Desired Features of version 1.0

[Timber]

What will be in version 1.0 when released?

My thoughts/suggestions:

1. Possibility to install any x86-OS'es.
2. Boot from external devices.

Not very much of a list yet, but fill in the wishlist and/or comment my suggestions.

[92GTA]

All 100% tested and working drivers for the 17", 20", MacBook Pro, and Mac Mini, included with instructions on how to slipstream them in.

A list in the Readme of URL's of other drivers that have limited device funtionality. Unless all driver issues are sorted by the time v1.0 is released.

Vista support starting with the April 2006 CTP. No point in supporting it until then because some thing may change before the final RC builds. Along with this also should be support for x64 OS's for that matter.

We are along way from a v1.0 BTW dude, lol. Like atleast 6 months...

[eobet]

A complete VGA (UGA?) solution (wrapper?) so that you can download new Catalyst drivers from ATI's webpage as they get released, and install them without the need for any modification.

Alternatively, if that can't be achieved, a similar application as the generic Mobility Modder (http://www.driverheaven.net/patje/) which patches any version of new driver releases to work painlessly.

Oh, and fan control and power savings options (for monitor and harddrive) would be nice... though probably an Intel driver issue...

EDIT: Support for all flavors of XP (HOME, OEM, etc)...

[kuchdawg]

It doesn't need support for x64 OS's because the processors (right now atleast) don't have x86-64 processors. I don't think that it will take that long, considering its only been a few days, alot of the drivers have already been found. Display driver works on the mini, along with almost everything. The only thing left are the Display drivers for the ATI, IR Receiver, and iSight. i don't think those can be too hard to find. (there seemed to be a breakthrew with the ATI drivers today....so can't be too long)

[SAN66]

1. A boot CD creator with a nice interface where you would select your current Mac Intel Type (So it can load the best drivers for the current system), pop in a windows XP CD of any type (SPII, SPI, Plain Jane, Media Center, Home, Pro, Whatever Other Crap M$ put Out), pop in a blank CD and have it create your MACOSX Windows CD, all from the Mac, no PC required.

2. Functionality for drive repartitioning and loading the bootloader without having to reformat the system.

3. An updater utility. In XP, to update the system if/when new drivers are created/found that better support your system profile. In MACOS, so that after any upgrade the bootloader can be re-established.

[Kroc]

1. An option so that you don't have to press enter to choose the OS. I'd much prefer to hold Option to switch OS, and boot to a chosen OS by default.
1.a Plain Grey boot logos to match normal OSX booting
1.b An XP boot skin to look the same (so you get the same logo all the way from boot choice up to before the login screen)

2. Stability, and lots of it please. (All drivers done and the efi file not getting hosed everytime you open the startup disk applet)

3. An HFS+ driver baked in?

[Vaxan]

1. Drivers included, especially working video drivers (of course)
2. I would prefer it if rather than having a screen that asks what OS you want to boot into, it boots into OSX unless you hold down a pre-defined key during the booting process
3. A download (even if a torrent file) to download the needed installer and/or ISO so that no modifications need to be made.

[Bradleylicious]

I am actually pretty happy with what we have right now... My only beef would be booting one os from within the other, and have propper restarting/shutdown feature with XP. Remote Desktop and Windows shares would be nice too... :P

[toppshot]

Hi. I don't have the time myself but I'd suggest a routine that DOESN'T involve using a Windows PC for the fact that a user may receive their Mac without a windows machine.
So the installer routine should be almost fully automated as follows:

User runs a install program on their mac which does the following in order:

- Check for existing slipstream DMG (See point 3). If exist, prompt user if they'd like to use this file or start again.
1) Prompt user to insert Windows XP SP2 disc.
- Program checks if this is the correct CD. If not, eject and prompt again.
- If correct, copy source files to a new DMG file.
- Update this DMG file with the required updated files and OEM files
- Eject XP
2) prompt user for Blank CD
- burn the new slipstream CD.
- Leave the CD in the drive.
3) Prompt user if they would like to leave the new image on the HDD for future use. If not, remove DMG file.
4) Prompt user if they would like to repartition their HDD.
- This is where it gets a bit tricky. Ideally, we need to repartition on the fly. We should also suggest to the user that they make a partition size that can be recognised when they run windows setup (i.e. 20GB). If we can't partition on the fly, perhaps we create a Bootable CD that has a script to repartition the HDD automatically.
- Install new .EFI file and bless the file as bootable.
5) Prompt user with final instructions and click to restart.

