TITLE:		Installing a bootsplash screen with progress bar
LFS VERSION:	3.3+
AUTHOR:		Bryan Gale <bryan@2dz.co.uk>

SYNOPIS:
	How to beautify the boot process with splash screen, progress bar and
	animation. Will also give you a pretty background on text consoles

HINT:

Required Packages
-----------------

The SuSE bootsplash kernel patch (versions available for 2.4.18 and 2.4.20
kernels):
	ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/people/stepan/bootsplash/kernel/
	bootsplash-3.0.7-2.4.18-vanilla.diff
	
Or
	ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/people/stepan/bootsplash/kernel/
	bootsplash-3.0.7-2.4.20-vanilla.diff

The splashutils package:
	ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/people/stepan/bootsplash/rpm-sources/bootsplash/
	splashutils.tar.bz2

The frame-buffer mng player:
	ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/people/stepan/bootsplash/rpm-sources/bootsplash/
	fbmngplay-0.5a.tar.bz2

Some helper scripts:
	ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/people/stepan/bootsplash/rpm-sources/bootsplash/
	scripts.tar.bz2

A sample theme:
	ftp://ftp.suse.com/pub/people/stepan/bootsplash/themes/
	Theme-Linux.tar.bz2
	
This hint will assume these have been downloaded to /tmp

You should also have installed libmng and libjpeg and as described in the Beyond
Linux From Scratch book


Installing the kernel patch
---------------------------

Change to the directory containing your kernel sources, and apply the patch. You
will then need to configure your kernel

	cd /usr/src/linux &&
	patch -p1 < /tmp/bootsplash-3.0.7-2.4.*-vanilla.diff &&
	make menuconfig
	
You should enable the following options. Make sure they are compiled into the
kernel, and not as modules

	Code maturity level options  --->
		Prompt for development and/or incomplete code/drivers
	Block devices  ---> RAM disk support
	Block devices  ---> Initial RAM disk (initrd) support
	Console drivers  ---> Video mode selection support
	Console drivers  ---> Frame-buffer support --->
		Support for frame buffer devices
		VESA VGA graphics console
		Use splash screen instead of boot logo
		
Now compile and install the kernel

	make dep &&
	make bzImage &&
	make modules &&
	make modules_install &&
	cp arch/i386/boot/bzImage /boot/lfskernel


Installing user space stuff
---------------------------

Unpack splashutils.tar.bz2, compile and copy the required binaries to /sbin

	cd /tmp &&
	tar xvjf splashutils.tar.bz2 &&
	cd splashutils &&
	make &&
	cp splash fbresolution /sbin &&
	cd ..

The two binaries we need are splash and fbresolution, so the rest can be
deleted. We also need one script from the scripts.tar.bz2 package

	tar xvjf scripts.tar.bz2 &&
	cd scripts &&
	chmod +x bootanim &&
	cp bootanim /sbin &&
	cd ..
	
The rest of the scripts are largely distro specific, so they can be deleted. The
one we save, bootanim, is used by splash to start and stop animations. The mng
player will also neeed to be installed to actually play the animations

	tar xvjf fbmngplay-0.5a.tar.bz2 &&
	cd fbmngplay &&
	make
	
You may get compile errors, but hopefully the fbmngplay binary will be there

	cp fbmngplay /sbin
	
If you do experence build errors they probably occured while building
fbmngplay.static. If you want a static version of fbmngplay, see the note at the
end of this hint
	

Installing a bootsplash theme
-----------------------------

We need to create a directory for our themes

	mkdir -p /etc/bootsplash/themes

Move the sample theme (or any other theme from http://www.bootsplash.og) to this
directory, and un-tar it

	cd /etc/bootsplash/themes &&
	tar xvjf /tmp/Theme-Linux.tar.bz2

The programs installed earlier will search for the theme in
/etc/bootsplash/themes/current, so we need to create a symlink

	ln -s Linux current

When you want to use a different theme you should delete this symlink and create
another one to your new un-tarred theme

	rm current &&
	ln -s MYNEWTHEME current
	

Updating Lilo and rebooting
---------------------------

You will need to edit /etc/lilo.conf. Under the entry for your linux kernel add
the line

	vga=791
	
This is so linux boots into a screen resolution that matches the size of the
bootsplash screen. You will also need to add

	initrd=/boot/initrd

To boot into silent mode (i.e. boot messages hidden), you will need also to add

	append="splash=silent"
	
Not all themes have a silent mode, so this will not always apply.

