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On Mon, Jun 25, 2012 at 12:05 AM, Dale <rdalek1967@×××××.com> wrote: |
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> Howdy, |
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|
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Hi Dale. |
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|
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> It appears that grub2 is coming soon. Thread on -dev said a couple |
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> months or so till it hits the tree, keyworded and/or masked I'm sure. I |
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> guess it is about time to jump off the cliff and give this a try. I |
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> installed Kubuntu on a system for my brother and it uses grub2. I have |
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> had to edit the config and then run the update script. I have sort of |
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> installed and made a config change to grub2, even tho it was only once. |
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> Basically, I sort of seen the thing at least. o_O |
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> |
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> My first question is, how hard is this to change from old grub to |
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> grub2? |
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|
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It's a completely new beast. Almost none of the old grub-legacy |
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related knowledge works for GRUB2. |
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|
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> I only run Gentoo here, no windoze at all and no other distro |
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> either. I figure that may make it easier. I must confess tho, I'm a |
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> hoarder of kernels. LOL I generally have several versions of them on |
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> here. Is there a way for it to only see say the last 3 versions or so? |
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> I only have three right now but I cleaned out all the non-init kernels a |
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> while back. Given time, I may have a dozen or so. I would rather not |
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> have that many lines on the grub screen when booting. |
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|
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You can edit the config file (you first need to give it the |
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appropriate permissions), and remove from it the kernels you don't |
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want. Also, you can move the kernels/initramfs' from /boot into a temp |
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directory when running the grub2-mkconfig script. |
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|
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> Also, will it know what init thingy image to connect the kernels too? I |
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> name my kernels with the version and name the init thingy with a similar |
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> name. Looks someting like this: |
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> |
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> root@fireball / # ls -al /boot/bzImage-3.* |
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> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4740064 May 16 20:25 /boot/bzImage-3.3.5-2 |
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> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4758496 May 23 13:09 /boot/bzImage-3.4.0-1 |
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> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 4758816 Jun 14 09:00 /boot/bzImage-3.4.2.r1-1 |
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> root@fireball / # ls -al /boot/initramfs-3.* |
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> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 3560934 May 12 05:03 /boot/initramfs-3.3.5-1.img |
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> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 3560423 May 23 13:10 /boot/initramfs-3.4.0.img |
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> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 3561170 Jun 14 09:05 /boot/initramfs-3.4.2.img |
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> root@fireball / # |
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|
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The grub2-mkconfig script should recognize the correct initramfs for |
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each kernel. |
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|
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> There are times when I may have more than one kernel but only one init |
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> thingy tho. So far, one init thingy will work with any kernel of that |
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> version. I have not tried mixing tho. |
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> |
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> Also, how much disk space does grub take up on /boot? Mine is on a |
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> separate partition and I hope it is large enough. |
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|
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Mine uses around 8MB: |
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|
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# du -sh /boot/grub2/ |
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7.9M /boot/grub2/ |
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|
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> Thoughts. Info. |
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|
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I upgraded to GRUB 2 because of ext4, since grub-legacy upstream |
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doesn't handle ext4 (and, apparently, never will). However, the Gentoo |
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ebuild applies the patch from |
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|
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http://code.google.com/p/grub4ext4/ |
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|
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and it's my impression it will continue to apply said patch in the |
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future, so grub-legacy on Gentoo supports ext4. Given that, I really |
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don't see an advantage to use GRUB2, except that it will be the one |
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being maintained in the future, and when UEFI hardware becomes the |
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standard (if ever), you will probably need it.. |
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|
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Besides ext4 upstream support, GRUB2 allows to use higher screen |
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resolutions for the graphical menu. That's about it's only advantage |
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over grub-legacy, and it's a very shallow one. The new configuration |
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format and the script to generate it are not flexible, and its |
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documentation is sorely lacking. I really think you should stick with |
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grub-legacy while Gentoo supports it. |
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|
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I keep using GRUB2 in my desktop and laptop, buy I didn't migrated my |
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servers nor my media center to it, nor plan to do it. I see no reason |
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for it. |
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|
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And being honest, I hope that something else replaces GRUB2; I like |
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the notion of a /firstboot minimal Linux as boot loader, or something |
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similar. If the boot loader has to do OS-related work (graphics/input |
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drivers and stuff like that), I think using Linux directly is better |
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than re-implementing something twice (and probably in the wrong |
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manner) as GRUB2 is doing. |
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|
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So, in short: I don't recommend switching to GRUB2. And I'm using it. |
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|
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Either wait for its documentation and tools to mature (i.e., when they |
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finally hit the 2.0 version), or wait for something else to handle the |
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future of Linux boot loader. Meanwhile, if you don't use UEFI, you |
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really don't need GRUB2. So stick to grub-legacy. |
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|
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My 0.02 ${CURRENCY}. |
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|
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Regards. |
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-- |
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Canek Peláez Valdés |
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Posgrado en Ciencia e Ingeniería de la Computación |
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Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México |