[Bug 1918736] Re: update-grub uses the wrong timout for efi system

[Nelson Minar]

This bug dates back to 2019. If I understand correctly every single
installed UEFI Ubuntu system is waiting 30 seconds on every boot because
of it. My system boots 8x faster when I fix it.

There's a lot of discussion in various places about the problem, the
usual suggested fix is to set GRUB_RECORDFAIL_TIMEOUT in
/etc/default/grub to change the delay from 30 seconds. Which isn't a
great fix; it's hiding a problem and also it's disrupting the useful
behavior on an actually failed boot. I suspect this change was put in
place because detecting a failed boot was not working properly in EFI
systems. There's a similar problem reported related to LVM boots.

Here's the exact bit of code in /etc/grub/00_config in Ubuntu 22.04.1
that is the problem

if [ \$grub_platform = efi ]; then
  set timeout=${GRUB_RECORDFAIL_TIMEOUT:-30}

Some other references:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/grub2/+bug/1800722/comments/16
https://askubuntu.com/questions/1120948/grub-recordfail-broken-regarding-lvm
https://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.php?t=287026

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1918736

Title:
  update-grub uses the wrong timout for efi system

Status in grub2 package in Ubuntu:
  Confirmed

Bug description:
  # What is happening
  When `GRUB_TIMEOUT=1` is set in `/etc/default/grub` and `update-grub` is run, the desired grub boot menu timeout of 1 second is not acknowledged. 
  This is on an EFI system.

  The following is the relevant snippet of `/boot/grub/grub.cfg`:
  ```
  if [ "${recordfail}" = 1 ] ; then
    set timeout=30
  else
    if [ x$feature_timeout_style = xy ] ; then
      set timeout_style=hidden
      set timeout=1
    # Fallback hidden-timeout code in case the timeout_style feature is
    # unavailable.
    elif sleep --interruptible 1 ; then
      set timeout=0
    fi
  fi
  if [ $grub_platform = efi ]; then
    set timeout=30
    if [ x$feature_timeout_style = xy ] ; then
      set timeout_style=menu
    fi
  fi
  ```

  The issue here is that on an EFI system, the `timeout` is overridden
  by the later test to 30 seconds.

  # What is expected
  I expect that when I set `GRUB_TIMEOUT=1` in `/etc/default/grub` that the grub menu will timeout (continue to boot) in 1 second.

  # Workaround
  The EFI timeout is taken from `GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET` in `/etc/grub.d/00_header`. Adding `GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET=1` solves the problem, but is the wrong approach.

  # Possible solutions
  As a user I do not see why on an EFI system there should be a separate timeout, or indeed that the timeout should even depend on the system type. i.e As a user I don't care.

  Looking at the generated grub config I would expect that the generated output would be:
  ```
  if [ "${recordfail}" = 1 ] ; then
    set timeout=30
  else
    if [ x$feature_timeout_style = xy ] ; then
      set timeout_style=hidden
      set timeout=1
    # Fallback hidden-timeout code in case the timeout_style feature is
    # unavailable.
    elif sleep --interruptible 1 ; then
      set timeout=0
    fi
  fi
  if [ $grub_platform = efi ]; then
    set timeout=1
    if [ x$feature_timeout_style = xy ] ; then
      set timeout_style=menu
    fi
  fi
  ```

  but am confused as to why the EFI detection is in a separate `if...`

  Clearly the code in `/etc/grub.d/00_header` should be changed from:
  ```
  413 if [ \$grub_platform = efi ]; then
  414   set timeout=${GRUB_RECORDFAIL_TIMEOUT:-30}
  415   if [ x\$feature_timeout_style = xy ] ; then
  416     set timeout_style=menu
  417   fi
  418 fi
  ```
  to
  ```
  413 if [ \$grub_platform = efi ]; then
  414   set timeout=${GRUB_TIMEOUT:-30}
  415   if [ x\$feature_timeout_style = xy ] ; then
  416     set timeout_style=menu
  417   fi
  418 fi
  ```

  # Additional information

  Ubunutu version:
  ```
  lsb_release -r
  Release:	20.10
  ```

  Package version
  ```
  dpkg -l grub2-common 
  Desired=Unknown/Install/Remove/Purge/Hold
  | Status=Not/Inst/Conf-files/Unpacked/halF-conf/Half-inst/trig-aWait/Trig-pend
  |/ Err?=(none)/Reinst-required (Status,Err: uppercase=bad)
  ||/ Name           Version          Architecture Description
  +++-==============-================-============-=====================================================
  ii  grub2-common   2.04-1ubuntu35.4 amd64        GRand Unified Bootloader (common files for version 2)
  ```

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