[Trisquel-users] Re : Issue with GRUB and existing /home partition in installing Trisquel mini

[lcerf]

Good.  I would still set the value of GID_MIN to 500 in /etc/login.defs.   
With the default GID_MIN, "jim" is not a normal group but a system group.  I  
honestly do not know what difference it makes (well, except for the commands  
'useradd', 'groupadd' and 'newusers' that create the groups).

[Trisquel-users] Re : Issue with GRUB and existing /home partition in installing Trisquel mini

[lcerf]

I should have told you to set the value of GID_MIN to 500 in /etc/login.defs  
before adding the user.  That value being 1000 (by default) is the reason for  
adduser's error, I believe.  When you write that you "changed the group ID",  
do you mean editing /etc/group to have 500 next to your login (if so, edit  
/etc/login.defs too) or changing the group owner of all your personal files  
('chgrp -R jim ~jim' or equivalent)?

[Trisquel-users] Re : Issue with GRUB and existing /home partition in installing Trisquel mini

[lcerf]

Instructions 7 and 11 of  
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2/Installing#via_ChRoot give you a  
shell with root privileges and, indeed, you then need to 'mount /dev/sda6  
/home'.


That said, you can also get a root terminal from GRUB's menu, using the "e"  
key to edit the entry you will boot and adding the "single" option to Linux  
(as far as I remember).  /home will be mounted with that technique.


Realizing how easy it is to get a root terminal for anybody with a physical  
access, you may then want to add recovery entries to GRUB's "Advanced options  
for Trisquel" (or whatever it is called).  Here is how:


Open /etc/default/grub in your favorite text editor (here 'nano') and using  
administrative privileges:

$ sudo nano /etc/default/grub
Add the character "#" at the beginning of the following line of  
/etc/default/grub:

GRUB_DISABLE_RECOVERY="true"
Save and quit;
Update GRUB:
$ sudo update-grub

Recovery entries boot in root terminals.

Your command is fine but, after reading some of 'man adduser', I am pretty  
sure it can simply be:

# adduser --uid 1 --gid 500 jim
Also, that command should create the group as well.

[Trisquel-users] Re : Issue with GRUB and existing /home partition in installing Trisquel mini

[lcerf]

You can get a root terminal using 'chroot' from another (installed or live)  
system.  Here is (too) comprehensive information on how to do so and then  
reinstall GRUB: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2/Installing#via_ChRoot


Instructions 7, 10, 11, 12 and 13 are certainly enough.  In fact there may  
not even be a need to reinstall GRUB (instruction 12): 'update-grub'  
(instruction 13) may be enough.


Still from that terminal, you need to set (e.g., with 'chown') the uid and  
gid of the files to match those of the created users/groups: they can be  
respectively read in the third and fourth column of /etc/passwd.  Or you  
delete those users (but not their home folders) and recreate them (e.g., with  
'adduser --uid ID') with the ids matching those of the files.  You can read  
those ids with 'stat /home/*' (well, assuming your /dev/sda6 was mounted in  
/home).  In fact, if your goal is to have /home shared among several  
GNU/Linux system, you must follow the second path (the uid and gid must be  
the same on all systems).