New Boot Loader Menu

[Garrett Cooper]

On Oct 7, 2012, at 1:49 PM, Julian Elischer wrote:

> On 10/7/12 1:36 PM, Devin Teske wrote:
>> On Oct 7, 2012, at 12:52 PM, Garrett Cooper wrote:
>> 
>>> On Oct 7, 2012, at 12:03 PM, Devin Teske wrote:
>>> 
>>>> On Oct 7, 2012, at 11:51 AM, Dag-Erling Smørgrav wrote:
>>>> 
>>>>> Devin Teske <devin.teske at fisglobal.com> writes:
>>>>>> Dag-Erling Smørgrav <des at des.no> writes:
>>>>>>> What problem are you trying to solve, exactly?
>>>>>> Many in-fact:
>>>>>> [list of things that bear no relation whatsoever to what was actually
>>>>>> in the email I replied to]
>>>> I disagree with your slight that those "things … bear no relation whatsoever to what was actually in the e-mail [you] replied to".
>>>> 
>>>> It only *seem* as those are unrelated. I assure you, they are _very_ related (and it's very much my mistake for not making it clear in my initial e-mail). I must apologize for this lack of clarity (I try to rectify it below).
>>>> 
>>>>> Then maybe you should have focused on that in your original email.
>>>>> 
>>>> Yes, perhaps.
>>>> 
>>>> Perhaps it would have been better to explain:
>>>> 
>>>> Hey…
>>>> 
>>>> + iX and I are working on enhancing the boot loader menu to include a new submenu for selecting a Boot Environment (BE). I'm providing the menu infrastructure, iX is providing the C code to populate that menu.
>>> Sounds like GRUB/Plymouth's model... sorta.
>>> 
>>>> + We can't add this new menu item without pigeon-holing ourselves into a position where no more menuitems can be added.
>>> Understood.
>>> 
>>> ...
>>> - Have you considered high resolution screens/fonts; there are some already in FreeBSD hooked into syscons, but that's available later on at boot? I mention this because there's a lot of wasted real estate on my 30" or 24" LCDs when I boot up FreeBSD.
>>> 
>> Adding screen real-estate won't help. Menus (and any of the maximum 65535 submenus) are always limited to 9 maximum menu items.
>> 
>> A significant overhaul of the Forth code would be required to accommodate more than 9 menu items per-menu.
>> 
>> Currently, if a 10th menuitem were rendered (assuming I lifted the boundary-checks), it would be rendered as such:
>> 
>> …
>> 8. Eighth Item
>> 9. Ninth Item
>> 1. Tenth item
> 
> A,B,C,D..... Z?

My mom would be confused with a user interface like that, but it would sure be funny to watch :) (makes me feel like Sesame Street).
-Garrett