bugGNU GRUB - Bugs: bug #32525, Prober does not add Grub 2 boot...

 
 

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bug #32525: Prober does not add Grub 2 boot entries for OS's on SW RAID1 filesystems

Submitter:  Bozo the Coder <bozonius>
Submitted:  Fri 18 Feb 2011 02:04:30 AM UTC
   
 
Category:  Installation Severity:  Major
Priority:  5 - Normal Item Group:  Feature Request
Status:  Invalid Privacy:  Public
Assigned to:  None Originator Name: 
Open/Closed:  Closed Release:  1.98
Release:  Reproducibility:  Every Time
Planned Release:  None

Wed 23 Mar 2011 11:47:18 AM UTC, comment #2: 

As was discussed on IRC the problem is in os-prober, not GRUB.

Vladimir Serbinenko <phcoder>
Group administrator
Fri 18 Feb 2011 03:05:56 AM UTC, comment #1: 

I have submitted this as a bug to the debian-installer project.

Bozo the Coder <bozonius>
Fri 18 Feb 2011 02:04:30 AM UTC, original submission:  

When installing LinuxMint 9, which uses Grub 2 1.98, it failed to generate a grub boot entry for the CentOS 5.5 installation already present on the disk.  I attempted this twice in real hardware, and as I explain below, further attempts in virtual machines under VirtualBox.

It is reasonable to expect existing OS's on RAID'd partitions to be detected and included in the grub boot menu.  This problem persists even after installation is complete.  Further runs of grub-install and update-grub do not generate the missing OS.

Ultimately, I manually added entries for CentOS in 11centos, a script I added.  Now CentOS appears on the grub menu.  This will not be up to date after future kernel upgrades to CentOS of course.

DETAILS

I had the following real-world hardware configuration:

2 320 GB Hard Disks, with identical partition layouts and no hard errors as per smartmontools:

Partition 1: swap
Partition 2: linuxmint 9
Partition 3: CentOS 5.5 i386 (32bit)
Partition 4: LVM, mainly intended for CentOS, but for various purposes (irrelevant, but included for completeness)

Partitions 3 & 4 are RAID 1, but 1 & 2 are non-RAID. Also, all 4 partitions are primary type, not extended/logical.

I had CentOS 5.5 installed, up and running without any issues. The problem was that when I installed LM9, it did not add the CentOS partition to the grub 2 menu. I went through many fits trying to get CentOS to boot again. I was able to use rescuebootcd to restore the CentOS boot.

PROOF

I've duplicated 2 scenarios under a VirtualBox dualboot VM (very sweet, saved me a lot of headaches trying to get back to my CentOS partition in real hardware), replicating the partitioning more or less in proportion to the real-world hardware, laying out the virtual disk partitions in the same order as above.

The first scenario, I didn't bother with RAID. I installed CentOS 5.5 + VBox guest additions, no problems. CentOS boots. Then I installed VM9 and guest additions, no problems either. CentOS shows up in the grub 2 boot menu that LinuxMint 9 installed.  All boot entries in the menu worked.

In the second scenario, I tried the same thing, but this time simulating RAID 1 for CentOS to model what I have in the real hardware world. RAID 1 under VM is rather slow, even on my brand-new AM3 system. With patience, the CentOS 5.5 install completed and I installed the guest additions for VBox with no issues. CentOS booted. Then I installed VM9 with guest additions, no problems. But this time, CentOS did not show up in the grub 2 boot menu.

CONCLUSION

It seems grub 2 WILL detect other OS's so long as they are NOT on a RAID drive.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Of course, if you need me to contribute further by attempting additional tests, I'd be happy to.

[Additional notes just fyi: I carefully checkpointed my VMs after getting CentOS installed so that I could avoid having to do that again. It's fairly simple, and I have it memorized at this point, having done it so many times already, but still it takes a lot of time. Also, I saved both of my multiboot scenarios in case I am requested to supply more information or run further trials, or even export them for developer examination (after changing my passwords...).]

Bozo the Coder <bozonius>

 

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    Date Changed by Updated Field Previous Value => Replaced by
    2011-03-23 phcoder StatusNone Invalid
        Open/ClosedOpen Closed

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