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+=================
+The EFI Boot Stub
+=================
+
+On the x86 and ARM platforms, a kernel zImage/bzImage can masquerade
+as a PE/COFF image, thereby convincing EFI firmware loaders to load
+it as an EFI executable. The code that modifies the bzImage header,
+along with the EFI-specific entry point that the firmware loader
+jumps to are collectively known as the "EFI boot stub", and live in
+arch/x86/boot/header.S and arch/x86/boot/compressed/eboot.c,
+respectively. For ARM the EFI stub is implemented in
+arch/arm/boot/compressed/efi-header.S and
+arch/arm/boot/compressed/efi-stub.c. EFI stub code that is shared
+between architectures is in drivers/firmware/efi/libstub.
+
+For arm64, there is no compressed kernel support, so the Image itself
+masquerades as a PE/COFF image and the EFI stub is linked into the
+kernel. The arm64 EFI stub lives in arch/arm64/kernel/efi-entry.S
+and drivers/firmware/efi/libstub/arm64-stub.c.
+
+By using the EFI boot stub it's possible to boot a Linux kernel
+without the use of a conventional EFI boot loader, such as grub or
+elilo. Since the EFI boot stub performs the jobs of a boot loader, in
+a certain sense it *IS* the boot loader.
+
+The EFI boot stub is enabled with the CONFIG_EFI_STUB kernel option.
+
+
+How to install bzImage.efi
+--------------------------
+
+The bzImage located in arch/x86/boot/bzImage must be copied to the EFI
+System Partition (ESP) and renamed with the extension ".efi". Without
+the extension the EFI firmware loader will refuse to execute it. It's
+not possible to execute bzImage.efi from the usual Linux file systems
+because EFI firmware doesn't have support for them. For ARM the
+arch/arm/boot/zImage should be copied to the system partition, and it
+may not need to be renamed. Similarly for arm64, arch/arm64/boot/Image
+should be copied but not necessarily renamed.
+
+
+Passing kernel parameters from the EFI shell
+--------------------------------------------
+
+Arguments to the kernel can be passed after bzImage.efi, e.g.::
+
+        fs0:> bzImage.efi console=ttyS0 root=/dev/sda4
+
+
+The "initrd=" option
+--------------------
+
+Like most boot loaders, the EFI stub allows the user to specify
+multiple initrd files using the "initrd=" option. This is the only EFI
+stub-specific command line parameter, everything else is passed to the
+kernel when it boots.
+
+The path to the initrd file must be an absolute path from the
+beginning of the ESP, relative path names do not work. Also, the path
+is an EFI-style path and directory elements must be separated with
+backslashes (\). For example, given the following directory layout::
+
+  fs0:>
+        Kernels\
+                        bzImage.efi
+                        initrd-large.img
+
+        Ramdisks\
+                        initrd-small.img
+                        initrd-medium.img
+
+to boot with the initrd-large.img file if the current working
+directory is fs0:\Kernels, the following command must be used::
+
+        fs0:\Kernels> bzImage.efi initrd=\Kernels\initrd-large.img
+
+Notice how bzImage.efi can be specified with a relative path. That's
+because the image we're executing is interpreted by the EFI shell,
+which understands relative paths, whereas the rest of the command line
+is passed to bzImage.efi.
+
+
+The "dtb=" option
+-----------------
+
+For the ARM and arm64 architectures, a device tree must be provided to
+the kernel. Normally firmware shall supply the device tree via the
+EFI CONFIGURATION TABLE. However, the "dtb=" command line option can
+be used to override the firmware supplied device tree, or to supply
+one when firmware is unable to.
+
+Please note: Firmware adds runtime configuration information to the
+device tree before booting the kernel. If dtb= is used to override
+the device tree, then any runtime data provided by firmware will be
+lost. The dtb= option should only be used either as a debug tool, or
+as a last resort when a device tree is not provided in the EFI
+CONFIGURATION TABLE.
+
+"dtb=" is processed in the same manner as the "initrd=" option that is
+described above.