Bug#585177: grub-common: grub-mkdevicemap print non stable names (/dev/[sh]dX)

[Vincent Danjean]

Package: grub-common
Version: 1.98+20100602-2
Severity: important

grub-mkdevicemap produce device names such as /dev/hda or /dev/sda.
However, these names can change over reboots. These device names are used (at
least) in the /boot/grub/device.map and in the debconf prompt of grub-pc to
choose disk to install grub into it.

Using these non persistant names leads to grave problems such as, during a
upgrade of grub-pc, installing (due to grub-pc postint) grub on an external
hard disk (/dev/sda this time) instead of the 'normal' hard disk.
  If /dev/sda is a usb key without partitions, this can even lead to data loss.

I recently experiment this problem twice: one time with an external disk on
/dev/sda when upgrading grub-pc, the second time when upgrading grub-pc after a
reboot to a 'libata' kernel (/dev/hda -> /dev/sdX)

Using /dev/disk/by-id/* when possible would be far better in my opinion.

  Regards,
   Vincent

-- System Information:
Debian Release: squeeze/sid
  APT prefers oldstable
  APT policy: (500, 'oldstable'), (500, 'unstable'), (500, 'testing'), (500, 'stable'), (1, 'experimental')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.34-1-amd64 (SMP w/2 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=fr_FR.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=fr_FR.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash

Versions of packages grub-common depends on:
ii  base-files              5.7              Debian base system miscellaneous f
ii  dpkg                    1.15.7.2         Debian package management system
ii  gettext-base            0.18-1           GNU Internationalization utilities
ii  install-info            4.13a.dfsg.1-5   Manage installed documentation in 
ii  libc6                   2.11.1-3         Embedded GNU C Library: Shared lib
ii  libdevmapper1.02.1      2:1.02.48-1      The Linux Kernel Device Mapper use
ii  libfreetype6            2.3.11-1         FreeType 2 font engine, shared lib
ii  zlib1g                  1:1.2.3.4.dfsg-3 compression library - runtime

Versions of packages grub-common recommends:
ii  os-prober                     1.38       utility to detect other OSes on a 

Versions of packages grub-common suggests:
pn  grub-emu                      <none>     (no description available)
pn  multiboot-doc                 <none>     (no description available)
pn  xorriso                       <none>     (no description available)

-- no debconf information