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Adding and configuring .contentFlavour and .contentVisibility

About

OpenCore 0.8.8 introduced two new hidden files: .contentFlavour and .contentVisibility to further control the behavior of the BootPicker. If you have been using OpenCore prior to 0.8.8 and use OCAT to update it, these files are most likely missing from your EFI/OC/BOOT folder.

How to add .contentFlavour and .contentVisibility

  • Mount your EFI
  • Download OpenCore Package
  • Extract it
  • Navigate to Downloads/OpenCore-0.9.X-RELEASE/X64/EFI/BOOT
  • Press CMD+. to show hidden files
  • Copy .contentFlavour and .contentVisibility to EFI/OC/Boot
  • Press CMD+. to hide the folders and files again

About .contentVisibility

.contentVisibility is used to hide boot entries from OpenCore's Boot Menu. This makes it a lot easier to hide entries then in previous versions where you had to calculate a ScanPolicy and in some cases combine it with CustomEntries to make it work.

Usage

Simply place the .contentVisibility file in the folder containing the bootloader of the Operating System you want to hide from the BootPicker.

The .contentVisibility file can be opened and edited with TextEdit, Visual Studio Code and Xcode, of course. It basically contains one word (ASCII): Disabled:

visibility

Options – You can change its behaviour by using these words:

  • Disabled → Hides the entry from OpenCore's BootPicker.
  • Enabled → Shows the entry.
  • Auxiliary → Treats the entry as Auxiliary, so it's only revealed after pressing the space bar. I am using this option for my USB flash drive that is permanently attached to my system as a plug and stay device that contains a working backup of my EFI folder.

Placement – You can place the file in the following locations:

  • /System/Volumes/Preboot/{GUID}/.contentVisibility
  • /System/Volumes/Preboot/.contentVisibility
  • /Volumes/{ESP}/.contentVisibility (not recommended)
  • /EFI/Boot folder on USB flash drives (set it to Auxiliary, not Disabled!)

Examples:

  • To hide the EFI folder, put in EFI/OC/BOOT
  • To hide Windows, put it in the EFI containing the Microsoft/Boot folder
  • For any other OS, the same principle applies.

InstanceIdentifier

OpenCore 0.9.4 added a new feature called IntanceIdentifier. This allows adding an InstanceIdentifier to the config, which describes the used OpenCore instance. If you have 2 different instances of OpenCore (using different identifiers), you can then modify the .contentVisibilty file to hide instances.

For more details, refer to the OpenCore Documentation, chapter 8.1.1: Boot Algorithm

About .contentFlavour

.contentFlavour is used to modify the look and feel of entries in OpenCore's BootPicker (Audio Assist included). In order to enable it, the OC_ATTR_USE_FLAVOUR_ICON flag has to be added to the PickerAtributes bitmask. Check out the OpenCore Calculators section to figure out how to generate it.

Configuration

To configure the .contentFlavour file, please follow the extensive OpenCore Content Flavor guide provided by Acidanthera.

Resources

OpenCorePkg Pull Request #446: Add Optional .contentVisibility Qualification