UEFI and Ubuntu Linux

[Bret Busby]

Hello.

I am currently running UbuntuMATE 16.04 LTS on various computers; UEFI
and otherwise.

In performing a system update on this one (a computer that has UEFI,
which is bypassed to run Linux), yesterday, I observed that the
packages to be installed/updated (I am not sure which), included a
number of packages relating to UEFI.

In checking using Synaptic, I found that 12 packages relating to UEFI,
are available, with a few of them, installed.

When I first installed Linux on this computer (it took me about two
years to get Linux properly running on this computer, due to three
separate system components, and with the infamous change from GNOME2
to GNOME3, designed to drive people away from GNOME, to MATE), with me
finally finding that  Ubuntu Linux 12.04 (at the time ) was the only
non-MS operating system to have available, the necessary hardware
drivers - DragonflyBSD was the only other non-MS operating system that
had a driver for the CPU (Haskell architecture), but, it did not, and,
still does not, have a driver for the graphics (for which, Ubuntu uses
nouveau), and, when I posted a query on the DragonflyBSD list,
recently, asking whether the recently released version of the OS now
had drivers for the graphics, the response was mostly (and, most
loudly), of the nature  "DragonflyBSD has a pretty set of wings - who
cares whether it works - we are not interested in a working OS!".

In getting non-MS operating systems installed on this machine, I had
to go through a procedure to bypass the UEFI, so Win8 is installed in
a UEFI compartment, which never gets accessed, and takes up about
250GB of the HDD, due to unmovable components, and UbuntuMATE is
installed and run, within the non-UEFI, "Legacy BIOS" compartment.

So, after all of that, ... does the existence and availability of the
packages relating to UEFI, mean that now,

1.  Ubuntu Linux (including UbuntuMATE) from 16.04 onward (especially,
for when it is released, 18.04), can be installed directly into the
UEFI compartment, and not need to use the Legacy BIOS compartment,
and, thence,

2. Performing a new install of Ubuntu Linux (including UbuntuMATE)
from 16.04 onward (especially, for when it is released, 18.04), can
replace - meaning eliminating and replacing - factory installed
installations of MS Windows, that are installed via UEFI?

Thank you in anticipation.

-- 
Bret Busby
Armadale
West Australia
..............

"So once you do know what the question actually is,
 you'll know what the answer means."
- Deep Thought,
 Chapter 28 of Book 1 of
 "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:
 A Trilogy In Four Parts",
 written by Douglas Adams,
 published by Pan Books, 1992

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