Quote:
Originally Posted by Lucas Malor
Yes, but only for file management from OS. Let me explain.
As you said, it's better to directly access the kernel file for many reasons (and I suppose the most important is that if partition table gets corrupted you can continue to use it). On the other hand, bootloaders like GRUB are more easy to manage, since you can access files using an ext4 partition, when the OS is loaded.
The question is: do you know if it exists a bootloader that allow you to manage the bootloader itself and the kernel image from the OS using partition abstraction, BUT it loads the kernel image directly from the device, provided offset, block size and block number?
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Uboot does implement loading binaries in memory from fat and ext2 partitions (as well as read and write the environment from linux userspace) but I don't know if those options are enabled on kobos firmware. If you attach a serial cable you can try it yourself (at uboot prompt try ext2load or fsload) I think kobo wrote the kernel into a dedicated raw partition to allow recovery mode to boot off even with a broken root partition ( /dev/mmcblk0p1)
all recent imx soc implement a way to bootstrap the kernel into memory without uboot or any other bootloader, it is implemented by bootlets ( just two programs that start dram and power up the device, then just load the kernel into memory and jump there) This way is good for very simple systems, but command line parameters needs to be stored in the kernel itseft, not passed trhough the bootloader, which make the system less flexible (you need to recompile your kernel to change the parameters) and it is incompatible with kobo's way of restore.