Another future development suggestion for the 2 wonder-boys would be that we have a VirtualPC like environment in MacOSX that can also run this same windows installation. This would be ideal because we can then run windows within MacOSX when we need to run the odd program, and also properly boot windows when we need to run games and have the benefit of using the same windows installation.

[settolo]

I think you should try to work togheter with cristopher (rEFIt). rEFIt could be the bootloader, and XOM the windows XP loader. It will save a lot of time in trying to make XOM customizable (1, 2, 3 partitions or OSes...).
XOM just could boot windows when called.

[ParanoX]

...
1) Prompt user to insert Windows XP SP2 disc.
- Program checks if this is the correct CD. If not, eject and prompt again.
Maybe a more flexible checking , do not forget how many sort of WinXP is out there.
I do not talk only about SP0, SP1, SP2, EOM or Corporate and any other special release such as MSDN one, but essentially about localized windows (no offence , but you know... every country where english is not the official Language :P ), no mention about nLite custimezed one.

So if checking , check only essential cab and other components (vital for Mac at least) and eventually allow to bypass by a modal dialogue "are You sure, It may give you a CD unusable to Boot on Macintosh" (see necessary needs for Mac Booting).
And then copy full content of the source iso to prevent pre customized elements (as It is for now, in fact)...
Ideal would be a Mac nLite (such prog wich do not even exist For Customizing OSX Boot CD/DVD)
Good job let's continue (me as supporter :o )

[Ryan1524]

all of the above, especially stability, and all drivers fully functioning.

most importantly: full hardware access and utilization. especially in the macbooks, sensors readable, sleep and hibernate functioning properly, etc etc.

and a nice little extra would be quick switching between OSX and Windows, or any other OS. Ideally, as painless as fast-user-switching in OSX. :D

[unigolyn]

and a nice little extra would be quick switching between OSX and Windows, or any other OS. Ideally, as painless as fast-user-switching in OSX. :D

Calling that "little" is the understatement of the millennium. That would entail creating a third OS that could run virtual machines for both OS X and XP and be capable of either preemptive multitasking to run them both at the same time, or somehow "hibernate" the state of each OS as you switch out of them. That's kind of like buying a Jetta and asking VW to include a sun roof, an iPod kit, and oh, a warp engine and a photon torpedo launcher.

[KublaKhan]

I want similar things to what others have said..

Here is what I would like XOM version 1.0 to have:

XOM installer (for OSX), which installs a program that can be used to configure XOM options, add Operating Systems, change pictures for OS's, add and delete (maybe even modify OS's). Preferably, this installer works off of OSX (and a smaller version for Windows - for making bootcd's only) and will allow you to modify the WinXP install disc adding the neccessary components and drivers... sort of like a prepackaged nLite for OSX.

In order for an XOM installer/program to be successful there a few features that need to be worked on. These are:

Full hardware support - thru drivers (modded or totally recoded if needed), Windows XP hacks, etc. (whatever works the best).

And, an easy to use partion manager that runs directly from OSX (no live CD's please! They suck, are hard to use, and look ugly!). There are some Opensource partion manager projects... all LiveCD though - I think...
*This could also wait until 2.0 if it slows everything down.

Once this has been accomplished XOM will be a perfect 1.0 release. As for a 2.0 release... how about a totally automated process -maybe from a live cd/usb drive that partitions, installs OSX and XP and neccesities, etc.


At least that's what I imagine the perfect XOM 1.0 release would be... please add drivers! Above all else! I can live with a complex install process, but if I can hardly use the end result... that sucks

[Alex Oughton]

The most important feature for me is non-destructive upgrading. The upgrade path from one version of XOM to another should not involve a reinstall of either OS X or Windows.

[sdavis]

from my perspective where i would be using it in a classroom where i work, it would be good to not only have the MAC/Windows logos, but also have the names under the logo for people who dont really know the MAC logo or the PC logo... have it say "MAC OSX" and "Windows XP"

maybe a clickable list instead of up and down arrow...

Thanks!

[KublaKhan]

from my perspective where i would be using it in a classroom where i work, it would be good to not only have the MAC/Windows logos, but also have the names under the logo for people who dont really know the MAC logo or the PC logo... have it say "MAC OSX" and "Windows XP"

maybe a clickable list instead of up and down arrow...

Thanks!

You can't click - no mouse drivers are loaded yet. I would only make that an option - like I outlined in my installer idea.

