Baslinux mailing list

["David Moberg" <davidjmoberg AT lycos.com>]

----- Original Message -----
From: "sindi keesan" <keesan AT sdf.lonestar.org>
 
> > loadlin vmlinuz root=/dev/hda1 initrd=initrd.img
> 
> Where in Ubuntu would we find initrd?

boot/initrd.img is the standard place for an initrd.

> BL2 on ext2 does not need one, just the floppy or
> ramdisk versions do.

Bigger distributions sometimes need it for a regular
partition.

> >> VFS:  Cannot open root device "hdb2" or unknown-block(0,)
> >> Please append a correct "root=" boot option.
> 
> > Are you sure that hdb2 exists? Can you access it from BL2? Does
> Yes and yes.  We can mount it from BL2, and chroot to it (but there 
> is not a single 'rc' file like in BL3, rather dozens of them, and I 
> don't know how to actually get it to work after chrooting with the 
> wrong kernel).

Can you boot BL with 2.6 (installing the appropriate modules first)
and see if you can still mount hdb2?

> >> We copied vmlinuz to the BL2 directory and skipped the grub and
> >> lilo options.  The installation program said we could boot manually
> >> setting it to root=/dev/hdb2 so I copied over a BL2 boot file and
> >> changed zimage to vmlinuz.  We tried with and without ro.
> >>
> >> I can chroot to /dev/hdb2 from BL2 ramdisk but it has the wrong
> >> kernel. Can we boot BL2 with kernel 2.6 and chroot and run things
> >> properly?
> >
> > Mostly. You won't get a Ubuntu init, so some things won't work
> > right.
> 
> Can I run init after chrooting?

No. "Init is the parent of all processes" and must be the first thing
started in user space.

> I think to chroot to BL3 I just 
> run rc (but the paths are still wrong, they refer to directories I 
> dont' have in BL3 and I am still in shell bash instead of sh).
> 
> I just tried typing 'init' while chrooted and got 'Init is the 
> parent of all processes'.  BL3 has no login, but if Ubuntu does, 
> could we login after chrooting?  I don't even know how to login as 
> root there - it did not ask us to pick a root password.

You should be able to run the login command and successfully log in.

> > I find it easier to work on BL until it fits my hardware than try
> > to get something else to work right. The big distributions are just
> > too big, slow, complicated.
> 
> Same here, but my partner was wondering what he was missing.  He 
> already decided to switch to Slackware 9.1 to see a big 
> distribution (having given up on Slackware 8.1 but forgotten why, 
> tried to install Mandrake but it crashed during installation, given 
> up on Caldera, and discovered the Redhat boot CD won't boot.).  So 
> he set up three 2G partitions and was going to put BL2, SW9.1 and 
> something else on them.  In the meantime I copied over 36MB of BL3 
> to a smaller partition so he will have something usable.  I 
> suggested SuSE as an alternate linux since it lets you choose what 
> to leave out (then you can delete half of the rest).

Does SuSE start umpteen processes and thereby take a long time to
boot?

> >> This is one of two computers that would not boot loop BL3, but it
> >> works with BL2 RAMdisk or ext2 and ubuntu is ext2.
> >
> > Can you try on a better PC?
> 
> Better in what way?  It worked on this one except we did not 
> install a boot manager.  It insisted on 128MB RAM.  The neighbor 
> gave it to him because it has a live CD.  I don't know why he put 
> it on hard drive.
> 300MHz.

I meant to try it on a PC that can boot loop BL3.

David

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