Bug#497791: Bug #497791, confirmation

[Adolf Winterer]

Am Monday 27 July 2009 16:25:29 schrieb Felix Zielcke:
> Am Montag, den 27.07.2009, 15:26 +0200 schrieb Adolf Winterer:
> > Hi,
> >
> > I can confirm the problem. This is the sequence that leads to the
> > problem:
> >
> > * Install Lenny 5.0.2
> > This will automatically use grub2, the system is perfectly bootable.
> >
> > * Add Squeeze to the sources.list
> > After updating the package list the packages grub-common and grub-pc are
> > shown as updateable.
> >
> > * Update grub-common and grub-pc
> > During the update a requestor shows up in the terminal window of Synaptic
> > asking for the device to install grub into. Here it is /dev/sda3. The
>
> You probable mean /dev/sda. We don't ask for partitions.

I must have misread the prompt then. On the other hand, grub is _not_ 
installed in the MBR of the device (where rEFIt resides), but in the 
partition /dev/sda3. How could the procedure work correctly if /dev/sda is 
specified.

> > requestor pops up again, this time I only hit the enter key as there is
> > only one target to install to. The installation process continues then
> > with no apparent error.
>
> If you get asked twice then this may be a bug in Synaptic. I never used
> it.

I use Synaptic quite often, normally with good results. But yes, there had 
been some strange things in the past (e.g. with LILO the non-execution of the 
lilo command was one of these).

> I just installed now lenny in a vm, upgraded grub-pc and grub-common to
> squeeze and selected /dev/sda and rebooted. Worked fine.

What was your partitition layout? Was grub in the MBR of the device?

> Then I did dpkg-reconfigure grub-pc to remove the selections of /dev/sda
> and tried the same.
> And it failed with unknown command initrd.
> Replacing the root=UUID with root=/dev/sda1 didn't help.
>
> Well anyway it's a bug we already fixed and that's why we implemented
> the debconf prompt now.

Hmm, but I had the problem. Could it be possible this only occurs, if grub 
does not reside in the MBR?

> Are you sure that /dev/sda was seletected the 2nd time you were asked?

There was no selection by option list, it was a prompt that asked for a 
string, anything could have been entered.

> Did you see the output of grub-install?
> Maybe try dpkg-reconfigure grub-pc

I will try later with another system that needs to be installed and updated.

> > * Permanent solution
> > Something is wrong with using UUIDs in connection with booting, because
> > uncommenting the according line in /etc/defaults/grub:
> > GRUB_DISABLE_LINUX_UUID=true
> > and running update-grub changes the file /boot/grub/grub.cfg. The line
> > with "search ... --fsuid ..." is still present, but the line with "linux
> > ..." has changed to reflect /dev/sda3 as boot device.
> >
> > Therefore the presence of the line containing "search ..." or the length
> > of the line do not seem to be a problem, but using the UUID is.
>
> That's maybe for you a solution. But the real solution is to make sure
> that grub-install gets run when the package gets upgraded, so you won't
> be affected by other bugs in the parser etc.
> For example there were now in the squeeze version a few parser bug
> fixes, though they didn't affect the default generated config.

I will issue a manual grub-install before reboot with the next installation 
and report back.

Thank you for supporting me.

Adolf Winterer