tech-kern archive


Re: Dates in boot loaders on !x86

>> True.  What I use the timestamp for (when I use it at all, that is)
>> is answering "is the bootloader (or whatever) I'm getting the one I
>> just built and think I installed, or did something go wrong?".  The
>> difference between ten minutes old and two weeks old is important;
>> the difference between two weeks old and six months old is not.
> BTW, the kernel version is still included, so at least on -current
> you can normally detect the case of "pretty recent" and "a few month
> old" from that as well.

Except that tells me whether the kernel being booted is recent, not
whether the bootloader doing the booting is.

Unless you mean it includes the version string of the kernel it was
built under, in which case it can't allow me to tell the difference
between multiple builds and installs all performed under the same
kernel (which is probably what I'd be doing when hacking booters).
(That also looks as though it would make bit-identical repeatable
builds under different kernels difficult, though it's not clear to me
whether that matters.)

However, based on the discussion, it sounds as though this is not an
issue: it appears the datestamps are still there unless turned off (as
anyone wanting bit-for-bit-repeatable builds presumably will), meaning
the issue I raised simply does not exist.

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