On a x86 machine I did "emerge -D -uav world" and got a response that read in part as follows: * Messages for package sys-boot/grub-0.97-r9: * * To avoid automounting and autoinstalling with /boot, * just export the DONT_MOUNT_BOOT variable. * * *** IMPORTANT NOTE: you must run grub and install * the new version's stage1 to your MBR. Until you do, * stage1 and stage2 will still be the old version, but * later stages will be the new version, which could * cause problems such as an unbootable system. * This means you must use either grub-install or perform * root/setup manually! For more help, see the handbook: * http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-x86.xml?part=1&chap=10#grub-install-auto * To interactively install grub files to another device such as a USB * stick, just run the following and specify the directory as prompted: * emerge --config =grub-0.97-r9 * Alternately, you can export GRUB_ALT_INSTALLDIR=/path/to/use to tell * grub where to install in a non-interactive way.
After reading http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-x86.xml?part=1&chap=10#grub-install-auto I did "grep -v rootfs /proc/mounts > /etc/mtab". That seems to have produced the needed /etc/mtab file. Now I'm confused by the part of the manual with code listings 2.6 and 2.7 and the associated commentary. The manual suggests doing "grub-install --no-floppy /dev/sda" but later says "If your system does not have any floppy drives, add the --no-floppy option to the above command to prevent grub from probing the (non-existing) floppy drives." My machine has a floppy drive. Should I omit the --no-floppy option and just do "grub-install /dev/sda" ? -John -- John P. Burkett Department of Economics University of Rhode Island Kingston, RI 02881-0808 USA phone (401) 874-9195
