[systemd-devel] bootctl: default mount point for the ESP partition.

[Dimitri John Ledkov]

On 1 September 2015 at 17:47, Simon McVittie
<simon.mcvittie at collabora.co.uk> wrote:
> On 01/09/15 17:21, Goffredo Baroncelli wrote:
>> I discovered that bootctl assume as default mount point for the ESP
>> partition the /boot directory. Instead it seems to me that the most part
>> of distributions prefers /boot/efi.
>
> For some context, the reasoning for /boot/efi is:
>
> In principle, it should be possible for the ESP to never be mounted at
> all, copying files in with mtools (or equivalent) when required.
>

In clearlinux we mount ESP at /boot.

However, we disabled the /boot automount, but keep the boot.mount
auto-generated unit.

The reason being, we really don't need /boot in userspace at all,
unless updater is running or one manually wants to mock with things.

What updater does is essentially `systemctl start boot.mount` updates
the kernel images/entries there using files from /usr (sdboot
bootloader, kernel images, initramfs, etc.) And then unmounts /boot.
If one has custom kernels to install one would do the same.

The distinction between "traditional" /boot and /boot/efi is imho
pointless, if one keeps kernel images to be booted on the ESP.

In clearlinux kernel images are EFI apps, packaged with stubs (either
using kernel config, or by means of packing .efi megablob which sdboot
supports to boot everything from).

Doing "traditional" flow of: Firmware -> ESP -> [ grub bootloader ->
find/mount "/boot" ] -> load kernel/initrmafs -> "mount/boot rootfs"
seems more than minimally necessary, when the steps in [] can be
skipped from the bootflow.

-- 
Regards,

Dimitri.
Pura Vida!

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