UEFI and GPT not developed by ArcaNoae - by whom else?

[Sigurd Fastenrath]

If I understand correctly U/EFI and GPT for ArcaOS are not developed by ArcaNoae.

Does anyone has a clue wich person/s / organzation is doing this?

Thank you very much!

My guess would be someone like the QSINIT Developer or Daniela Engert. But that is only a guess.

Or is the plan to keep it as some kind of "Unknown mysterious Miracle" ? 

[Andi B.]

To my understanding it is developed by (or to be more precise organized by, or developed under control of) ArcaNoae. As usual with a lot of parts in ArcaOS there are some ArcaNoae people involved but also some other developers/testers/translators/volunteers....

Both, UEFI and GPT, needs changes in different places of the OS. So different people work on different tasks. But as far as I can see (mind I don't speak for ArcaNoae) they are all organized by ArcaNoae. Some of them may be paid or not.

[Sigurd Fastenrath]

Hi Andi,

I read my information form Rodericks Warpstock Presentation here - please see attached picture.

But I was not able to understand more about it during his Presentation.

[Tom]

Roderick's presentation is described as "Demonstration and Explanation of Secure Boot on ArcaOS which is a project of OS/2 VOICE".
Secure Boot is (as I understand it) connected to UEFI, but not necessary for UEFI.

And UEFI and GPT are not connected at all: there are systems with a classical BIOS (so non-UEFI) and a GPT disk. Both GPT and UEFI just happen to be introduced into OS/2 at the same time, namely in version 5.1 of ArcaOS.

[Sigurd Fastenrath]

Hi Tom,

thank you very much for the explanation, my comment before was a bit misleading, sorry.

I mean I have no clue who is doing the work.

I do know what UEFI, Secure Boot and GPT means.

Thanks again!!!

[Rich Walsh]

I have no clue who is doing the work.

The primary developer for UEFI and GPT is Dmitry Zavalskov (Dixie), the author of QSINIT and one of the best low-level coders OS/2 has ever seen. Roderick Klein tested countless DOS games to help Dixie get the video right, while I worked with him on designing GPT and some of the boot-up "plumbing"; others at AN rearranged the deck chairs and the like. AFAIK, all of the work is proprietary to AN.

While the implementation of UEFI and GPT is really phenomonal on a functional level (I'm posting this from a UEFI-only machine with a GPT-formatted NVME disk running an AOS 5.1 beta and it all "just works"), a little perspective is needed to avoid getting too, too impressed with this accomplishment.

I'd estimate it took the equivalent of one full-time employee 2 years to implement almost everything needed. In the grand scheme of IT projects, that's small potatoes. And, out of all the subsystems that comprise OS/2, only two were changed: loader and video. Stuff like networking, DASD/LVM, PM, etc. are all unchanged.

Strangely enough, it's the fact that these changes are so limited that allows AOS to do things that I don't think are possible with any other OS. Before my old BIOS/UEFI machine died last week, I was able to boot eCS v2.2rc2 under UEFI with absolutely NO changes to the eCS installation. After it died, I xcopied my primary BIOS-based installation from the old machine to this UEFI-only machine, changed 2 lines in my config.sys, and then booted up the fully UEFI-compliant installation that I'm using now.

I missed Lewis' AOS 5.1 upgrade presentation at last weekend's Warpstock. Did he mention these as upgrade options?

[Sigurd Fastenrath]

Thank you very much, the QSINIT Developer was my best guess  I wonder why these informations have not been included in the Presentation.

If I understand you correct: if it is possible to boot eCs on UEFI only it should be possible to boot an with AN Drivers updated MCP 4.52 (what is my main system) as well, shouldn't it?

Would you share these two lines wich have to be changed in config.sys? My guess is that one may be able to use an updated QSINIT and need the filter driver.

Again: Thank you very much!

[Rich Walsh]

If I understand you correct: if it is possible to boot eCs on UEFI only it should be possible to boot an with AN Drivers updated MCP 4.52 (what is my main system) as well, shouldn't it?

If - and only if - you own a license for AOS 5.1 because you need AN's proprietary UEFI bootloader files installed in your EFI System Partition (ESP). Don't expect to use QSINIT - as I said, I believe that UEFI is AN-only.

Would you share these two lines wich have to be changed in config.sys? My guess is that one may be able to use an updated QSINIT and need the filter driver.

I described 2 very different scenarios. The one that you want to emulate requires NO changes to eCS _at all_. The other one that required config.sys changes involved a licensed 5.1 beta BIOS/MBR install that I converted to UEFI/GPT using files already part of that system (i.e. no license violations).

I wonder why these informations have not been included in the Presentation.

Either they don't want to have to deal with it (possible) or they simply don't know about it (probable).

FYI... I worked for AN for 5 years before quitting last February.

[Tom]

Hi Tom,

thank you very much for the explanation, my comment before was a bit misleading, sorry.

I mean I have no clue who is doing the work.

