Syslinux - Aug 2015 - What about other patches? WAS: EFI: HP + syslinux = crash [ brown paper bag update ]

Updating myself again:

On 07-08-15 16:03, Oscar Roozen wrote:
 > e466d24 still has an issue with png's in vesalinux causing crashes

I can confirm this remaining crash is caused by the line "MENU 
BACKGROUND bootlogo.png".

The original bootlogo.png is 640x480. Forcing the videomode with "MENU 
RESOLUTION 640 480" did not resolve the crashes, nor did resizing the 
png to 1024x768 and forcing the mode to that size. If anyone wants to 
test or just admire this exact bootlogo.png, it is available for 
download at https://okkie.nu/tmp/bootlogo.png.

What did work, was resaving the logo as a jpg. This boots just fine.

According to the debug info, both videomodes initialized okay. The crash 
happens later. See these snippets of debug() output:

[640x480]
| Opening config file: pxelinux.cfg/category.default open_file 
pxelinux.cfg/category.default
| searchdir: pxelinux.cfg/category.default  root: 0x0000000000000000 
cwd: 0x0000000000000000
| PXE: file = 0x00000000772faaf8, retries left = 0: ok
| ok
| Hello, World! (initvesa.c)
| Hello, World! (vesa.c)
| mode 0 version 0 pixlfmt 1 hres=1024 vres=768
| mode_num = 0 query_status 0
| mode 0 hres=640 vres=480
| BGR8bit bpp 32 pixperScanLine 640 logical_scan 2560 bytesperPix 4
| Success setting mode 0
| Mode set, now drawing at 0x0000000091000000
| Ready!
| open_file bootlogo.png
| searchdir: bootlogo.png  root: 0x0000000000000000  cwd: 0x0000000000000000
| PXE: file = 0x00000000772faaf8, retries left = 0: ok
|  ^@ProLiant System BIOS P89 v1.40 (05/06/2015)
| (C) Copyright 1982 - 2015 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.


[1024x768]
| Opening config file: pxelinux.cfg/category.default open_file 
pxelinux.cfg/category.default
| searchdir: pxelinux.cfg/category.default  root: 0x0000000000000000 
cwd: 0x0000000000000000
| PXE: file = 0x00000000772faaf8, retries left = 0: ok
| ok
| Hello, World! (initvesa.c)
| Hello, World! (vesa.c)
| mode 0 version 0 pixlfmt 1 hres=1024 vres=768
| mode_num = 0 query_status 0
| mode 0 hres=640 vres=480
| mode_num = 1 query_status 0
| mode 1 hres=800 vres=600
| mode_num = 2 query_status 0
| mode 2 hres=1024 vres=768
| BGR8bit bpp 32 pixperScanLine 1024 logical_scan 4096 bytesperPix 4
| Success setting mode 2
| Mode set, now drawing at 0x0000000091000000
| Ready!
| open_file bootlogo1024.png
| searchdir: bootlogo1024.png  root: 0x0000000000000000  cwd: 
0x0000000000000000
| PXE: file = 0x00000000772faaf8, retries left = 0: ok
|  ^@ProLiant System BIOS P89 v1.40 (05/06/2015)

Setting the mode succeeds. The crash (reboot in this case) seems to 
happens during or after loading the PNG.

Here is a succesfull load of the bootlogo1024.jpg:
| BGR8bit bpp 32 pixperScanLine 1024 logical_scan 4096 bytesperPix 4
| Success setting mode 2
| Mode set, now drawing at 0x0000000091000000
| Ready!
| open_file bootlogo1024.jpg
| searchdir: bootlogo1024.jpg  root: 0x0000000000000000  cwd: 
0x0000000000000000
| PXE: file = 0x00000000772faaf8, retries left = 0: ok
| kernel is images/default-image/vmlinuz, args = 
initrd=images/default-image/initrd  rdblacklist=nouveau [...]

Even with vesa debugging turned on, this is all I can see.  The kernel 
line only appears after I select a menu entry of course.

For me this has a very low priority, as the jpg workaround is just fine. 
But maybe somebody wants to dig deeper, just bug me if you want more 
feedback.

 > Is it time to update the official repository yet? ;-)

Yeah! Found it at git://repo.or.cz/syslinux.git :-)

> 
> For me this has a very low priority, as the jpg workaround is just fine. 
 
Well, vesamenu.c32 under UEFI, although "almost needed", it is already
behaving in a crappy manner anyway :(.

(Reminder, FWIW, PNG is non-patented, loss-less and popular.)

With so many regressions and features not working (in vesamenu under 
UEFI), I have "suggested" in past months / emails that perhaps it
might
need to (or should?) be reviewed altogether (maybe even improving it 
for BIOS too ;).

In the meantime, perhaps some suggested patches (regarding other 
issues) might deserve some attention / not-so-low priority? Recent 
examples:

_ com32: write_sectors fixes 
 http://www.syslinux.org/archives/2015-August/023962.html 

_ efi: leaving long mode in kernel_jump routine 
 http://www.syslinux.org/archives/2015-August/023911.html 

(Somewhat self-centered, but not so much: I would also like to see the 
initial patches from Patrick about the CLI and lss16 being taken by 
someone so to improve them, after 3 years of patiently waiting.)

To be clear, I do not know their effects nor whether they are correct, 
needed, useful, convenient, positive... I am just hoping for them not 
to be ignored / left as "lost" in the mailing list.

TIA,
Ady.

>>>
 On 07-08-15 16:03, Oscar Roozen wrote:
 e466d24 still has an issue with png's in vesalinux causing crashes
 
 I can confirm this remaining crash is caused by the line "MENU 
 BACKGROUND bootlogo.png".
 <<<
 
Since last week I've been able to reproduce this problem.
This is a weird bug affecting zlib but it looks like a compiler issue (v4.7.2)

Please implement these new changes over your last non-debug
working build (multi-nic fix) and let's see how it goes.

https://github.com/ppatpat/syslinux/compare/master...ppatpat:zlib?expand=1

Please report your results.
Thanks,

Best,
Patrick

On 11-08-15 10:07, Patrick Masotta wrote:
> Please implement these new changes over your last non-debug
> working build (multi-nic fix) and let's see how it goes.
>
> https://github.com/ppatpat/syslinux/compare/master...ppatpat:zlib?expand=1
>
> Please report your results.
Results are in. They are very good. No crashing even with the original 
config!

On Aug 10, 2015 10:28 PM, "Ady via Syslinux" <syslinux at
zytor.com> wrote:
> needed, useful, convenient, positive... I am just hoping for them not
> to be ignored / left as "lost" in the mailing list.
In this thought, I created a label in my mailbox of pending patches several
months ago.

--Gene