The developers of the openSUSE project announced the integration of support for the systemd-boot boot loader in the openSUSE Tumbleweed distribution, which uses a continuous version update cycle (rolling updates). Compared to using the traditional GRUB boot loader, switching to systemd-boot will enhance boot speed and improve the security of the boot process. Currently, support for systemd-boot is implemented as an option, while GRUB remains the default, except for builds for QEMU, where systemd-boot is planned to be included by default along with full disk encryption.
The main goal of adding systemd-boot support in openSUSE is to simplify and enhance the efficiency of working with full disk encryption. When using GRUB in a configuration with full disk encryption, the boot loader needs to embed code for data decryption and obtaining the key, which significantly complicates the boot loader code. With systemd-boot, these operations are handled by the Linux kernel and the user space handler.
Additionally, in MicroOS and openSUSE Tumbleweed, the Btrfs filesystem is used by default, and working with snapshots complicates the boot process. Snapshot management is integrated into systemd-boot, simplifying booting from individual snapshots and improving the efficiency of kernel update organization using the sdbootutil utility.
Source: opennet.ru
