Re: Installer problem report (dual boot loadlin)
Lennart Sorensen wrote:
> The boot files go to /boot. There is no question to ask about it.
Well, the question I wanted it to ask was "which partition
should /boot go onto?" AFAI recall that question wasn't
asked. I had two other ext2 partitions, so I was just
surprised that the command to format /dev/hda6 was also
taken to mean that /dev/hda6 was where /boot should go.
I wonder how the installer decides where to place /boot
if I had formatted multiple partitions? I also wonder what
it would have done if I'd chosen not to reformat /dev/hda6
as ext3 (it was an empty ext2 before)? My point is
formatting/partitioning != choosing where to install.
Maybe there was a screen asking that, but I don't recall
one. I just remember being surprised I wasn't asked.
> Anyone that thinks loadlin is a good solution needs to manually deal
> with getting the boot files to the right place.
As a user of Debian, but not a frequent installer of Debian,
I had no way to know whether loadlin was 'good', all I knew
was it worked. As far as I knew, loadlin was an officially
supported and sanctioned and 'good' boot method... I was
looking for it in the installer menu options. I just had no
way of knowing that it was deprecated or obsolete... where
is that written? Maybe I just missed it.
> I trust any boot loader more than I trust anything
> that comes with DOS/Windows to get my system booted.
OK, but trust is a subjective thing. I had a working loadlin
system for five years; I trusted it, it worked through
several revisions of kernel 2.2. By contrast, I didn't
trust LILO, having tried and failed to get it working
(bear in mind I was a total Linux newbie five years ago,
and I knew loadlin worked, so I switched back from LILO
to loadlin when I couldn't get LILO working.) For me,
"if it works, why change it?" I mean, I don't even know
why GRUB is preferred to LILO now. I just wanted a method
which boots, and I had one, so I thought, why change it?
>> Also, it seemed the disk partition screen didn't have
>> a "don't write changes" button, only "write changes"
>> (upgrades mightn't require any partitioning).
>
> It asks for confirmation afterwards.
Oh, I realise that now, and I wasn't suggesting otherwise.
But I only discovered that by trying it.
My perspective was odd... I had a previously installed
Debian system, with a blank 2GB ext2 partition ready and
waiting for a new installation, so I didn't _need_ to
partition anything. The installer expected me to, though.
So, only having a "write changes" button, when potentially
nothing needed to change, seemed odd. But only from my
perspective. For a new user, with an empty PC hard drive,
partitioning would be necessary, and "write changes"
would therefore be necessary.
>> But perhaps there's a good reason why FIPS or loadlin
>> are not options in the installer?
>
> Because the only OSs that use filesystems fips can do anything about
> (and fips being a dos program can't run from the Debian installer) are
> obsolete and no longer supported. loadlin only runs on those same OSs
> too. No supported version of windows can run loadlin or fips or have
> any use for either. Most likely 99% of x86 PCs run windows XP or 2000
> or have no OS at all on them, in which case loadlin is not an option.
OK, I didn't know loadlin/FIPS wouldn't work with recent
versions of Windows. Thanks for that info!
I had used that combination five years ago, and it worked
fine, so until today I assumed it would still work, or
was still supported, or that recent upgrades to those
packages would work with recent versions of Windows.
I'm a bit surprised that they've been allowed to lapse.
Surely being able to install Linux and boot into it from
an icon on the Windows desktop is a desirable way to
convert the unwashed masses? Forcing people to start
with a clean PC, or lose their existing Windows partition,
seems IMHO to raise the barrier for entry. Or is it that
Windows won't play fair and is putting files all over the
disk to stop FIPS-like disk repartitioning?
>> OK, I didn't know that, so I'll try the initrd parameter,
>> that helps a lot.
As it turns out, the initrd parameter solved the problem,
and I now have loadlin booting kernel 2.4.27.
> Was there a good reason you didn't want grub?
No, not much, apart from a vague unease about formatting,
partitioning, or changing MBRs if I didn't need to (the
disk had existing data and operating systems on it).
But see below for a comment on incremental vs big changes.
> Remember debian systems are not
> upgraded by the installer. The installer is for initial installs,
> everything else is just done with apt-get/dpkg/dselect when it comes to
> upgrades in the future. So there is no reason for the installer to go
> looking for other systems other than as things to add to the boot menu.
I'm hearing you on FM, buddy.
I just expected (I don't know why) that the installer
also had an upgrade-detection capability. I don't know
why, I just assumed it would. (My apt database got
corrupted a few years ago, long story omitted.)
> Where is the risk in modifying the MBR?
I just had a working system so I was trying to keep it
working the same way. The working system used a choice menu
in the Win98 autoexec.bat file, firing off loadlin to boot
into Debian after 3 seconds, unless the user hits an arrow
key to select Win98 instead, in which case the Windows GUI
starts. I had a vague preference for keeping this two-stage
bootup so that if something went wrong with the installation
I would still have a booting Win98 system, and I could
still go back to the old Linux 2.2 system. GRUB was a
new thing to learn. I'm sure it's all very shiny. It just
wasn't incremental for me, it was a break from the old,
with the potential to screw up my system if I did something
wrong, whereas loadlin seemed lower risk (it just involved
copying some files to /dev/hda1). One of the reasons why
I like Debian is that it is incremental... old software
generally doesn't just break because someone decides I must
do a forced upgrade (unlike other operating systems).
So, it's not that I didn't trust GRUB, or didn't trust it
to modify the MBR correctly, it was more that I didn't
trust *me* to get the configuration files right (since
I'd earlier stuffed up a LILO config file). Whereas I
did trust myself not to break anything with loadlin (it
just involved copying a few files and editing a script).
So, once bitten, twice shy.
> Your setup is very different than normal, so unless you are an advanced
> user (and far from a newbie) it is not a very realistic way to run linux
> on a system.
OK, well, I didn't realise that using loadlin wasn't very
realistic, since it's been working for me for five years,
and it now works with Debian 3.1.r1 for me. So, I just
didn't know it was deprecated, and I'm unsure how I was
supposed to know, short of asking here.
But it looks like GRUB is the way to go in future, and
certainly for new machines (which don't have Win98!).
So thanks for the info!
Loki
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