Re: EFI amd64: boot.cfg goes where?

On Tue, 4 Aug 2026, Robert Elz wrote:

>  | On Sun, 2 Aug 2026, DTB wrote:
>  |
>  | > My boot.cfg is just
>  | >>>  root NAME=NETBSD
>  | >>>  boot NAME=NETBSD:netbsd
>  | >
>  |
>  | That syntax isn't right. See boot.cfg(5) for examples.
>
> The syntax is OK, boot.cfg just shows a more complex example
> using a menu so the user can select what to boot.   If that's
> not desired it doesn't need to be used.
>

Isn't that the interactive boot-loader command-line syntax? The boot.cfg(5)
man-page says:

```
    FILE FORMAT
      The format of the file is a series of lines containing keyword/value
      pairs separated by an equals sign (`=').  There should be no whitespace
      surrounding the equals sign.  Lines beginning with a hash (`#') are
      comments and will be ignored.
```

So, `boot=...' and `root=...' in boot.cfg -- if on their own lines ie. not
as part of a `menu=...' line.

>  | How did you manage to create a disklabel on a GPT partitioned
>  | (and UEFI booted) system?
>
> That is a good question.   The easy way would be to pass the wedge
> as a disk to some virtual host environment (qemu, XEN, ...) and then
> install onto that using a BIOS type install (a UEFI install would make
> an even bigger mess).   That method is OK, but only if the intent is to
> keep running the installed system via the same hosting method.   An install
> like that is not intended to be booted standalone.
>

Yeah. I did this as a challenge a few years ago: multiple disklabels on the
same disk. I used a CCD overlay over a slice/wedge if I recall correctly.

>  | PS. if any of the GPT partitions have a `bootme' attribute,
>  | just get rid of it.
>
> No, don't just do that, it is needed if the root partition isn't the
> NetBSD ffs partition with the lowest GPT index, and you want to be able
> to boot without explicitly choosing a root/boot partition (ie: just
> "boot netbsd", which is the default when there is no boot.cfg - and since
> that needs to be (currently) in the root partition, there has to be a way
> to find it.    If the partition name is always explicit, or if the
> desired boot (root normally) partition is the one with the lowest index,
> (among NetBSD ffs partitions - ESP, linux, wintrash etc, don't count)
> then bootme doesn't add any value.
>

True, but, `bootme' also causes problems if attached to the wrong partition:

https://www.unitedbsd.com/d/1301-efi-installation-latitude-e4310

Not really needed for the simple use-cases. And, I don't what's going on here
--from the data presented so far.

-RVP