[Steve1496]

from my perspective where i would be using it in a classroom where i work, it would be good to not only have the MAC/Windows logos, but also have the names under the logo for people who dont really know the MAC logo or the PC logo... have it say "MAC OSX" and "Windows XP"

maybe a clickable list instead of up and down arrow...

Thanks!


It wouldn't take much to learn them;)

[bombastica.net]

Not have to reformat.

[Tchewy]

The most important thing I want is the ability to install WindowsXP or, better, windows vista, on an usb drive, without changing the internal drive at all.

[m41ku]

I don't know why it is taking so long for narf and blanka to set up a sourceforge project. However, I think we should start an official feature request list, and import it once it is up. Here's where I think we're at so far:

1. integration with rEFIt (basically, take out the dual boot-ness, so that you can pick either boot.efi for apple, xom.efi for winxp, or e.efi for linux.
2. A graphical installer/cd creator (this dosen't really have to be part of the xom project, as many people seem to be making these)
3. Support for all flavors of XP (home, pro, sp0, sp1, sp2, corporate, msdn, mce, etc)
4. full power management support in xp
5. more work done on the bios interrups (maybe even getting compatibility with other/older versions of windows/other x86 oses.
6. more flexibility with the xom loader (ex. if you want to have 2 windows installs a osx and 2 linux installs, xom should at least handle the 2 windows' without b*tching)

anyway, that's just preliminary, but it all seems pretty reasonable.

[PreemPalver]

It would be interesting to have the opportunity to perform the Windows XP installation without the necessity to install OSX first. Freedom to choice.

[KublaKhan]

Oh, I almost forgot... I'd really, really like XOM to load instantly when I turn my computer on - it shouldn't take that long to load (like it does now). I really liked that my computer would boot in 10 sec. before XOM was loaded - now it takes 5-7 sec for XOM to load and another 10-15 for OSX after that.... this time should definetly be cut down! It shouldn't be too hard either - I'm guessing someone should know how to do some optimization coding (once it's on sourceforge).

[jmansion]

This isn't really a question fro 1.0 (and my interest isn't really Mac) but I suspect that the technology used here may have wider application.

In particular, I'm wondering if the ability to create a 'soft' boot environment that shields XP from EFI, could also be used to create a net-boot facility using a small image loaded by PXE, which will then use common gigabit network adapters to boot XP from an iSCSI share.

That would be very handy. ;-)

[wouterteepe]

Calling that "little" is the understatement of the millennium. That would entail creating a third OS that could run virtual machines for both OS X and XP and be capable of either preemptive multitasking to run them both at the same time, or somehow "hibernate" the state of each OS as you switch out of them. That's kind of like buying a Jetta and asking VW to include a sun roof, an iPod kit, and oh, a warp engine and a photon torpedo launcher.

no, this is not neccesarily needed. imagine this scenario
* power management on xp works beatifully (woohoohaha, i know)
* both os x and xp contain a hook where code can be inserted into the os, at the spot where the sleep mode is activated, just before the processor is shut down, and all the periphals have been shut down by the os.
* in this hook, some last housekeeping is done (i.e. cpu and memory state flushed to disk) and the other os's cpu and memory are restored.

"fast-user-switching" would essentially work as follows:
* os 1 goes into "sleep": it shuts down all hardware
* just before it *really sleeps*, a driver decides not to sleep, but to switch to os 2
* os 2 resumes from "sleep": it starts up all hardware

Still this is no "little" feature... but it might be a feasible idea for the 2.0 version.

[chiouche]

I'd Love to be able to do all of this without having to re install osx or re format my hard drive. hfs+ built into windows would be great too.

[KublaKhan]

no, this is not neccesarily needed. imagine this scenario
* power management on xp works beatifully (woohoohaha, i know)
* both os x and xp contain a hook where code can be inserted into the os, at the spot where the sleep mode is activated, just before the processor is shut down, and all the periphals have been shut down by the os.
* in this hook, some last housekeeping is done (i.e. cpu and memory state flushed to disk) and the other os's cpu and memory are restored.

"fast-user-switching" would essentially work as follows:
* os 1 goes into "sleep": it shuts down all hardware
* just before it *really sleeps*, a driver decides not to sleep, but to switch to os 2
* os 2 resumes from "sleep": it starts up all hardware

Still this is no "little" feature... but it might be a feasible idea for the 2.0 version.

Did you read digg today? Looks like Apple has a little suprise cooking in Leopard... built in virtualization support... I like that. Maybe it will even develop into something were you'll be able to run .exe's as if they were .dmg files. Apple's reportedly working with Intel and Microsoft on this...

