Saturday, December 18, 2010

Other Advanced Linux Bootloaders.

In most Linux system GRUB (Grand Unified Bootloader) or GRUB 2  is the default bootloader. If you have more than one OS installed in your hardware, then you have to stare for few seconds on the bootloader everytime, you power on. There are other options which will help you getting ride of such monotonicity. If your system has GRUB by default (Fedora & OpenSUSE), you can upgrade it to GRUB 2 which has more features. There is also a derivative of GRUB called Burg (GRUB, letters written in reverse stands for  Brand-new Universal loader from GRUB ). Let's see the features of both bootloader separately:

GRUB 2
It provides themable options. Both Ubuntu and Debian use GRUB 2 by default, so if you use either of those distros you can jump right to the theming section. In case of Fedora you can directly switch to GRUB 2 by installation but in OpenSUSE, you have to compiled by source.
 Features:

  • The format consists of a text file that lists fonts, colors, and bitmap components, and defines their onscreen layout. 
  • Themable elements include the background image, progress bars, and "styled boxes", you can specify images for each corner, the left, right, top, and bottom sides, and the space in the middle.
  • List of bootable kernels can be altered about how it is rendered, but you can't rearrange it entirely. 
  • Can use HTML/SVG colors/comma-separated RGB triples/ PFF2 bitmap fonts.
 GRUB 2 stores configuration files in /etc/grub.d/; the theming commands  moved to the 00_header file. Of course, you'll probably want to browse some pre-tested themes before you create a custom one all on your own. Bennett's site has a few examples; for additional collections your best bet is to check the openDesktop sites, gnome-look.org and kde-look.org.
If you intend to do some customizing, start by simply changing the splash screen image. Move on to defining your own theme later. There is a complete guide to GRUB 2's theme format.
Burg

Burg expands on GRUB 2's theming in a number of respects but it's in experimental phase, that's why major distros don't use it.
  • Ability to hide text and present an "icon only" boot menu. 
  • Switch between text and graphical modes, play sounds.
  • Ability to preview a theme without rebooting the system, run sudo burg-emu from a terminal. 
To install Burg all you need to do is add the PPA as an Apt repository, and select the Burg package. There are also instructions for compiling the Burg source code useful for other distributions — as with GRUB 2, it is a straightforward process with no unusual dependencies. .
Burg's main configuration file is /boot/burg/burg.cfg. Check here for configuring its variables.
You specify the Burg theme to use, by name, with GRUB_THEME=themename. Themes are stored in the directory /boot/burg/themes/.  For your own theme customization read this documentation.
The downloads page has a "burg-theme" package available.

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