Re: New discussion: ppc64 installer -- ext2 /boot partition to keep yaboot happy.
Please don't send me private mails, this is a mailing list discussion.
On 10/09/2017 01:33 AM, Rick Thomas wrote:
> First, the HFS partition should be /dev/sda2, not /dev/sda1. The Apple
> partitioning scheme is unusual in that it reserves the name /dev/sda1 for
> the partition table itself. It’s usually about 32KB in size.
That's one of the things that needed to be figured out, yes. I never claimed
that my any of my statements were correct when it came to NewWorld Macs.
> The first usable partition is called /dev/sda2 (Assuming for the sake of
> this discussion that the disk in question is /dev/sda, or course.)
> The yaboot installer in d-i looks for a partition that is marked “bootable”
> and uses it regardless of its position in the partition table.
Well, yes, grub-install doesn't do it yet because we haven't implemented
it yet. I'm feeling there's a dejavu here, no?
> From what you say, it appears that grub-install does not have that feature.
I explicitly mentioned that you should not confuse grub-install with
grub-installER. The former is part of the grub2 package, the latter
is a udeb which is part of debian-installer. The latter is the one that
we are working on and - as I have mentioned many times already - that is
still not in the shape it needs to be.
Of course, yaboot-installer has everything set and working, Yaboot has
been the default bootloader for powerpc for some time already while GRUB
was never officially used in Debian on powerpc and ppc64 (it is already
being used on ppc64el). It is therefore not surprising at all that
the installation process for GRUB is currently lacking. And, no,
that does not mean we should keep Yaboot which is dead upstream.
> Am I correct that it needs the HFS partition to be the first partition in
> the partition table?
I never claimed that.
> Second, you are correct that the separate /boot partition is not strictly
> necessary as long as the bootloader program (yaboot or grub or whatever> can read the filesystem that is used for the root. But there are *lots* of
> filesystem formats that don’t fit that model, ext4 with all the modern features
> enabled is only one.
This applies to Yaboot only which we are working to get rid of, remember?
> For yaboot, there’s LVM, encrypted disk, btrfs, ext4 and so on…
When you enable LVM, debian-installer automatically creates a separate /boot
partition. This has already been mentioned in this discussion.
> For grub, the list of unsupported filesystems may be shorter, but it’s not
> zero.
Which I never claimed.
> I like to use a separate /boot because it gives me much greater flexibility
> in what I do with the other partitions. It’s a matter of personal preference,
> and it’s clear that your preference and mine are different — but my preference
> is not automatically invalid just because it differs from yours.
This isn't about your personal preferences, this is about the default partitioning scheme
for debian-installer. I never said I am forcing you to use any particular scheme,
you are free to use whatever you want. And you will be able to in the future,
debian-installer always allows manual partitioning.
My intention with the testing is not to get the confirmation whether GRUB works
or not in principle but rather to gather all steps required to implement the
necessary code in grub-installER.
> If there is an important reason why you would like me to do an experiment for you
> without the separate /boot, please explain and I will be glad to comply.
> If not, I’d like to continue to use a separate /boot.
As I have probably explained for at least 10 times now, it's because I want to
fix the grub-installer script in debian-installer so the automatic setup of
GRUB from installation works with the default settings.
I do not understand why the same things are brought up over and over again:
* Yes, I do know that the proper setup of the boot partition of
Yaboot works and that it currently doesn't work with GRUB,
that's why we're here
* No, I will not keep you from using Yaboot in the future, you are
free to use whatever you want
* No, I also don't force you to use a certain partitioning scheme
* No, I don't know all the exact steps to set up and install GRUB
on a NewWorld Mac as I haven't tested it myself yet due to a massive
lack of time
I'm sorry if I am being a bit harsh here now, but I feel like I'm tilting
at windmills here. It's starting to become frustrating.
I started the discussion because I want to improve debian-installer and
I am just looking for testers and help to reach this goal to speed up
the process and work more efficiently (I am also working on Debian's
other ports architectures, not just powerpc and ppc64).
If you are willing to help with that, please perform tests and make
suggestions for what to implement. If you just want to express your
personal preferences in bootloaders and partitioning, then you should
probably stay away from this particular discussion.
Adrian
--
.''`. John Paul Adrian Glaubitz
: :' : Debian Developer - glaubitz@debian.org
`. `' Freie Universitaet Berlin - glaubitz@physik.fu-berlin.de
`- GPG: 62FF 8A75 84E0 2956 9546 0006 7426 3B37 F5B5 F913
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