Why “bootloader” is being discussed
The most recent Hacker News stories and comments contributing to this topic's mentions.
> Everything else should probably be left to whatever is running at the initialization vector of the storage. Which, if you'd like, can be a complete UEFI implementation. Puttin…
by yjftsjthsd-h · Oct 28, 2026
If you want an OS to handle edge cases like booting from the network (that can be arbitrarily complex), reusing an existing one makes a lot more sense than writing a custom one…
by orbital-decay · Oct 28, 2026
Before we start this debate, let me state from the outset that I have been installing AOSP derivatives on my own phones since 2015, and I don't want to disparage all the hard wo…
by amosbatto · Oct 28, 2026
BIOS didn't have a spec at all, it was hacks stapled to reverse-engineered chips that were Good Enough To Ship for IBM decades ago. Most of the alternatives require brand+model…
by jeroenhd · Oct 28, 2026
Your computer's awful implementation says nothing about UEFI as a whole, it just means that the vendor you bought your hardware from sucks at writing firmware. I update my UEFI…
by jeroenhd · Oct 28, 2026
Phones most commonly use their own bootloader stack.
by mschuster91 · Oct 28, 2026
Interest
Proportion of Hacker News items mentioning "bootloader" over time.
Mentions
Total number of Hacker News items mentioning "bootloader" over time.
A bootloader, also spelled as boot loader or called bootstrap loader, is a computer program that is responsible for booting a computer and booting an operating system. If it also provides an interactive menu with multiple boot choices then it is often called a boot manager. Read more on Wikipedia