The following will need to be done now, and everytime you want to change theme.
Use splash to create a ram disk image of the bootsplash screen

	splash -s -f \
	/etc/bootsplash/themes/current/config/bootsplash-1024x768.cfg > \
	/boot/initrd

Now update the mbr and reboot, and you should see your new splash screen

	lilo &&
	shutdown -r now
	

Utilising the progress bar
--------------------------

If your theme is enabled with a progress bar, you will need to make some changes
to your bootscripts to get it to work. The progress bar can be contolled by
echoing commands to /proc/splash. For a tidy way to use this, you should add the
following code to your /etc/rc.d/init.d/functions script

	progressbar()
	{

		if [ $# != 1 ]
       		then
                	echo "Usage: progressbar {progress}"
        		exit 1
        	fi
		
		echo "show $(( 65534 * $1 / 100 ))" > /proc/splash

	}

Now edit your bootscripts in /etc/rc.d/rcsysinit.d and (by default)
/etc/rc.d/rc3.d to use this function. In general, before each instance of
loadproc, you should add

	progressbar XXX

Where XXX is boot progress out of 100. The LFS book explains the order in
which the scripts will be run, and it will take some trial and error to get a
smooth running progress bar. Remeber not to use this function before /proc
has been mounted


Utilising animation
-------------------

The splash program handles animation, examining the
/etc/bootsplash/themes/current/config/animations.cfg file, if your theme has
one. Again, a function should be added to /etc/rc.d/init.d/functions file

	animate()
	{

		if [ $# = 0 ]
       		then
                	echo "Usage: animate {hook}"
        		exit 1
        	fi

		splash "$*"

	}

To use it place the following line in your bootscripts wherever an animation
should be played

	animate HOOK

To determine values for HOOK, you need to look at
/etc/bootsplash/themes/current/config/animations.cfg. The file takes the format

	HOOK:command
	HOOK:command

This is from the Redmond theme at http://www.bootsplash.org
	
	fsck start:bootanim start bounce.mng
	master:bootanim stop
	shutdown: bootanim start bounce.mng
	
The command bootanim is the script we installed earlier, which handles the
animations, and uses the fbmngplay command to actually play the things. To see
a full list of paramemters, simply run bootanim. In this example we should add
the following to the bootscript where fsck is run

	animate fsck start

You should place the line

	animate master

just before the bootscripts finish, as this will stop all animations.

The line
	
	animate shutdown

should be placed somewhere in the shutdown scripts. Look in
/etc/rc.d/rc6.d to see what will be run, and insert the line somewhere
before the killproc-ing begins.

There is consistency between theme about these hooks, so once you have them in
place, they should not need changing. No harm should come from trying to play a
non existent animation.


Miscellaneous
-------------

Using splash, you can add or change a background on any of your terminals

	splash -n -s -u 1 \
	/etc/bootsplash/themes/tty2-theme/config/bootsplash-1024x768.cfg

	splash -n -s -u 2 \
	/etc/bootsplash/themes/tty3-theme/config/bootsplash-1024x768.cfg

	splash -n -s -u 3 \
	/etc/bootsplash/themes/tty4-theme/config/bootsplash-1024x768.cfg
	
	splash -n -s -u 4 \
	/etc/bootsplash/themes/tty5-theme/config/bootsplash-1024x768.cfg
	
	splash -n -s -u 5 \
	/etc/bootsplash/themes/tty6-theme/config/bootsplash-1024x768.cfg
	
You can remove the background with

	splash -s -n -u CONSOLENUMBER
	
You can retrun to silent mode using

	echo "silent" > /proc/splash

This may be useful for creating a shutdown screen

Verbose mode can be triggered with F2 or
	
	echo "verbose" > /proc/splash

You may want to place this in the print_status function of
/etc/rc.d/init.d/functions, inside the failure case, or use it when your hard
drive is being scanned for errors. You may also want to insert it somewhere
into your bootscripts if silent mode doesn't automatically give way to verbose
when your system finishes booting.

If you want to boot into a resolution other than 1024x768, simply follow the
instructions as usual, but replace each mention of bootsplash-1024x768.cfg with
bootsplash-XRESxYRES.cfg (you will of course need to make sure this file exists
within your theme). You will also need to change the vga=791 line in lilo.conf
appropriately. Here's a table I borrowed from the Gentoo forums:

Colors-----640x480-----800x600-----1024x768-----1280x1024

256----------769---------771----------773----------775
32000--------784---------787----------790----------793
65000--------785---------788----------791----------794
16.7 Mill.---786---------789----------792----------795


Compiling a static fbmngplay
----------------------------

If you keep /usr on a different partition to /, then you will need to use the
static version of fbmngplay. This is so it does not depend on any libraries that
are on a partition that may not have yet been mounted. To rid yourself of the
compile error, edit the line in /tmp/fbmngplay/Makefile

	LIBSS    = $(LIBDIR)/libmng-mini.a $(LIBDIR)/libz.a -lm

To

	LIBSS    = $(LIBDIR)/libmng.a $(LIBDIR)/libjpeg.a $(LIBDIR)/libz.a -lm

Then copy /tmp/fbmngplay/fbmngplay.static to /sbin/fbmngplay

The splash command does not have any such dependencies problems, as it links
only to glibc.

(Thanks to Dagmar d'Surreal for this bit)

Sources
-------

http://www.bootsplash.org
http://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?t=26494 (Thanks to kachaffeous)
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