Re: Why Grub? Must I Switch?
On Tuesday 01 February 2005 10:41, Clive Menzies wrote:
> On (31/01/05 22:57), Paul E Condon wrote:
> > On Mon, Jan 31, 2005 at 09:01:26PM -0800, Karsten M. Self wrote:
> > > Revisiting old posts...
> > >
> > > on Thu, Dec 23, 2004 at 01:13:31PM -0700, Paul E Condon
> > > (pecondon@mesanetworks.net) wrote:
> > >
> > > [GRUB/LILO pimpfest deleted...]
> > >
> > > > Just my opinion:
> > > > Grub is much more featureful than lilo. It has a scripting language
> > > > that can be used during boot to get you out of any trouble that you
> > > > may have gotten into by reworking your kernel config. But to use it,
> > > > you have to remember how it works. To remember you have to have
> > > > learned it features. When I realized this I reverted to lilo. It
> > > > does the job for me. I truly believe grub is better, but I'm not ever
> > > > going to learn and _remember_ how to use it.
> > >
> > > The bonus of GRUB here is that not only can you get an interactive
> > > shell at boot, but there's a modicum of contextual support, at least
> > > insofar as tab-completion is supported. You can also type 'help' for a
> > > list of commands, and 'help <keyword>' for a short but usable
> > > description of commands.
> > >
> > > It's somewhat similar to DOS, in this regard really. Though lacking
> > > some of the file management utilties.
> > >
> > >
> > > Peace.
> >
> > Yes, grub is good. But I'm 72 and have a bunch of things to do in the
> > time I have left here. Learning to use grub isn't one of them, and I
> > don't think a simple user should struggle with it if they already have a
> > functional command of lilo.
>
> Well, you have nearly 20 years on me and I take a similar view on what I
> should and shouldn't spend time on (there's so much great stuff to
> learn).
>
> My first experience of Debian and Linux was on on old Mac booting from
> MKLinux )bootloader on the Mac side. Since then I've played with Lilo,
> which just works on servers with only one operating system, yaboot on
> later Macs and Grub.
>
> Grub, I found very confusing at first but where you are running
> different OS's on one machine it is excellent. I use it on a test machine
> which is running Win98, Sarge, Ubuntu, Mepis and others when the mood
> takes me. I also use it on a laptop with WinXP, sid (amd64) and sarge.
>
> Once you are familiar with it, Grub is pretty intuitive.
My biggest gripe about Grub, especially when explaining to new users,
is that not only do they have to learn about the flat address space (no
C: etc) and /dev/hd? etc, but they also have to learn Grub's device naming
convention. It is a real shame that Grub does use, or even accept, the
naming system that the rest of Linux uses. OK, normally they ignore
the device name, but if ever they need to do anything special it is
needed.
David
>
> If you aren't booting multiple OS's .... then I suspect the "devil you
> know" is the least line of resistence. Otherwise, GRub is definitely worth
> the effort and it isn't a big learning curve.
>
> Just my 2c ;)
>
> Regards
>
> Clive
>
> > Recent progress in live CD versions of Debian make me wonder as to grub's
> > usefulness for error recovery. A live CD is vastly more powerful, IMHO.
> >
> > But if one is a newbie with zero knowledge of how boot loading works, it
> > might make sense to study grub, maybe.
>
> --
> www.clivemenzies.co.uk ...
> ..strategies for business
Reply to: