RFC: Name of the command to boot a linux kernel on x86

[Juergen Beisert]

Alessandro,

On Donnerstag, 3. Dezember 2009, Alessandro Rubini wrote:
> > Should we hide the different handling by providing an x86 specific
> > version of the "bootm" command or should we add a new command that
> > deals with bzImage's special requirements?
>
> I'd use "mkimage" on the bzImage file to make an uImage, with name
> string, checksum and the rest of meta information (is load address
> applicable to the crappy 16-bit processor of the eighties?)

For x86 there is one showstopper:

linux-2.6 $ make uImage
linux-2.6 $ make: *** No rule to make target `uImage'.  Stop.

Recent kernels also supporting starting from flat mode instead of real mode 
only. But there are binary parts in the bzImage that must be handled 
separately from the kernel image itself. I don't know, if the uImage can 
handle it, or if it contains all the information to separate the parts after 
extracting the uImage file.

> /alessandro, who just learnt new grubs wait untile the vga cable is plugged

Sound like a VESA/VideoBIOS/BIOS bug and not grub.

Regards,
jbe

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