I do know what UEFI, Secure Boot and GPT means.

Thanks again!!!

To avoid possible misunderstanding: my only relation with AN is being a customer. I have never worked for them.
I have only given my impressions based on what I have seen and read. Rich knows much more than I do.

[Dave Yeo]

And UEFI and GPT are not connected at all: there are systems with a classical BIOS (so non-UEFI) and a GPT disk. Both GPT and UEFI just happen to be introduced into OS/2 at the same time, namely in version 5.1 of ArcaOS.

They are loosely coupled. I understand that newer Windows (8+?) require GPT to use UEFI and my old Dell (Win 7 era) works much better with both UEFI and GPT, without GPT it doesn't see the ESP partition to boot from, though you can put the /boot files on a regular FAT32 disk and it works, along with USB boot.

[Sigurd Fastenrath]

FYI... I worked for AN for 5 years before quitting last February.

Hi Rich,

that is funny, during my Presentation at Cologne I talked about ISOFS, using it i.e. to store the content of teh AVARICE game CD so the game can be played on Laptops without a CDROM.
And I mentioned, unfortunately I did not know the author of ISOFS

Right now I realized that in fact it is you - in German we call such things a "Treppenwitz" 

Thanks for this great program!

I do have a wish though: it is possible to mount the Trials of Battle (TOB) ISO Image with ISOFS, but once you want to start the game it stops, saying "Put the CD in the Drive".

The same happend for a long time with Virtual CD Drives inside Virtualbox, but at some point Virtualbox did overcome this and today one can play TOB with OS/2 inside Virtualbox with the ISO in the Virtual CD Drive.

I guess it is a problem with some kind of Copyright Protection of the TOB CD. As I am a fan of OS/2 nativ on bare metal I would like to ask: do you see a chance that ISOFS can overcome this as well?

But I don't want to bother you, it is just something I would like to have.

Thanks for your Thoughts about it!

[Martin Iturbide]

Roderick's presentation is described as "Demonstration and Explanation of Secure Boot on ArcaOS which is a project of OS/2 VOICE".
Secure Boot is (as I understand it) connected to UEFI, but not necessary for UEFI.

And UEFI and GPT are not connected at all: there are systems with a classical BIOS (so non-UEFI) and a GPT disk. Both GPT and UEFI just happen to be introduced into OS/2 at the same time, namely in version 5.1 of ArcaOS.

Hi Sigurd

I just want to say that I got the same confusion while watching Roderick's presentation live at Warpstock.
After some slides and checking the demo he showed, I understood that he was only talking about "Secure Boot", not the full UEFI support.

Regards

[Andi B.]

After seeing the presentation (parts of it) I'm confused too. One thing to remember is UEFI is different thing than GPT. Moreover Secure Boot seems to be another separate thing. Although these three things may come at once with a new Windoze notebook these are separated things.

[Sigurd Fastenrath]

From my knowledge it is like this:

- GPT is a new (different) HDD Layout, that replaces MBR (Master Boot Record). There is no coexistence on one HDD, so you can only have the HDD Used in one way: MBR or GPT

- UEFI is a new (enhanced) BIOS, that replaces the "Old" BIOS. Some of the UEFI/EFI Bios still have an "CSM" Compatible Modul to support the "old" BIOS standard. I.e.: Booting in "Legacy mode"

- Secure Boot is a new way to prevent Attacks/Virus from the BIOS. Operating Systems need a key wich marks them as "Secure" and then the Boot process continues.

("new" means new to OS/2, everything is avaible for several years now)


Restrictions:

On MBR HDDs the Bootmanager is on one Partition (Like IBM OS/2 Bootmanger) or resides in the MBR itself (like Airboot Manager).

On UEFI Systems there is a separat "EFI" Partition on the HDD, where all the OS have their entrys. The OS are booted from this Partition.

UEFI BIOS needs GPT HDD Layout (only Exception: The UEFI BIOS uses the CSM Mode if present!)

SecureBoot needs UEFI BIOS

I very informative internetpage: https://www.heise.de/select/ct/2018/22/1540542514723734
(German, please use Online Translator)


Regarding OS/2, eCS, ArcaOS up to 5.0.7. on modern Hardware:
 

These Versions need so far:
- "old" BIOS or UEFI BIOS in CSM Mode
- MBR (GPT not possible)
- SecureBoot not possible



Funfact:
- Installing These Version next to Windows 11 is hard (but not impossible) as Windows 11 usually checks SecureBoot



ArcaOS 5.1 now will come with

- GPT
- UEFI

But these two things have to be completed with a Secureboot key.

[Andi B.]

Good sum up Sigurd. Only -

UEFI BIOS needs GPT HDD Layout (only Exception: The UEFI BIOS uses the CSM Mode if present!)

is wrong I think. I'm not really sure but I think UEFI can work with MBR disks without problems. Only Windoze does not support UEFI without booting from a GPT disk. But....