Syslinux - Jun 2009 - menu broken if default 'append' option specified

Hello.

This is my first post here. ;)

I noticed that if the default 'append' option is
specified in the config file, menu and vesamenu
wont boot the system.  Instead of offering a menu,
the screen goes blank; after hitting any key on the
keyboard, empty menu frame gets displayed with no
boot entry list inside.

It gets fixed by removing default 'append' entry
(the one before any 'label').

Default syslinux (without menu) works correctly with
this configuration.

Maybe this is the reason for
http://syslinux.zytor.com/archives/2009-June/012680.html --
"[syslinux] pxelinux.bin (3.80) hanging at the beginning
of menu.c32 TFTP transfer" but might be unrelated.

Tested with syslinux-3.82 tarball.  It's my first
expirence with syslinux :)

Thanks.

/mjt

Michael Tokarev wrote:
> Hello.
> 
> This is my first post here. ;)
> 
> I noticed that if the default 'append' option is
> specified in the config file, menu and vesamenu
> wont boot the system.  Instead of offering a menu,
> the screen goes blank; after hitting any key on the
> keyboard, empty menu frame gets displayed with no
> boot entry list inside.
> 
> It gets fixed by removing default 'append' entry
> (the one before any 'label').
> 
> Default syslinux (without menu) works correctly with
> this configuration.
> 
> Maybe this is the reason for
> http://syslinux.zytor.com/archives/2009-June/012680.html --
> "[syslinux] pxelinux.bin (3.80) hanging at the beginning
> of menu.c32 TFTP transfer" but might be unrelated.
> 
> Tested with syslinux-3.82 tarball.  It's my first
> expirence with syslinux :)
I assume your config looks somewhat like this:

UI menu.c32
APPEND foo
LABEL mylabel
COM32 hello.c32

Due to the APPEND line "foo" gets passed to "menu.c32" and
the menu
system tries to parse it as the config file [1]. A similar problem was reported
with the "ONERROR" keyword [2].

You can use "UI menu.c32 ~" to make it parse the config file as a
workaround.

[1] http://syslinux.zytor.com/archives/2009-May/012507.html
[2] http://syslinux.zytor.com/archives/2009-June/012747.html

- Sebastian