no longer
569 automatically appent "auto". See the "DEFAULT" command in
570 syslinux.doc for more information.
571 * PXELINUX: Clean up the allocation of local socket numbers.
573 Changes in 1.53:
574 * PXELINUX: Rename pxelinux.bin to pxelinux.0, to match what
575 most PXE servers seem to expect.
576 * PXELINUX: Update the DHCP/boot server setup documentation.
577 * PXELINUX: Support new "localboot" option for "label"
578 sections.
579 * PXELINUX: More robust parsing of DHCP/boot server packets.
580 * PXELINUX: Include a small utility program "gethostip" to
581 compute hexadecimal IP addresses.
583 Changes in 1.52:
584 * PXELINUX: Fix bugs introduced by new A20 code. (SYSLINUX
585 has also been changed for code consistency reasons, but I'm
586 pretty sure the changes are don't care on SYSLINUX.)
587 * Documentation updates.
588 * PXELINUX: Add "ipappend" option to generate an ip= option to
589 the kernel.
591 Changes in 1.51:
592 * PXELINUX: Not all PXE stacks fill in the IP address for a
593 type 3 cached info query. Use a type 2 cached info query
594 for this information (only.)
595 * Yet another attempt at A20 coding. Now support BIOS call
596 15:2401 as well, and handle machines which always have A20
597 on separately.
598 * Support memory detection using INT 15h, AX=0E820h. BIOS
599 manufacturers have apparently gotten sloppy about keeping
600 INT 15h, AX=0E801h working properly.
601 * Don't issue <CR><LF> onto the serial port when we're doing
602 screen wraparound.
604 Changes in 1.50:
605 * Yet another A20-code update. It seems some "legacy-free"
606 machines and embedded gear simply don't have a KBC to talk
607 to, and that waiting for one will wait forever. Sigh.
609 Changes in 1.49:
610 * SYSLINUX: Implement a hack for BIOS drivers which hog significant
611 chunks of low memory during boot. (Note: PXELINUX already
612 had this modification. SYSLINUX does still require that the
613 low 512K is available; PXELINUX requires 384K. Machines
614 with a physical memory hole in the low 640K cannot boot
615 Linux no matter what.) Depending what the reason is for the
616 memory hole, a new kernel (2.4.0-test3-pre3 or later) may be
617 required.
618 * SYSLINUX: Default installer binary now compiled against
619 glibc 2.1. If this is inappropriate for your system and you
620 still want to use the offical version of SYSLINUX, please
621 follow the instructions in "distrib.doc" to rebuild the
622 installer.
623 * SYSLINUX: Linux installer program now supports -o <offset>
624 option which does a loopback mount with the
625 -o loop,offset=<> option. Useful to run SYSLINUX on an
626 individual partition of a whole-harddisk image.
627 * Include the source code to a Master Boot Record (MBR)
628 functionally equivalent to the one installed DOS except it
629 includes EBIOS support, and should be resistant to geometry
630 changes. The MBR code is public domain.
631 * PXELINUX: Fix "double p" bug: if the tftp prefix was null,
632 all filenames would get a "p" preprended, e.g.
633 "ppxelinux.cfg" and "pvmlinux".
635 Changes in 1.48:
636 * PXELINUX: Workaround for PXE ROMs based on the Intel PXE PDK
637 3.0 build 071 and earlier: missing !PXE structure pointer.
638 * PXELINUX: Handle larger BOOTP/DHCP packages.
639 * PXELINUX: The command line passing was broken; fix.
640 * PXELINUX: Make COMBOOT images work.
641 * PXELINUX: Documentation on how to make booting work using
642 the PDK 3.0-derived clients, which aren't so generous as to
643 allow booting with only "PXEClient" specified.
645 Changes in 1.47:
646 * PXELINUX: RFC 1123 states that a TFTP implementation MUST
647 use adaptive timeout, "at least an exponential backoff of
648 retransmission timeout is necessary." Implement a very
649 simple exponential backoff for retransmits.
650 * PXELINUX: Updated documentation, including pointer to new
651 TFTP server.
652 * PXELINUX: When sending ERROR due to bad OACK, use the proper
653 destination port number (why are TFTP port numbers so odd?)
654 * PXELINUX: If the boot dies in the middle somewhere,
655 eventually give up and reset the machine (unattended
656 operation.)
658 Changes in 1.46:
659 * New program PXELINUX to do network booting using a
660 PXE-compliant (Pre-Execution Environment) network booting
661 PROM. See pxelinux.doc for details.
663 Changes in 1.45:
664 * Serial console support. See syslinux.doc for details.
666 Changes in 1.44:
667 * Change HIGHMEM_MAX to 38000000h to (hopefully) avoid the
668 kernel stepping on it; 3f000000h was apparently a higher
669 limit than the kernel used!
671 Changes in 1.43:
672 * Add sys2ansi.pl script to display the contents of a
673 colorized SYSLINUX file.
674 * Changed the io_delay once again, after a report that the
675 old delay port causes hangs on some systems.
677 Changes in 1.42:
678 * Frob the "fast A20 gate" port as well as the keyboard
679 controller; will this help systems with problems?
680 * Be even more paranoid about A20, unfortunately even this
681 seems to be not paranoid enough... what I don't understand
682 is that if there is hardware out there *this broken*, how
683 can it run Linux at all? Report an error message rather
684 than hang forever if A20 is stuck.
685 * Include some intermediate files in the distribution, plus
686 provide a "make installer" target for distributors to relink
687 the install programs only. I would prefer the syslinux boot
688 loader proper to be "binary clean" for debuggablity -- use
689 "make clean ; make installer" to rebuild the installers only.
