In computing, booting is the process of starting a computer. It can be initiated by hardware such as a button press, or by a software command. After it is switched on, a computer's central processing unit (CPU) has no software in its main memory, so some process must load software into memory before it can be executed. This may be done by hardware or firmware in the CPU, or by a separate processor in the computer system.
In computing, firmware is a specific class of computer software that provides the low-level control for a device's specific hardware. Firmware, such as the BIOS of a personal computer, may contain basic functions of a device, and may provide hardware abstraction services to higher-level software such as operating systems. For less complex devices, firmware may act as the device's complete operating system, performing all control, monitoring and data manipulation functions. Typical examples of devices containing firmware are embedded systems, home and personal-use appliances, computers, and computer peripherals.
Open Firmware is a standard defining the interfaces of a computer firmware system, formerly endorsed by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). It originated at Sun Microsystems, where it was known as OpenBoot, and has been used by vendors including Sun, Apple, IBM and ARM. Open Firmware allows the system to load platform-independent drivers directly from a PCI device, improving compatibility.
GNU GRUB is a boot loader package from the GNU Project. GRUB is the reference implementation of the Free Software Foundation's Multiboot Specification, which provides a user the choice to boot one of multiple operating systems installed on a computer or select a specific kernel configuration available on a particular operating system's partitions.
The Syslinux Project is a suite of five different boot loaders for starting up Linux distros on computers. It was primarily developed by H. Peter Anvin.
A bootloader, also spelled as boot loader or called boot manager and bootstrap loader, is a computer program that is responsible for booting a computer.
The Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) is a publicly available specification that defines a software interface between an operating system and platform firmware. UEFI replaces the legacy Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) firmware interface originally present in all IBM PC-compatible personal computers, with most UEFI firmware implementations providing support for legacy BIOS services. UEFI can support remote diagnostics and repair of computers, even with no operating system installed.
QEMU is a free and open-source hypervisor. It emulates the machine's processor through dynamic binary translation and provides a set of different hardware and device models for the machine, enabling it to run a variety of guest operating systems. It can interoperate with Kernel-based Virtual Machine (KVM) to run virtual machines at near-native speed. QEMU can also do emulation for user-level processes, allowing applications compiled for one architecture to run on another.
The software project coreboot, formerly known as LinuxBIOS, is aimed at replacing proprietary firmware found in most computers with a lightweight firmware designed to perform only the minimum number of tasks necessary to load and run a modern 32-bit or 64-bit operating system.
A power-on self-test (POST) is a process performed by firmware or software routines immediately after a computer or other digital electronic device is powered on.
In computer science, execute in place (XIP) is a method of executing programs directly from long-term storage rather than copying it into RAM. It is an extension of using shared memory to reduce the total amount of memory required.
RedBoot is an open-source application that uses the eCos real-time operating system Hardware Abstraction Layer to provide bootstrap firmware for embedded systems. RedBoot is used in both product development and in deployed products in the field, such as the entertainment systems on the Airbus A380s and Delta's Boeing 767.
Das U-Boot is an open-source, primary boot loader used in embedded devices to package the instructions to boot the device's operating system kernel. It is available for a number of computer architectures, including 68k, ARM, Blackfin, MicroBlaze, MIPS, Nios, SuperH, PPC, RISC-V and x86.
Network booting, shortened netboot, is the process of booting a computer from a network rather than a local drive. This method of booting can be used by routers, diskless workstations and centrally managed computers such as public computers at libraries and schools.
Linux startup process is the multi-stage initialization process performed during booting a Linux installation. It is in many ways similar to the BSD and other Unix-style boot processes, from which it derives.
Kickstart is the bootstrap firmware of the Amiga computers developed by Commodore International. Its purpose is to initialize the Amiga hardware and core components of AmigaOS and then attempt to boot from a bootable volume, such as a floppy disk. Most Amiga models were shipped with the Kickstart firmware stored on ROM chips.
Samsung Knox is a proprietary security and management framework pre-installed on most Samsung mobile devices. Its primary purpose is to provide organizations with a toolset for managing work devices, such as employee mobile phones or interactive kiosks. Knox provides more granular control over the standard work profile to manage capabilities found only on Samsung devices.
In computing, a devicetree is a data structure describing the hardware components of a particular computer so that the operating system's kernel can use and manage those components, including the CPU or CPUs, the memory, the buses and the peripherals.
Custom firmware, also known as aftermarket firmware, is an unofficial new or modified version of firmware created by third parties on devices such as video game consoles and various embedded device types to provide new features or to unlock hidden functionality. In the video game console community, the term is often written as custom firmware or simply CFW, referring to an altered version of the original system software inside a video game console such as the PlayStation Portable, PlayStation 3, PlayStation Vita and Nintendo 3DS. Installing custom firmware typically requires bootloader unlocking.
The booting process of Android devices consists of various phases. The booting starts at power-on and ends at the visibility of the Android home screen. The boot process of devices that run Android is influenced by the firmware design of the SoC manufacturers.
