Guide for Automatic Boot of a Mac using this Utility (WIP)

[0nelight]

THIS IS WORK-IN-PROGRESS - PLEASE FOLLOW DISCUSSION TO SEE WHAT IS WORKING TILL NOW

In case you successfully tested a manual startup of a Mac with the this EFI-Utility you may be intererested to automate booting this on every boot.

What you ask for is an so called "NSH-Script" - it is a Textfile which EFI-Shell commands in it that gets interpreted line-by-line by an EFI-Shell.

Here is how you do it:

1. Make sure you have a working EFI-Shell which you can access through rEFInd
   An EFI-Shell is a small program like the Windows cmd or powershell but for the EFI-Environment. You can download one here.

2. Create an Textfile with an .nsh extension
   Regarding the possible commands - you can refer to (Shell Command Reference Manual).

echo Running disable-ram-area.efi with Parameters
stall 1000000
fs7:\EFI\tools\disable-ram-area.efi 0x190000000 0x21000000 3000
echo Starting MacOs
stall 1000000
fs5:\5668A9CD-407D-35EB-87EB-59CD393D65B1\System\Library\CoreServices\boot.efi

3. Create menuentry in refind.conf to be able to call this NSH-File
   Regarding creating Manual Boot Stanzas.
   in loader you put the path for your downloaded efi-shell
   in options you put the path for your NSH script

menuentry "Boot MacOs with defective RAM-Area" {
    loader /EFI/tools/Shell_Full.efi
    options "dummyarg fs7:\EFI\tools\launch_macoswithdefectiveram.nsh exit"
}

4. Set this as default in rEFInd
   With the "default_selection" Token.

[daniel-nextgti]

Hi @0nelight

I`ve tried the method above. The .nsh-file is read but automatically kicks me out to the shell terminal and neither commands on the file are read by the shell.

I`ve recorded what happened in Slo-Mo, just so it could be read in time. Here are some prints:

I`ve ajusted the script to the correct paths:

And, here`s the rEFInd.config menuentry:

Any ideas why the script didn`t worked?

Thanks again,
Dan

[MeTalOneOEight]

At least the Booting MacOS path in the .nsh looks wrong.
It's pointing to an installer.
Compare it to the rEFInd entry.
Better check all paths.

[0nelight]

So the following nsh-file works for me - but only with the compiled version with the hard-coded ram-areas.
When trying with the command line arguments version of disable-ram-area.efi - then I get a hang immediately after entering it.

Here the Content of launch_macoswithdefectiveram.nsh:

echo Running disable-ram-area.efi with Parameters
stall 1000000
fs7:\EFI\tools\disable-ram-area.efi 0x190000000 0x21000000 3000
echo Starting MacOs
stall 1000000
fs5:\5668A9CD-407D-35EB-87EB-59CD393D65B1\System\Library\CoreServices\boot.efi

here the menuentry at the End of refind.conf:

menuentry "Boot MacOs with defective RAM-Area" {
    loader /EFI/tools/Shell_Full.efi
    options "dummyarg fs7:\EFI\tools\launch_macoswithdefectiveram.nsh exit"
}

Please note the first argument under options "dummyarg" you could write anything here - it is necessary for the way the EFI-Shell takes in the arguments. It throws aways the first one.

Also note we have to use backslashes in the options-line.

Please note that fs0: fs5: and so on could be different in your system. Best to navigate through them interactively to get an overview. Simply enter Shell_Full.efi via rEFInd Boot Manager and type in "help" - you will see all the commands.

Edit 1:

Added Command Line Options within the NSH File

[0nelight]

You are right! I corrected my previous post.

In refind.conf the options line is the path to the NSH File.

In the NSH File you put the path to the disable-ram-area.efi and its parameters into the same line - each after the other (see post for example).

[daniel-nextgti]

@0nelight Thanks for updating the code above!

Unfortunately, when i use the lastest .efi file and the code above, i got an error with the parsed values - Even with the correct StartAddr/EndAddr, the script reads a different StartAddr, and uses the StartAddr that i`ve inputed as the EndAddr.

Please, take a look at the picture below:

Any ideas why the script is parsing a different start value?

Thanks,
Dan

[0nelight]

This is connected to how the Efi-Shell-App provides the command line parameters to the disable-ram-areas.efi-App.

I will think about a solution for this. Maybe I have to change the Code.

[0nelight]

So the refind-boot-manager only passes the three arguments to the efi-app while the efi-shell passes an additional parameter at the beginning - the name of the app.

so my efi-app gets 4 parameters instead of 3 which causes the error.

I will fix this asap so that the app counts how many parameters are provided and in case they are 4 the first one will be skipped :)

[0nelight]

Updated Release - Please test and tell me your results!