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UEFI HTTP boot support in the Installer

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  UEFI HTTP boot support in the Installer Emanuele Rocca <ema@debian.org> - 2025-02-12 09:50 +0100
    Re: UEFI HTTP boot support in the Installer Steve McIntyre <steve@einval.com> - 2025-02-13 00:10 +0100

#85488 — UEFI HTTP boot support in the Installer

Hello Installer and Kernel teams.

It is now possible to boot d-i using UEFI HTTP boot. No need to copy the
ISO to a USB stick or configure DHCP and PXE or similar netboot setups,
just specify the ISO URL in your firmware configuration.

For Tianocore the procedure is as follows:

 Device Manager -> Network Device List -> (choose device) ->
 HTTP Boot Configuration -> Boot URI -> (add ISO URL)

Save and go back to the main menu, then:

 Boot Manager -> UEFI HTTP

A few caveats:

- Notice the missing "s" in "UEFI HTTP boot". Only plain HTTP is
  supported, not HTTPS.
- HTTP redirects, either 301 or 302, are also not supported. This means
  that [1] does not work, whereas [2] does.
- Not a lot of UEFI implementations support this yet. Tianocore does,
  and I've heard modern Dell, Lenovo and HP systems do too.

The missing pieces to get this working were:

- Adding pmem modules to the installer initrd [3] (Kernel 6.12.13-1)
- Recognizing pmem devices in list-devices-linux [4] (debian-installer-utils 1.152)

Thanks to ukleinek, carnil, and Sledge for reviewing and merging the
patches.

  ema

[1] http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/daily-builds/daily/arch-latest/amd64/iso-cd/debian-testing-amd64-netinst.iso
[2] http://chuangtzu.ftp.acc.umu.se/cdimage/daily-builds/daily/arch-latest/amd64/iso-cd/debian-testing-amd64-netinst.iso
[3] https://salsa.debian.org/kernel-team/linux/-/merge_requests/1167
[4] https://salsa.debian.org/installer-team/debian-installer-utils/-/merge_requests/14

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#85498

On Wed, Feb 12, 2025 at 09:46:54AM +0100, Emanuele Rocca wrote:
>Hello Installer and Kernel teams.
>
>It is now possible to boot d-i using UEFI HTTP boot. No need to copy the
>ISO to a USB stick or configure DHCP and PXE or similar netboot setups,
>just specify the ISO URL in your firmware configuration.
>
>For Tianocore the procedure is as follows:
>
> Device Manager -> Network Device List -> (choose device) ->
> HTTP Boot Configuration -> Boot URI -> (add ISO URL)
>
>Save and go back to the main menu, then:
>
> Boot Manager -> UEFI HTTP

Awesome work!

>A few caveats:
>
>- Notice the missing "s" in "UEFI HTTP boot". Only plain HTTP is
>  supported, not HTTPS.
>- HTTP redirects, either 301 or 302, are also not supported. This means
>  that [1] does not work, whereas [2] does.
>- Not a lot of UEFI implementations support this yet. Tianocore does,
>  and I've heard modern Dell, Lenovo and HP systems do too.

Nod. It's something I've spoken to various vendors about. The lack of
https and redirects is limiting, but we can hope they will improve.

-- 
Steve McIntyre, Cambridge, UK.                                steve@einval.com
"I used to be the first kid on the block wanting a cranial implant,
 now I want to be the first with a cranial firewall. " -- Charlie Stross

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