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diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 00000000..ce6bad77 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,25 @@ +# shim, a first-stage UEFI bootloader + +shim is a trivial EFI application that, when run, attempts to open and +execute another application. It will initially attempt to do this via the +standard EFI `LoadImage()` and `StartImage()` calls. If these fail (because Secure +Boot is enabled and the binary is not signed with an appropriate key, for +instance) it will then validate the binary against a built-in certificate. If +this succeeds and if the binary or signing key are not forbidden then shim +will relocate and execute the binary. + +shim will also install a protocol which permits the second-stage bootloader +to perform similar binary validation. This protocol has a GUID as described +in the shim.h header file and provides a single entry point. On 64-bit systems +this entry point expects to be called with SysV ABI rather than MSABI, so calls +to it should not be wrapped. + +On systems with a TPM chip enabled and supported by the system firmware, +shim will extend various PCRs with the digests of the targets it is +loading. A full list is in the file [README.tpm](README.tpm) . + +To use shim, simply place a DER-encoded public certificate in a file such as +pub.cer and build with `make VENDOR_CERT_FILE=pub.cer`. + +There are a couple of build options, and a couple of ways to customize the +build, described in [BUILDING](BUILDING). |