Re: Two installations on the same system
On Tue, Jun 15, 1999 at 01:01:20PM +0000, Gertjan Klein wrote
> On Mon, 14 Jun 1999 21:59:30 +0200 (CEST), Bruno Goncalves Russo
> <russo@ram.rwth-aachen.de> wrote:
>
> [Two Linux partitions]
>
> >This is exactly what I want to do. I just tried to do it, but wasn't
> >totally successful because I didn't configure lilo correctly.
> >I was using the unstable version and when I tried to switch back to
> >stable, lilo loaded the incorrect kernel and some things didn't work
> >because of that. How should I configure it in this case?
>
> It's advisable to set up LILO on both partitions. Use the LILO on the
> stable partition (I'm assuming /dev/hda1) for the boot menu. E.g.:
>
> boot=/dev/hda
> root=/dev/hda1
> delay=50
>
> image=/vmlinuz
> label=Stable
> read-only
>
> other=/dev/hda2
> label=Unstable
>
> (Note: this probably isn't a full working configuration, this is just
> to give you an idea.) Then, in the unstable Debian (I'm assuming
> /dev/hda2), configure LILO to boot from the bootsector of it's own
> partition:
>
> boot=/dev/hda2
> root=/dev/hda2
> delay=0
>
> image=/vmlinuz
> label=Stable
> read-only
>
> The advantage of this setup is that if you recompile your kernel on
> your unstable partition, all you have to do is rerun LILO (which
> make-kpkg will do for you) to keep things working (the same goes for the
> stable partition, of course).
>
The disadvantage to this is that *both* /dev/hda1 and /dev/hda2 have to fall
within the first 1024 cylinders cylinders for this to work.
You should be able to do just as well with a single LILO installation
booting both; the tricky part is making sure both kernels fall within
the first 1024 cylinders of the disk.
You could try a disk layout like this:
/dev/hda1 5Mb (system 1:/boot)
/dev/hda2 5Mb (system 2:/boot)
/dev/hda3 127Mb (swap for both, just don't run them concurrently)
/dev/hda5 ???Mb (system 1:/)
/dev/hda6 ???Mb (system 2:/)
and a lilo.conf like this: (in system 1:/etc/lilo.conf, assuming that
/dev/hda2 is mounted at /system2_boot, you are using a 'standard' mbr
and /dev/hda1 is marked as bootable in cfdisk).
boot=/dev/hda1
delay=50
vga=normal
image=/vmlinuz
root=/dev/hda1
label=Stable
read-only
image=/system2_boot/vmlinuz
root=/dev/hda2
label=Unstable
read-only
As always when trying something like this for the first time,
make a boot floppy just in case. Q&D boot floppy for /dev/hda1:
# dd if=/vmlinuz of=/dev/fd0 bs=18k # good, formatted floppy in /dev/fd0
# rdev -R /dev/fd0 1 # mark the image readonly
# rdev /dev/fd0 /dev/hda1 # sets the root device to /dev/hda1
...and then test it :-)
John P.
--
huiac@camtech.net.au
john@huiac.apana.org.au
"Oh - I - you know - my job is to fear everything." - Bill Gates in Denmark
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