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Re: status of LILO in upcoming Stable release



On Mon, 07 Feb 2011 09:56:30 -0500 (EST), Andrei Popescu wrote:
> On Thu, 03 Feb 2011, 21:43:02, Stephen Powell wrote:
>> 
>> I don't know for sure, but I've never seen a release upgrade
>> replace a boot loader.  And I have no reason to suspect it will
>> this time.  Install a newer version, yes.  But, say, change
>> lilo to grub2?  I doubt it.
> 
> This release will replace grub (grub-legacy) with grub2 (grub-pc). Does 
> it count? :)

Yes, but that's because they have played games with package names
to force it to do so.  Both Lenny and Squeeze have a package called
"grub".  On Lenny, this package is the original grub (grub version 1).
Squeeze also has a package called "grub", but it is not grub version 1.
In Squeeze, the package called "grub" is a dummy transitional package
which has a dependency on grub-pc, which is grub version 2.  As far
as something like "aptitude full-upgrade" is concerned, it is simply
replacing the old version of "grub" with the new version of "grub".
But because the powers that be have re-defined what "grub" actually is,
it ends up replacing grub version 1 with grub version 2 (which, despite
the similarity in name, is a completely different boot loader).
If you want to continue using grub version 1 in Squeeze, you should
point your /etc/apt/sources.list file to Squeeze, manually install
grub-legacy, then purge grub.  Then do the release upgrade.  I haven't
tested the procedure, but I would suppose that something like that
should work.  I haven't looked at the release notes yet, but I would
suppose that something like that would be in there.

So I see your point.  Fortunately, the package called lilo in Squeeze
is not a dummy transitional package with a dependency on grub-pc.
It is the real lilo.  :-)

-- 
  .''`.     Stephen Powell    
 : :'  :
 `. `'`
   `-


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