first, here's the drive setup
hda1 30G partition on a 40G PATA drive root partition for slack 13.0. showed up on slack 13.37 install as sdb1
hda2 10G partition for backing up files. showed up on slack 13.37 install as sdb2

sda1 30G partition on 1T SATA drive /home for both installs
sda2 950G partition on 1Tsata drive root partition for slack 13.37 install


the boot config for 13.0 reads:
the boot config for 13.37 reads:
the lilo config for 13.37 did not see a slack 13.0 install.
the machine still boots into slack 13.0

could somebody give me a clue how to set this up. is lilo for 13.37 going to see the PATA drive as hda or sdb?. i could probably get it to work by editing the lilo.conf for 13.0, because sda2 is the same in both installs..... it's also been a couple of years since i messed with dual boot, so i'll be reading the manpage for lilo.conf.

It should be sdb1 then, because the installer and slack use the same kernel.

i'm trying to do a dual boot, so i don't lose any work (which is also the reason for the common /home partition) while i get apps and such installed in 13.37 that i'm already using in 13.0. so far i've managed to boot into 13.37 (by swapping boot first drives in cmos), but can't get into my user account because 13.37 reset my permissions to user 1000 and group 1000 so maybe i need to copy some stuff (like /etc/passwd) from the original install into the new one...

apparently the installer (13.37) sees sda as the first disk, and 13.0 sees hda (sdb) as the first disk, which is why lilo in 13.0 put the MBR of the PATA disk, and 13.37 put it on the MBR of the SATA disk, and it doesn't matter what the boot drive is set to in cmos, but the two different versions of slack see two different things for which piece of hardware is first

I had this problem so I setup lilo to boot from the old install, and booted the new install from a usb-boot-pen which was created when I did the new install. Once I had the new install setup as I wanted it I ran lilo on the new install. If I want to access the old install I can boot from the install cd.

Not really a fix, but a reasonable work around.

samac

this was documented by pat a long time ago on the 2.6.27 kernel Slackware 13.0 and was carried to the latest 13.37
read here for it
Thank you Pat 13.37 solid

well i guess i can live with the "dual boot" method of changing the boot order in cmos then, at least for now, but i'm going to have to create a different user account in 13.37 because my common /home directory causes permission problems when i switch between versions unless copying the original /etc/passwd file to the new install will cure it.

You can only have one MBR. Each time you run lilo you are altering the mbr

boot into 13.0
upgrade the lilo package to the version in 13.37

I would suggest the following in your lilo config file
Add this in the global section
boot = /dev/sda

Add after
# End LILO global section

# Linux bootable partition config begins
image = /boot/(your name for the 13.0 kernel)
root = /dev/sda1
label = Linux-13.0
read-only
# Linux bootable partition config ends
# Linux bootable partition config begins
image = /mnt/13.37/boot/(your name for the 13.37 kernel)
root = /dev/sdb2
label = Linux-13.37
read-only


Then alter your /etc/fstab to mount the 13.37 boot directory as /mnt/13.37/boot/(your name for your 13.37 kernel)
and mount it

run lilo
on reboot lilo should offer Linux-13.0 and Linux-13.37 as boot options

that should help
but please backup anything that is valuable

using the same username & password in each system and a common home will work but 2 different versions of KDE will not

This is how I sextupple boot
But I am not good at explaining myself

john

If I may suggest another solution, boot from the install CD / DVD of 13.37.* When you're done, mount /dev/sda2 in /mnt. Mount proc and dev into /mnt/proc and /mnt/dev and chroot into /mnt. When you're there, mount 13.0's partition somewhere, like /mnt/hd.

Then you open lilo.conf. You need to know which hd gets called first by the BIOS. If it's the 40GB drive, add this:
If it's the 1T drive, replace sdb with sda. Then, add the two entries. You have to use the temporary mount point as the reference for lilo or it will fail, so it will be something like this:

Then you run lilo. This will update your MBR and will add both Slacks to the menu. Then you exit chroot and reboot. Let us know if it works.

* I don't know if 13.0's lilo will boot 13.37.