Syslinux - Nov 2006 - pxelinux localboot enhancement

pxelinux, when given a localboot=... option, will try to boot next bios 
device itself.

The problem is it takes next BIOS device by BIOS order of enumeration.  
That has no connection with the boot order defined in BIOS. Since a user 
cannot control BIOS enumeration but can control the boot order, there is 
no way one can force a desired next device for local boot with pxelinux. 
In general, you even do not know what will happen.

Suppose I defined the BOOT order to Ethernet0, disk3, disk2, disk0.

BIOS enumerated devices as Ethernet0, etherne1, disk0, disk2, disk3.

At some point of time, I want to configure PXE to force a certain node 
to do localboot. Oops, it will try ethrenet1 and not disk3 as I 
specified in BIOS.

I think pxelinux is really missing localboot=-1 option of isolinux 
(return failure to bios). This would solve a whole lot of problems that 
users may encounter when specifying localboot= option.

How trivial is it to implement it?

-- 
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Constantine Gavrilov
Kernel Developer
Qlusters Software Ltd
1 Azrieli Center, Tel-Aviv
Phone: +972-3-6081977
Fax:   +972-3-6081841
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Constantine Gavrilov wrote:
> pxelinux, when given a localboot=... option, will try to boot next bios 
> device itself.
> 
> The problem is it takes next BIOS device by BIOS order of enumeration.  
> That has no connection with the boot order defined in BIOS.
That's utter bunk.  It should boot the next device in order of booting.
> I think pxelinux is really missing localboot=-1 option of isolinux 
> (return failure to bios). This would solve a whole lot of problems that 
> users may encounter when specifying localboot= option.
It's called "localboot 0" in PXELINUX.

	-hpa