131 lines
3.3 KiB
Plaintext
131 lines
3.3 KiB
Plaintext
.TH 9BOOT 8
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.SH NAME
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9bootfat, 9bootiso, 9bootpxe, bootia32.efi, bootx64.efi \- PC bootloader for FAT, ISO and PXE network booting
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.SH SYNOPSIS
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Started by PC BIOS or chainloaded by partition bootsector
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.SH DESCRIPTION
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9boot is the bootloader used on PCs to start the Plan 9 kernel.
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Its task is to read and parse the
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.IR plan9.ini (8)
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configuration file, gather some basic system information like
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the amount of usable system memory, do some basic system
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initialization and load the kernel from the boot media into memory.
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After reading the configuration, the loader will automatically
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attempt to boot the kernel that was specified by the
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.B bootfile=
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parameter. If there is no such parameter, a key
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gets pressed on the keyboard or the kernel file was not
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found then the loader enters the interactive
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boot console.
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The syntax of the boot console is the same as in the
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.IR plan9.ini (8)
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file with
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.IB key = value
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pairs setting boot parameters. In addition a few command
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words are recognized that are intended for interactive use:
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.TP
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.BI clear [prefix]
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can be used to remove parameters from the configuration.
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If a
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.IR prefix
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is specified, the first parameter that matches the prefix
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is removed. If the
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.IR prefix
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argument is omitted, the whole configuration will be reset.
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.TP
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.B show
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displays the current configuration in memory.
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.TP
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.B wait
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will return to the console prompt after processing the
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configuration file preventing automatic boot.
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.TP
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.B boot
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will end the console and attempt booting the kernel.
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.SS
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There are many ways to boot a PC so
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.IR 9boot
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was split into a number of distinct programs one for each boot
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method.
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.SH FAT BOOTING
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When booting Plan 9 from a harddisk or USB pen drive, a
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FAT16/32 partition
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.IR (9fat)
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is used to store the kernel and
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.IR plan9.ini (8)
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configuration. Due to size limitations, instead of loading
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the kernel directly, the bootsector
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.IR (pbs)
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of the FAT partition loads
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a 2nd stage bootloader
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.IR (9bootfat)
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from the root directory of the filesystem.
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.SH CD-ROM BOOTING
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Booting from CD-ROM requires only the
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.IR 9bootiso
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bootloader to be included in the ISO-9660 image under
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.B 386/9bootiso,
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set as a non-emulation bootblock (see
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.IR mk9660 (8)).
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Boot parameters are read from
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.B cfg/plan9.ini.
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.SH NETWORK BOOTING
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With a PXE capable BIOS and network card one can download
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.IR 9bootpxe
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and boot the kernel from a TFTP server (see
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.IR dhcpd (8)
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and
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.IR ndb (6)
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for details). Once started,
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.IR 9bootpxe
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will read the file
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.B /cfg/pxe/$ether
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or, if this file is not present,
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.B /cfg/pxe/default
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from the tftp server, where
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.B $ether
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is the MAC address of the client's network card
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in lower case hex, and uses this as its
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.IR plan9.ini (8)
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file.
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.SH EFI BOOTING
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EFI firmware looks for the files
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.B bootia32.efi
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(for 386)
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or
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.B bootx64.efi
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(for amd64)
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in the directory
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.B /efi/boot
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of the EFI boot partition and executes them.
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Once started, the file
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.B /plan9.ini
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is read from the boot partition and interpretated in
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the same way as with
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BIOS booting.
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.SH FILES
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.B /386/pbs
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.br
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.B /386/9bootfat
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.br
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.B /386/9bootiso
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.br
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.B /386/9bootpxe
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.br
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.B /386/bootia32.efi
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.br
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.B /386/bootx64.efi
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.br
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.SH SOURCE
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.BR /sys/src/boot/pc
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.br
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.BR /sys/src/boot/efi
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.br
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.SH "SEE ALSO"
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.IR plan9.ini (8)
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.SH HISTORY
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9boot first appeared in 9front (April, 2011).
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EFI support first appeared in 9front (Oct, 2014).
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