(Apologies for breaking threading; I noticed this message on the
mailing list archive, and don't have the message-ID.)
Okuji Yoshinori wrote:
> I'm now thinking of adding serial console support, because there are
> some requests for it. But I'm not familiar with serial console very
> much, so please give me some hints if you can. I have several
> questions:
> 1. What user interface is good? Obviously, we cannot use the same menu
> interface for serial console.
A command line is best. If menus are required, you can simply ask for
the appropriate item number or name to be entered.
> 2. What escape sequences can be used for it? Can I assume that all the
> ANSI C escape sequences (such as CR, LF and BS) are available?
You can assume CR, LF and BS. Don't assume anything else. In
particular, don't assume that all the world's a VT100.
> 3. Must the stage1 and the stage1.5 support it? I think that is
> difficult.
Since we should never have to interact with them, I don't think it's
necessary.
> 4. Do you want to use both the local terminal and the remote terminal
> simultaneously?
No. However, it would be nice if GRUB could be made to choose between
serial and keyboard input when it starts up by seeing which one
happens first. (Some Alpha firmware has this feature - it's very
handy.)
There needs to be a way for GRUB to tell the kernel that it boots
which form of console is active. The choice is essentially between
keyboard (the default?) and a serial port at a particular IO address:
it should be quite easy to extend the Multiboot standard to provide
this information.
Steve Early
