Hi, Pascal Hambourg <pas...@plouf.fr.eu.org> wrote (Wed, 23 Oct 2024 17:09:22 +0200): > On 23/10/2024 at 15:18, Marcin Juszkiewicz wrote: > > W dniu 23.10.2024 o 14:38, Pascal Hambourg pisze: > >> On 23/10/2024 at 11:46, Marcin Juszkiewicz wrote: > >>> For that first 16MB partition it would be nice to use GPT type > >>> EF02 (BIOS boot partition) so partitioning tools will see that it > >>> is partition for bootloaders. > (...) > >> AFAIK the "BIOS boot" type is used only by GRUB for BIOS on x86. Does > >> U-Boot or any other arm64 boot loader use this type ? > > > > It is type which shows the purpose of partition. Probably none of OS > > loaders (like grub etc) use it on arm64. In Fedora we have one big EFI > > binary for Grub, Debian uses modular approach with modules kept in the > > /boot/grub/ dir. > > Debian also has signed monolithic GRUB images for UEFI secure boot. > > >> I know this is very specific, but using the "BIOS boot" type for > >> the 16MiB reserved partition would get in the way of a multi-boot > >> x86+arm64 installation because GRUB for BIOS is written at the > >> beginning (30-100 kB) of the BIOS boot partition. Is this a > >> realistic use case ? > > > > I would love to meet someone who uses storage that way. Using one disk > > for 10+ years old PC (BIOS/CSM) and modern AArch64 system. It is > > theoretically possible but in practice it is cheaper to buy some disk. > > Except if you want all systems to share common data on the same portable > medium. I do not know if the notion of a portable installation makes > sense in the arm64 world. But I doubt that anyone would use automatic > partitioning to create such setup. > > To be honest, I considered using the "BIOS boot" type when I added the > 16MB reserved partition to arm64 recipes. It has the additional > advantage of allowing automatic partitioning in free space to reuse an > existing partition of the same type instead of uselessly creating a new > one, for multi-boot. But again I do not know if multi-boot is a common > use case or even possible on arm64. > > The decision is up to d-i maintainers.
I see the benefit of using the "BIOS boot" type for this reserved partition, more easier allowing people to understand, what this partition is used for. But on the other hand, since we don't know how dual-boot on this arch is working (or will work at some time in the future), it may be required to have separate partitions for boot loader for both of those dual-booted OS'es. Therefore, I would be in favour of not creating a partition scheme, which easily allows to mix them up by some semi-automatism (like auto-partitioning, when installing a new Debian). IOW /me voting for keeping this partition as it is now (FAT). Holger -- Holger Wansing <hwans...@mailbox.org> PGP-Fingerprint: 496A C6E8 1442 4B34 8508 3529 59F1 87CA 156E B076