[KublaKhan]

hfs+ built into windows would be great too.
HFS+ support built into Windows? Yeah right! That would require some MAJOR hacking of MS code... first for the setup, then allowing it to read/write/use during normal use (I wonder if programs would even work anymore).

If you were to take this on you wouldn't see much of an opensource project for a while - that would be huge; unless the MacDrive people gave away their source code for free. Then you would have only about 1/4 of the project completed... if you would even give it that much credit.
I wish it were possible too, though... sorry :rolleyes:

[m41ku]

actually... if someone ported hfsplusutils to winxp as a system driver, and they were slipstreamed in when you created the xom disc, there is no reason it couldn't see hfs+ "out of the box"

hmm... now that I made it sound so easy perhaps I should go out and start a win32 fork of the hfsplusutils project

[MowgliBook]

-Possibility to restart directly on the same OS when you choose Restart, and not Shutdown...
-Possibility to Start a Default OS after a few seconds, when no choice has been made (auto-start, wake-up, WC etc..;))
-Beautifull icons, the actual Apple isn't very nice...
-XoM must be able to deliver you a good coffe on demand...

[Threephaserebel]

I'd like to see a timeout for the boot selection. After so many seconds (default 10 let's say) it boots into which ever OS you set as defualt. I saw a mention of HFS+ drivers and if that's possible, it'd be really convinient. Also having all the drivers included would be nice too.

Mainly right now I'd like to see some source code before worrying about improvements.

[Ari]

I'd like to see the int 13 issue fixed (type "g" and press return twice) when booting, an OS X script to auto-bless xom.efi, and power management working on all machines (can't leave Windows on overnight; it pisses me off).

[ziol]

hi,

when new version?

tnx

[Steve1496]

hi,

when new version?

tnx



It is not yet planned, and 1.0 is months maybe a year or more off.

[Thi3f]

When are we looking at another release? Any time in the near future?

[jerbare]

I think people are seeing xom as becoming more than it really is - which at present is strictly an OS loader + basic "boot" loader...

I believe it's primary focus should be BOOTING Windows - and nothing but that. Everything else mentioned (cd-builders, boot loader/selection menus, etc) should be developed externally. rEFIt is a great example of the modular approach (and the potential customization factor makes this a huge benefit).

People don't realize that EFI seperates the need for an all-in-one boot/OS loader (and chainloading) as traditionally seen with legacy BIOS configurations. They should really be split out between the boot 'GUI' and the actual OS loader. rEFIt is exactly what the boot GUI should be from an architectural standpoint. It is an EFI application which is nothing but a 'front end' to other EFI applications which boot the operating system.

When the user turns on their computer the 'Boot loader' should present the user with the option to boot given, specified OS'. The boot loader then hands control to the OS loader, whos duty is then to load the chosen OS - with the potential to change boot options (for the given OS only). If the user changes their mind, they may quit the OS loader which should then return them to the boot loader to select another OS.

ELILO is only able to boot Linux. XOM should only be able to boot Windows. Apples BootX obviously boots Mac OS X.

GRUB on the other hand will be interesting. Will future EFI-capable versions of GRUB focus on loading Linux (as ELILO already does), or will it focus on boot selection (graphical, customizable, etc)? Or will it do both?

Back to the topic of feature requests...

In terms of OS-loading features for xom, I would like to see the following (if possible, understanding the very buried and legacy restrictions XP has):

1. configuration file (xom.conf?) to enable/disable features (block device visibility? option roms? mbr?)
2. ability to use a custom mbr (from file) instead of using the 'xom' mbrUpdate routine (nothing personal, just need more control... and can XP still boot & function if the PMBR isn't overwritten? can you 'fake' NTLDR to see & use a 'fake' MBR from an external, seperate file?)
3. ability to boot the xp installer from removable usb/1394 (is it possible to boot the installer from non-optical media or is it necessary to emulate ATAPI?)
4. ability to boot xp from removable usb/1394 (if possible?)

I have concerns about keeping the legacy FDisk_partition_scheme MBR at the beginning of the disk - especially with future OS updates and/or installing/upgrading to 10.5 when it comes out. At present, the Mac OS X Installer refuses to install on anything but a GUID_partition_scheme. The way that Disk utility 'hides' the EFI partition and partition scheme options for disks puts users in a very difficult place - both novice users and advanced alike...

[docbrody]

- Windows XP Home and Pro Service Pack 1 support
- Driver support for all hardware
- Mac Software Update and Windows Update support
- Boot Windows from external device