Re: [gentoo-user] Removing or renaming old /boot/grub directory warning

[Dale]

Michael wrote:
> On Saturday, 5 February 2022 09:36:44 GMT Dale wrote:
>
>> It failed with a missing normal.mod file.  That file is in the old grub
>> directory.  Once I renamed the directory back to what grub expected, the
>> system loaded grub fine.
> Ahh!  The normal.mod command:
>
> http://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/grub/html_node/normal.html
>
> You won't get a boot menu without this file, or a lot of GRUB commands.
> However, in a GRUB2 installation this file is found here:
>
> # find /boot/ -name normal.mod
> /boot/grub/i386-pc/normal.mod
>
> It should not exist the old legacy filesystem.  :-/
>
> I wonder if you have somehow mixed the legacy and new GRUB2 files?
>
> Anyway, the solution is to go fishing for it from the GRUB rescue prompt, using
> the ls command and then set root and set prefix before you can insmode it.
>

I kind of tried to do that.  Thing is, it doesn't do tab completion or
anything and I forgot I had renamed that directory until I booted a
rescue media and did a ls on it from that.  Then I remembered renaming
it and simply renamed it back.  After that, grub was happy.  Of course,
then I ran into the bad kernel and after that my second screen wasn't
working either.  Things sort of ganged up on me all at once.  It's one
reason I hate rebooting.  I have to say tho, dracut has been good to me
so far.  Only had one init thingy go bad.  I simply booted a old kernel
and fixed the new bad init thingy.  Still, I hate rebooting.  From
uprecords: 


root@fireball / # uprecords
     #               Uptime | System                                    
Boot up
----------------------------+---------------------------------------------------
     1   303 days, 11:46:23 | Linux 4.5.2-gentoo        Sat Jul 29
23:20:27 2017
     2   227 days, 22:10:30 | Linux 5.6.7-gentoo        Wed Oct 28
13:59:36 2020
     3   200 days, 06:51:46 | Linux 4.18.12-gentoo      Sat Jan 12
03:42:55 2019
     4   193 days, 09:28:37 | Linux 3.5.3-gentoo        Sat Sep 22
07:50:38 2012
     5   184 days, 15:47:57 | Linux 3.18.7-gentoo       Tue Dec 15
21:53:59 2015
     6   166 days, 20:47:12 | Linux 5.6.7-gentoo        Thu May 14
00:47:09 2020
     7   143 days, 15:05:26 | Linux 4.5.2-gentoo        Sun Oct 23
20:09:26 2016
     8   138 days, 11:27:28 | Linux 4.5.2-gentoo        Tue May 29
13:27:44 2018
     9   135 days, 11:11:44 | Linux 4.5.2-gentoo        Thu Mar 16
11:58:17 2017
    10   119 days, 02:59:44 | Linux 4.19.40-gentoo      Wed Jul 31
12:12:08 2019



>> There's been other threads about kernel boot
>> problems and the one I recently built could be having one of those
>> problems.  I haven't looked into that.  I doubt there is any file system
>> problem.  The problem was me renaming a directory that grub still needs
>> files from.  There is likely a way around this but my post was to warn
>> others that renaming that directory could cause problems.
> Right, renaming should be done carefully as you could mix the legacy and GRUB2
> filesystems.

Well, I expected everything the new grub needed to be in the new grub2
folder.  I think that is what Neil was expecting as well.  Just renaming
the directory instead of deleting it was a really good idea tho.  Of
course, everything is in /usr and can be restored from there but that
means having to set up lvm since /usr is on a lvm as is /var as well. 


>
>>>> I've reinstalled
>>>> using the grub-mkconfig command but have not reinstalled using the
>>>> grub-install command.
> Right, the 'grub-mkconfig' command only generates a new grub.cfg file and
> overwrites the old one.  It does not *install* GRUB, whereby install involves
> dropping GRUB's bootloader code in the MBR and also copying all GRUB files into
> /boot.
>
> TBH, once GRUB2 is installed properly and it works, it tends to carry on doing
> so.  So the question remains, why did it barf at its normal.mod path ...
>
>
> [snip ...]
>> I don't have the old grub installed, just a directory that was installed
>> by the old grub but contains files that the new grub needs.
> Hmm ... that should not be the case.  The legacy and GRUB2 filesystems are
> different.
>
>> The file
>> and path it needs is this:  /boot/grub/i386-pc/normal.mod  Why that
>> isn't installed in the new grub directory and told to look there for it,
>> I have no idea at the moment.  I may test it one day but don't feel the
>> desire to try it today.
> Life's a mystery!  :-)


Yea, I'm working on it.  Pulling out install info and may rename the
directory and do a complete reinstall process.  Just like I would on a
fresh install.  That should fix it.  If not, I understand more about the
grub rescue terminal at least.  I'm going to look that info up and do
some printing with my nifty duplex laser printer.  I hate the cost of
toner but I love the printing it does. 

Dale

:-)  :-)