691 Changes in 1.41:
692 * Don't get confused by directories, volume labels, or VFAT
693 long names.
694 * Use INT 15h, AX=0E801h to query memory size before trying
695 INT 15h, AH=88h. This not only provides more headroom
696 between the kernel and the initrd on large-memory machines,
697 but it appears some recent BIOSes actually have started
698 returning garbage for the AH=88h (older) call.
699 * Trust high memory beyond the 15 MB mark if the user has
700 specified it, or if obtained with INT 15h, AH=0E801h (with
701 no memory holes above 1 MB.)
703 Changes in 1.40:
704 * Increase A20M delay and put in a test to avoid problems on
705 certain IBM Thinkpads (thanks to Donnie Barnes of RedHat
706 for vital info on this one.)
707 * Support COMBOOT style boot command images.
708 * Support chain loading (foreign operating systems, e.g. DOS).
709 * Include a new "copybs" DOS utility to copy a boot sector to
710 a file (under Linux, use "dd".)
711 * Fix the DOS installer to work for disks over 32 MB.
712 * SYSLINUX should now handle disks with more than 65536 tracks.
714 Changes in 1.37:
715 * Fix a bug that caused "label" statements in syslinux.cfg to
716 not be handled properly.
717 * Updated the documentation. Among other things, we now allow
718 up to 128 "label" statements.
720 Changes in 1.36:
721 * Fix for booting old (pre-initrd) kernels.
722 * It seems at least some versions of OS/2 doesn't set up all
723 the fields in the superblock correctly. Account for that.
724 * Fix bug that caused boot failure when using the mem= option.
726 Changes in 1.35:
727 * Loading from partitions now should work properly. (Actually
728 tested, this time. You should even be able to dd a floppy
729 to a partition and boot from it.)
730 * Removed large workaround code for an alleged ancient BIOS
731 bug I have never actually seen. The -s option should work
732 on those machines, anyway.
733 * Support for simple keyboard remappings, same as used by
734 LILO (once again to support localization.) The program
735 keytab-lilo.pl from the LILO distribution included to
736 generate such maps.
737 * Added a "safe, slow and stupid" (-s) option to the
738 installers. This option will lobotomize the boot sector to
739 hopefully work on even very buggy BIOSes.
741 Changes in 1.34:
742 * Ability to load a VGA font on bootup (for localized Linux
743 distributions.)
745 Changes in 1.33:
746 * Bug fix in the Linux installer.
747 * Added a workaround for a bug in certain AMI/Intel BIOSes
748 when booting from CD-ROM.
749 * Documentation changes.
751 Changes in 1.32:
752 * FAT16 filesystems are now supported.
754 Changes in 1.31:
755 * Now compiles under Linux, using NASM, rather than using
756 Turbo Assembler under DOS. See http://www.cryogen.com/Nasm
757 for information about NASM.
758 * Linux-hosted SYSLINUX installer, as well as a
759 rewritten DOS installer (now is written in assembler, so we
760 don't need Turbo C.)
762 Changes in 1.30:
763 * Added support for loading bzImage and initrd loading, and made
764 SYSLINUX new-setup-code aware (SYSLINUX 1.30 id=0x31).
765 * Added LILO-style kernel labels; see the LABEL and IMPLICIT
766 keywords in README file.
767 * Added support for colorization of intro and help screens.
768 * The vga= option is now handled correctly.
769 * Massive rewrite of large chunks of the code in order to
770 support the first two new features.
772 Changes in 1.20:
773 * Added simple online help at the "boot:" prompt.
774 * Removed 2880K image as I no longer have access to such a
775 floppy drive. (Donations accepted!!)
776 * Decided to distribute the source in a subdirectory rather
777 than in a nested zipfile.
779 Changes in 1.11:
780 * Removed a sanity check which would cause booting to fail on
781 Phoenix BIOS version 4.03. Apparently this BIOS is buggy.
783 Changes in 1.10:
784 * Added configuration file SYSLINUX.CFG. This file contains all
785 configurable options, and can be edited from any OS which can
786 access an MS-DOS filesystem; there is no longer a need to run
787 SYSLINUX.EXE except to write the boot sector.
788 * Default command line now given by "default" line in config
789 file.
790 * LINUXMSG.TXT and BOOTMSG.TXT hard-coded file names replaced by
791 "display" and "prompt" lines in config file.
792 * LILO-style option appending now supported ("append" line in
793 config file).
794 * Prompt timeout is now supported ("timeout" line in config
795 file). The timeout is cancelled when anything is typed on the
796 command line.
797 * Pressing <ESC> or <Ctrl-C> at the Loading... stage now aborts
798 the kernel loading in progress and returns the user to the
799 boot: prompt.
800 * The installer now automatically sets the READONLY flag on
801 LDLINUX.SYS.
802 * Added 2880K disk image.
804 Changes in 1.03:
805 * Fixed bug that would prevent booting from double-density
806 floppies and other DOS filesystems with multiple sectors per
807 cluster.
808 * Added 720K disk image.
809 * Changed default kernel name on disk images to LINUX.
811 Changes in 1.02:
812 * Fixed bug that would garble the command line on recent kernels
813 with more than 4 sectors of setup code (this wasn't really a
814 *bug*; rather, a kernel change broke the code. Unfortunately
815 the Linux boot interface is still sorely undocumented).
816 * Added BOOTMSG.TXT file support (message file which does not
817 force display of the boot prompt).
819 Changes in 1.01:
820 * Fixed bug on some (most?) 386 BIOSes would require two boot
821 attempts.