UEFI and Ubuntu Linux

[Liam Proven]

On 27 January 2018 at 08:32, Bret Busby <bret.busby at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> In performing a system update on this one (a computer that has UEFI,
> which is bypassed to run Linux)

You can't "bypass" UEFI.

It's the system firmware and it boots the computer. You have it or you
don't and you can't turn it off.

The main Linux-related option is SecureBoot. This requires a
cryptographically-signed OS boot loader.

There are 2 options:

* use a distro that has a signed bootloader and can boot in Secure Boot mode.

* turn Secure Boot off, and ignore errors in Windows, or tolerate
Windows possibly not booting any more.

> 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)

Heh. I sympathise but that was not the reason! :-)

My theory for the _real_ reason is laid out here:

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2013/06/03/thank_microsoft_for_linux_desktop_fail/

However I have taken this to the GNOME 3 team leads and they adamantly
deny it. The reasons they claim, though, make no sense to m.e

>  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!".

Dragonfly BSD is an experimental OS. It is not really intended for
general-purpose desktop use, yet or possibly ever.

But you should not need a "driver" for a CPU.

> In getting non-MS operating systems installed on this machine, I had
> to go through a procedure to bypass the UEFI,

Can you give some details of this?

> so Win8 is installed in
> a UEFI compartment,

Do you mean a partition?

> which never gets accessed, and takes up about
> 250GB of the HDD, due to unmovable components,

That seems extremely large.

I have also published a guide on how to clean up a lot of Windows'
clutter. It's here:

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/06/23/reg_linux_guide_2/

I'd add:

* turn off System Recovery (Google for how)
* uninstall anything non-essential & as many apps as possible
* defragment the Windows drive, possibly in Safe mode for best results
* reboot and do it again in normal mode


> 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,

I do not understand your terminology.

Ubuntu does now understand UEFI and can install & run on UEFI computers.

The main limitation is that you cannot dual-boot with another copy of
Ubuntu or with Mint.

> 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?

If you wish, yes.



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