Re: Current laptop issues with 2.2.5
Hi.
In article <[🔎] 20000130165529.F517@tausq.org>,
at Sun, 30 Jan 2000 16:55:29 -0700,
on Re: Current laptop issues with 2.2.5,
Randolph Chung <tausq@debian.org> writes:
> The way dbootstrap handles this is that it writes lilo to your boot
> partition (/dev/hda3 or what not). It then lets you install a mbr. With this
> setup, you will by default boot into /dev/hda1 (which might hang, if you
> don't have anything installed bootable on /dev/hda1) but if you hold down a
> key during the boot process, you should get the mbr prompt (123F: or
> similar) from which you can boot /dev/hda3 (through lilo).
In bootconfig.c, dbootstrap uses "/sbin/install-mbr <boot device>" command.
And the default boot partition for mbr is the "active" primary partition
in that boot device.
Again, in bootconfig.c, make_bootable() calls set_boot_default() when
install_mbr() returns successfully. and this set_boot_default() uses
"/sbin/activate <device> <partition>". So if user selects "Yes" at
the prompt of "Make Linux the Default Boot Partition?", then the default
boot partition for mbr should be the partition which Debian is installed.
# The warning message is shown when user selects "No" at that prompt.
# "You have selected not to boot Debian as the default. ..."
> this can obviously be confusing for users, and dbootstrap needs to give
> more information about this process. on the "plus" side, lilo won't force you
> to boot into linux. (hm...)
As far as I know, the installer for "bo" uses mbr as the 1st boot loader.
# I don't know about rex or prior to that.
But this default mbr/lilo combination of Debian is not well known
even for current Debian users, so maybe adding more detail information
is good thing, I think.
> There is a separate bug (#53113) reported by rcw that is similar, but the
> fix is different -- mbr should never go on anything other then the first
> boot device.
I have not read that report, but make_bootable() in bootcofig.c has
the following lines:
yesNoBox(_("With your current configuration, LILO will try to boot "
"from a disk that is not your first IDE or SCSI disk. "
"It's possible that your BIOS doesn't support that.\n\n"
"Do you want to install LILO anyway?"), _("Problem")))
&& (! is_first_scsi(Root) || ! fdisk_find_disk(DEV_HDA) ||
yesNoBox(_("With your current configuration, LILO will try to boot "
"from your first SCSI disk, but your system has also a "
"master IDE disk at the primary IDE controller. "
"It's possible that your BIOS doesn't support that.\n\n"
"Do you want to install LILO anyway?"), _("Problem"))))
{
if (is_logical_part(Root)) {
struct fdisk_partition *extd = select_not_mounted(_(
"The root filesystem is installed in a logical partition. "
"LILO can't boot from there, so you must install LILO "
"in one of the following extended partitions. "
"Please select the partition to use."),
_("Select Partition"), 1, FSTYPE_EXTPART);
Suggestion: Add the description for mbr/lilo combination to boot up
the Debian system before these messages, and replace the word "LILO"
with "mbr" in the messages above. How do you think ?
--
Taketoshi Sano: <sano@debian.org>,<sano@debian.or.jp>,<kgh12351@nifty.ne.jp>
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