On 22/10/99 Jocke wrote:
I have 2 debian partitions the one that works are on hda2 and the one
that messed up is on hda5.
I have some old vmlinuz + System.map in /boot
Could anyone guide me thru this so I can get my hda5 debian to boot again ?
Can I fix it from "this" (hda2) partition or do I have to use a rescue disc or
something and recompile or what ?
Hoping for some help!
do you have lilo configured so you can boot the other partition? if
not you should do that after to get this straightened out, and then
alway leave your old kernel in place and have a lilo image for it so
if the new one fails you can just boot the previous without
problem... i will give you example lilo .conf at the end so you can
do this.
if you have successfully booted to your unbroken root hda2 then you
can mount -t ext2 /dev/hda5 /mnt to get access to your messed up
root, if you still have the working kernel there then simply edit
your /etc/lilo.conf (on hda2) and add
image=/mnt/boot/vmlinuz #whatever working kernel name is
label=linux.good
root=/dev/hda5
read-only
make sure that you also have prompt in there and run lilo when you
reboot press tab at the lilo boot: prompt and you will see linux.good
so type linux.good and you should boot into hda5 with the working
kernel you put there.
you can use the above convention to dual boot between different linux
setups just make sure to mount the appropriate filesystems before
updating lilo.
my lilo.conf to dual boot debian and redhat with support for one
backup kernel (debian side):
boot=/dev/hda
map=/boot/map
install=/boot/boot.b
prompt
timeout=50
default=linux
image=/vmlinuz
label=debian
alias=linux
read-only
root=/dev/hda1
image=/vmlinuz.old
label=debian.old
read-only
root=/dev/hda1
image=/redhat/boot/vmlinuz
label=redhat
read-only
root=/dev/hda2
image=/redhat/boot/vmlinuz.old
label=redhat.old
read-only
root=/dev/hda2
on the redhat side the /redhat part of the paths are deleted and the
debian parts (and the map and install lines) have /debian added to
them, each time I run lilo I first make sure that either /debian or
/redhat is mounted (the root filesystem of the other system)
depending on which i am running, I also make sure that the symlinks
point to the right kernels one old/previous one current then I can
boot into anything i want right from the lilo prompt.
note: I always use the debian lilo binary, so if I boot into redhat i
use /debian/sbin/lilo to update lilo this is to keep the bootloader
consistent.
if you build kernels the debian way then the vmlinuz.old symlink
should be taken care of for you but check it anyway :)
Best Regards,
Ethan Benson
To obtain my PGP key: http://www.alaska.net/~erbenson/pgp/