multiboot2-header

Convenient and safe parsing of Multiboot2 Header structures and the contained header tags. Usable in no_std environments, such as a bootloader. The default builder feature also allows the construction of the corresponding structures.

Design

For every Multiboot2 header structure, there is an ABI-compatible rusty type. This enables a zero-copying parsing design while also enabling the creation of these structures via convenient constructors for the corresponding types.

Use-Cases

What this library is good for:

construct a Multiboot2 header at runtime (constructing one at build time with macros is not done yet, contributions are welcome!)
write a Multiboot2 bootloader that parses a Multiboot2 header
understand Multiboot2 headers better
analyze Multiboot2 headers at runtime

Features and `no_std` Compatibility

This library is always no_std. The default builder feature enables alloc; using it requires an #[global_allocator]. Remove that feature if you do not need to construct headers.

# Without the `builder` feature or the `alloc` crate:
multiboot2-header = { version = "<latest>", default-features = false }
# With the default `builder` feature (requires the `alloc` crate):
multiboot2-header = "<latest>"

Example 1: Builder + Parse

use multiboot2_header::{
    Builder, HeaderTagFlag, HeaderTagISA, InformationRequestHeaderTag,
    Header, MaybeDynSized, MbiTagType, RelocatableHeaderTag,
    RelocatableHeaderTagPreference,
};

/// Small example that creates a Multiboot2 header and parses it afterwards.
fn main() {
    let header_bytes = Builder::new(HeaderTagISA::I386)
        .relocatable_tag(RelocatableHeaderTag::new(
            HeaderTagFlag::Required,
            0x1337,
            0xdeadbeef,
            4096,
            RelocatableHeaderTagPreference::None,
        ))
        .information_request_tag(InformationRequestHeaderTag::new(
            HeaderTagFlag::Required,
            &[
                MbiTagType::Cmdline.into(),
                MbiTagType::BootLoaderName.into(),
            ],
        ))
        .build();

    let header = unsafe { Header::load(header_bytes.as_ptr()) }.unwrap();
    println!("{header:#?}");
}

Example 2: Multiboot2 header as static data in Rust file

You can use the builder, construct a Multiboot2 header, write it to a file and include it like this:

#[used]
#[unsafe(no_mangle)]
#[link_section = ".text.multiboot2_header"]
static MULTIBOOT2_HDR: [u8; 64] = *include_bytes!("mb2_hdr_dump.bin");

You may need a special linker script to place this symbol in the first 32768 bytes of the ELF. See Multiboot2 specification.

MSRV

The MSRV is 1.85.1 stable.

License & Contribution

See main README file.

multiboot2-header 0.9.0