What I want:

To boot into a BTRFS snapshots from rEFind boot manager. But rEFInd doesn’t show the snapshots.

Additional Info:

  1. So, apparently, to restore the BTRFS snapshot of a root subvolume, I shouldn’t do it with the root partition being actively used.
  1. So, I need to boot into the desired snapshot from the boot manager itself.
  1. GRUB has grub-btrfs, which lets you boot into snapshot from OS selection screen itself.
  1. rEFInd has refind-btrfs, which should do the same as grub-btrfs. But it didn’t in my case. I am not seeing any way to boot into a snapshot from rEFInd.
  1. I use BTRFS Assistant with snapper to manage snapshots.
  1. I am not seeing any way to restore the snapshot from live environment too.
  1. I am using CachyOS (Arch) with Plasma DE.
  1. I suspect the reason is my unusual /efi /boot partition layout. (attached below)
  1. I did my partition this way because, my initial EFI partition had less storage (as seen on image), so , I created another boot partition and mounted my pre-existing EFI partition to /boot/efi. I did this by referring a Youtube video (I know, I should’ve known better)
  1. I also encrypted my BTRFS / partition
  1. If you need any other info, please ask.

I know this is a general community, but this is the 7th community that I’m asking this 🥲

Some people suggested Limine bootloader, but I like rEFInd for its versatile theme support.

  • Eugenia@lemmy.mlEnglish
    2·
    11 hours ago

    From arch’s site:

    Tip: make sure btrfs_x64.efi driver is installed, it can be installed manually by copying from /usr/share/refind/drivers_x64/btrfs_x64.efi to esp/EFI/refind/drivers_x64/btrfs_x64.efi, or you can install all drivers with the refind-install /dev/sdx --alldrivers option.

    Warning: btrfs_x64.efi does not support raid1c3/4.