[SOLVED] Installing without Lilo

Tim Johnson · 02-27-2011, 02:16 PM

I'm currently running mint 10 on the 3 'first' partitions of my
workstation. I have Ubuntu 10.04 on the 'second' 3.
From df

Code:

/dev/sda1             80881432   3180864  73592024   5% /
none                   1539264       264   1539000   1% /dev
none                   1547516      1020   1546496   1% /dev/shm
none                   1547516       352   1547164   1% /var/run
none                   1547516         0   1547516   0% /var/lock
/dev/sda2             80242520  19717364  56449076  26% /home
/dev/sda9             19220180   3416276  14827572  19% /usr
/dev/sdb1              7753728        32   7753696   1% /media/6331-6538
/dev/sda7             52866604  23926440  26254676  48% /mnt/ubuntu/home
/dev/sda8             19223252    370880  17875888   3% /mnt/ubuntu/user_local
/dev/sda6             52866604   9191004  40990112  19% /mnt/ubuntu/root

I want to retain mint and its grub2 bootloader for now. That would
be accomplished (I believe) by choosing the skip option at
the Install Lilo screen. I'm not entirely sure whether the
grub2 loader on the mint 'side' will automatically pick up slack.
To be sure, would there be any data gathering or other analysis that
I should do when the slack install is finished and before reboot?
thanks
tim

Josh000 · 02-27-2011, 02:29 PM

After installing switch to a terminal before rebooting, mount your system and run grub with the equivilant of lilo -r ?

trademark91 · 02-27-2011, 03:11 PM

just update-grub afterwards.

if slackware doesnt start up, you could try adding the following to your grub.cfg, changing what you need to point to your drives/vmlinuz:

Code:

menuentry 'Slackware'
        insmod ext2
        set root='(hd0,msdos5)'
        search --no-floppy
        echo    'Loading Slackware ...'
        linux   /boot/vmlinuz-custom-2.6.37 root=/dev/sda5 ro quiet vga=791
        echo    'Loading initial ramdisk ...'
        initrd  /boot/initrd.gz.
}

Robert.Thompson · 02-27-2011, 03:28 PM

Hello:

Note: I am an inexperienced SlackWare and linux user.

I had windows XP and Mint Debian installed before I installed SlackWare 13.1 (32 bit)

I installed SlackWare to 2 new partitions: sda7 & sda8 for root and home respectively and I SKIPPED INSTALLING LILO.

Then I rebooted into Mint Debian and updated grub by doing:

Code:

sudo grub-install --recheck /dev/sda

Code:

sudo update-grub

Then I rebooted and grub had found Windows XP, Mint and SlackWare.

The key part seems to be: sudo grub-install --recheck /dev/sda before doing: update-grub.

I edited out some of grub entries that were not required later.

Note: I am an inexperienced SlackWare and linux user.

Hope this helps.

Tim Johnson · 02-27-2011, 03:38 PM

The replies that I am getting is what I had guessed to be the solution.
I appreciate the input and the help.
Thanks of course to trademark91,

and
Robert.Thompson - give yourself a pat on the back.

cheers
tim

davidsrsb · 03-01-2011, 06:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by trademark91

just update-grub afterwards.
if slackware doesnt start up, you could try adding the following to your grub.cfg, changing what you need to point to your drives/vmlinuz:

Manually editing grub.cfg is discouraged these days on Ubuntu.
I have been triple booting Slackware, XP and Ubuntu for several years, with Ubuntu grub on the MBR

One machine works automatically, but another is a bit awkward to find other OS, so I use a custom grub script file /etc/grub.d/40_custom with the following lines

Code:

menuentry "Slackware Linux (Slackware 13.1)" {
	set root=(hd0,7)
	linux /vmlinuz root=/dev/sda8 ro vga=normal
}

Do NOT run Lilo in Slackware

Tim Johnson · 03-01-2011, 10:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by davidsrsb

Manually editing grub.cfg is discouraged these days on Ubuntu.
I have been triple booting Slackware, XP and Ubuntu for several years, with Ubuntu grub on the MBR

One machine works automatically, but another is a bit awkward to find other OS, so I use a custom grub script file /etc/grub.d/40_custom with the following lines

Code:

menuentry "Slackware Linux (Slackware 13.1)" {
	set root=(hd0,7)
	linux /vmlinuz root=/dev/sda8 ro vga=normal
}

Do NOT run Lilo in Slackware

Thank you for the contribution. I was aware that with grub2, you should be adding custom entries
at /etc/grub.d, but I'm glad that you brought that up. Good tip. And for anyone reading
this, some of the parameters above may be different on your machine.

cheers
tim