kern/143370: splash_txt ASCII splash screen module

[Antony Mawer]

On Thu, Jun 30, 2011 at 3:04 AM, Torfinn Ingolfsen
<torfinn.ingolfsen at broadpark.no> wrote:
> On Wed, 29 Jun 2011 22:50:15 +1000
> Antony Mawer <lists at mawer.org> wrote:
>> Not sure if this is the right place to post it -- about 6 years ago I
>> put together a module which displays an ASCII splash screen on boot
>> (rather than the graphical splash_pcx and splash_bmp modules). We have
>> been running it in production since that time without issue.
>
> So, the difference between this and loader.conf's loader_logo construct is that
> a) this is a proper splash screen module
> b) you can / must design your splash screen with a separate program (compared to write / modify Forth code)
>
> Is my understanding correct?

Not quite. The loader_logo is only displayed at the boot screen, and
disappears as soon as the kernel begins booting. The splash module
effectively creates an "overlay" display which is placed on-screen
while the kernel probes devices and starts up, replacing the standard
startup messages. Think more along the lines of your OS boot screen on
Windows/Mac/Linux.

In our case, this provides a clean boot screen instead of confusing
probe messages (or silence if they're hidden) while the system starts,
which can be reassuring to a non-tech audience, and does so without
reliance on VESA support which doesn't always work on the systems we
work with.

The choice of file format was simply that it was an easy to use format
supported by ASCII drawing software that I was familiar with (TheDraw,
DuhDraw). There is nothing to stop someone adding support for a
different format of encoding if they wanted -- the same as someone
could write a splash_jpg or splash_gif module if they really wanted
to.

-- Antony