How to add Windows to the Limine boot menu

EasyOS image file has the Limine bootloader, and I posted a few days ago how easy it is to write the image to any drive and bootup Easy:

https://easyos.org/install/how-to-install-easyos-on-a-new-ssd.html

I mentioned in that page, that more entries could be added to 'limine.cfg', including boot Windows.

The little Mele mini-PC has Windows 10 on a 32GB eMMC flash memory, and Easy is on a 240GB Kingston SATA SSD, that I added to the Mele. So, it should be easy enough to add an entry to boot Windows, but at first had problems, that I reported:

https://github.com/limine-bootloader/limine/issues/188

The developer was very helpful, and the issues were resolved. Here is 'limine.cfg':

QUIET=no
TIMEOUT=20
GRAPHICS=no
DEFAULT_ENTRY=1
EDITOR_ENABLED=yes
INTERFACE_BRANDING=EasyOS Limine Boot Manager

:EasyOS dunfell in sda2
    COMMENT=EasyOS Dunfell bootup
    PROTOCOL=linux
    TEXTMODE=yes
    KERNEL_PATH=boot://2/easyos/vmlinuz
    MODULE_PATH=boot://2/easyos/initrd
    KERNEL_CMDLINE=initrd=initrd rw wkg_uuid=41e4e492-f6a0-11ec-9a02-287fcfeb4376 wkg_dir=easyos/

:Windows 10 in mmcblk0
    COMMENT=Windows 10 in mmcblk0
    PROTOCOL=chainload
    #IMAGE_PATH=hdd://2:1/EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi
    IMAGE_PATH=guid://09ddd6ad-80b0-4265-8d7f-1621eb5a4d9f/EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi

...both of those "IMAGE_PATH" variables work.

The "hdd" option requires <drive number>:<partition number>, in my case "2:1"
The "guid" option requires the partuuid. Running 'blkid' on the Windows boot-partition gives this:

# blkid /dev/mmcblk0p1
/dev/mmcblk0p1: LABEL="SYSTEM" UUID="5A85-A404" TYPE="vfat"

However, that is a filesystem uuid and not what is needed. Easy has the blkid applet in busybox, but I think the blkid from util-linux package will display the partuuid.

Anyway, can find the partuuid like this:

# ls -l /dev/disk/by-partuuid
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Jul  2 05:07 09ddd6ad-80b0-4265-8d7f-1621eb5a4d9f -> ../../mmcblk0p1
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Jul  2 05:07 174c8de6-dc78-4207-9176-f04235684cdd -> ../../mmcblk0p2
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Jul  2 05:07 34e2b902-6cf5-4350-b941-db0652c28dd4 -> ../../mmcblk0p3
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Jul  2 05:07 f52e64e1-ab42-4918-aa6f-2c5df878cfe9 -> ../../mmcblk0p4

...the one I want is highlighted. So, bunged that into 'limine.cfg' and Windows bootup works.

Today, Limine develop mintsuki has added another option, that I have not yet tested:

    IMAGE_PATH=fslabel://SYSTEM/EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi

...that's fantastic. As long as there is only one partition with that label.

In case you are wondering how I arrived at that path "/EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi", I don't remember.
If you poke around in the Windows vfat boot-partition, it is very complicated and there are lots of ".efi" files.
Back in 2017 when I first added Windows booting to the rEFInd menu, I must have read about that path somewhere.
Anyway, it works.

We can merrily add more entries, if there are other installations of Linux. And note, another Linux could be in the same partition as EasyOS, as Easy is a "frugal" install, only requiring one folder in the partition. You can read about the configure options here:

https://github.com/limine-bootloader/limine/blob/v3.0-branch/CONFIG.md

I am seeing Limine as a better choice than GRUB2, that most distributions are using, due to its simplicity.

2017, that long ago! Yep, that was when I bought the little Mele:

https://bkhome.org/news/201709/mele-pcg35-apo-works-well.html

I see that Mele has a shop at mele.aliexpress.com, and their fanless mini-PCs now have higher specs.   

Tags: easy