On Mon, Sep 19, 2011 at 10:53 AM, Doug Ledford <dledford@redhat.com> wrote:
Like I said, not true.  The grub package is designed to be updateable without requiring an mbr reinstall.  What's more is I had a look at the stage1.[hS] files in the grub shipped in FC-1 and RHEL-5, and just like I said, they are indeed binary compatible.  So even if the grub user space application pulls its MBR from a statically linked copy of the MBR, it will still work with pretty much any stage1.5 or stage2 you find in a guest.


Pretty much any? Hmm are you saying that random other linux distribution's grub  binaries are garunteed(or promised/expected) to be binary compatible?  Other distributors do have the ability to patch that 1.5 stage code in non-binary compatible ways don't they? We aren't talking strictly about the Fedora/RHEL ecosystem are we? Just because RHEL and Fedora have chosen not to include binary incompatible patches, doesn't mean its a truism across the guest OS landscape does it?

Is that binary compatibility tested for as part of operation? Is that compatibility strictly a consequence of distribution level decision making concerning Fedora and RHEL?  Is that binary compatibility guaranteed or promised from other distribution's grub1 variants being shipped?  

-jef