[solved] unable to get installed by any means!

[floke]

Ok so I've tried the new 2008 live cd install, but fell foul of its inability to copy over a kernel (!).
Then tried a stage3 tarball from a chrooted environment, but unable to run genkernel due to an absence of loop load support (or some such thing). So, I compile my own and add it to grub, but when selecting it from the menu I get a grub error 2, 'bad file or directory type', indicating that there is no such file - but on checking the /boot directory there's definitely one there (have now tried this twice!).

If anyone can help that that would be (extremely) good.

[cyrillic]

when selecting it from the menu I get a grub error 2, 'bad file or directory type', indicating that there is no such file ...

A missing file would give you grub error 15.

Can you post the contents of your grub.conf ?

[floke]

I have no grub.conf, since the installer failed to copy over the kernel, and grub refused to install on account of being unable to find a kernel. The only thing that was installed in /boot that has any kernelness about it is 'System.map-genkernel-x86-2.6.24-gentoo-r5'. I did compile a kernel via chroot, and added this to my working grub/menu.lst. The Gentoo stanza looks like:

title Gentoo 2008
root (hd0,7)
kernel /boot/kernel-2.6.24-gentoo-r5 root=/dev/sda8

(the 'kernel-2.6....' being the name of the compiled one). I've tried this also with a 'boot' line added, and also by chainloading. All with the same error.

[krinn]

your boot partition is sda6 and your root is sda8, right?

[zyko]

Ok so I've tried the new 2008 live cd install, but fell foul of its inability to copy over a kernel (!).

Don't be mad at all of Gentoo because of the installer. The installer is notoriously borked. Yet it seems to be presented in a way that implies a functional and officially recommended installation method. Some have speculated that this might be done on purpose to irritate a specific sub-fraction of new users (the one that doesn't read the fine print).

Refering to your problem:
Am I right in assuming that this is you: http://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=51393 ?

There you said:

The gui installer does everything fine except for copying over the kernel, which is fairly crucial, really. Even for a noob. So, back to stage 3 chrootiness it is. After all, I do now have the system. The 'only' thing I need is a kernel. How hard can it be?

This reads like you chrooted into the installation that was created by the installer instead of starting with a blank partition and the tarballs. Is that correct? I dont know if that's a good idea. You shouldn't trust the installer at all. Did you already try the official handbook, from start to finish?

Also, please give us your partition layout (with filesystems), this might help as well.

/edit: Gentoo might seem to be very inaccessible at first, but don't give up and don't forget that we're here to help you.

[floke]

Thanks for the help.

@ krinn: not sure where you get sda6 from - Gentoo is on sda8 (am using a grub menu.lst on sda5, but that should have nothing to do with it)

@ zyko: If the installer was designed not to work then that would be genius! And the Arch post was meant in humour, really, but it seems you got it, so no offence. It also seems a revised version of the live cd with the error fixed, so will give it a go later on.

Just for the record, btw, even if I never manage to get it going, I think the world's a better place with Gentoo in it.

(PS: Have edited the Arch post to make it clear that its supposed to be funny and not a distro-bash).

[krinn]

@ krinn: not sure where you get sda6 from - Gentoo is on sda8 (am using a grub menu.lst on sda5, but that should have nothing to do with it)

It was to show you the error.
We can guess your boot partition because you are telling grub where it is...
root (hd0,7) = first disk, partition 8 (grub count from 0, while linux count from 1) so sda8 in the grub you show.

And it is bad
if your boot partition is sda5 as you said, it should be root(hd0,4), else grub will try to boot from sda8 witch is also your root partition, and because it's your root partition you should have a /boot in there. That's good if you know what you are doing, but generally people follow the manual that try to direct people with a boot partition and not using the root for booting.

So if you didn't mount /boot and copy a kernel to /boot, that kernel will be copied in your /boot of your root partition, and as you are telling grub to boot from there, it will always try to boot that kernel, that might explain why you are unable to fix your boot.

It's a little bit hard to explain but you should fix your root(hd0,7) to root(hd0,4) and you'll go one step further to success.

[floke]

Not sure if I explained myself properly here:

Gentoo is on sda8. The gentoo /boot - along with a non-working kernel - is also on sda8
The sda5 is my Arch partition, which currently controls grub (ie the mbr points to sda5).
The grub menu.lst from which I choose options at startup is on sda5.
The Gentoo stanza points to sda8.

Thus:

root (hd0,7) [points to the /boot on sda8]
kernel /kernel/blah... root=/dev/sda8 [points to the kernel on sda8]

Thanks anyway though - I'll keep going, if only for the fun of it.

[Akhouk]

One way of checking what is going on is to get grub to drop to a shell. Specify your root(0,7). Then you can manually type kernel / followed by double tab and it should list the available files. Navigate your /boot folder and see which kernel you can find.

Sometimes I find fixing things from the grub shell lets me know exactly what should be in the grub.conf (menu.lst)

[floke]

The strange thing is, whenever I do this (for whichever stanza I'm editing), tab always pulls up the kernels from my Arch partition rather than the one specified by root (hd0,X). I reinstalled grub too, to see if that had any effect, but same result.

Anyway, I now have the 2008-r1 ready to go, so will try it in a few hours whes I get back to my machine.

Thanks again.

[idella4]

for what it's worth, I've developed the same problem, and your menu.lst or grub.conf (same things) look right. I can't understand why the others think you have a boot partition. I can't find where you said you have one.
Yours is like mine. You are OHHH now this hasn't been verified.
the penny dropped, maybe.
The grub is working from /dev/sda5, your Arch.
Like mine, your 'other' systems are to be added to the menu.lst in /boot/grub of the system on /dev/sda5/
i.e. in Arch's /boot/grub/menu.lst
While the mbr on /dev/sda is occupied from Arch, that is the menu,lst the it reads, never mind what the menu.lst says in your new gentoo. You may as well not have one. At boot grub reads from /dev/sda5!!!

Can you verify that is in place. Otherwise I have the same problem and still seek a solution

[floke]

Ok, so now I'm in! .... well, kind of

The new r-1 live installer worked perfectly, except that...

(a) No boot from grub. I had to put gentoo stanza on the grub of my chainloaded SuSE partition (don't ask). So now the mbr points to sda5 (Arch) which chainloads sda4 (SuSE) which gives me another grub from where I boot Gentoo (sda8). Still this isn't my main problem. This is...

(b) x doesn't start - something about a lack of AGP support, which apparently involves recompiling a kernel. So here we go again: kernel compiling as I write.

Wish me luck.

[floke]

All done!

Thanks to everyone who helped in this thread. It's much appreciated.

[terracotta_shore]

Although you've found a workaround by chainloading round the houses, or rather partitions, the reason why you were having grub/booting problems may be due to this little gotcha.

Interesting, I've just posted the same link on another thread. I've been stung with this one myself with Fedora 9 and Foresight Linux. Seems it's come to haunt Gentoo now.

[zyko]

(PS: Have edited the Arch post to make it clear that its supposed to be funny and not a distro-bash).

Don't you worry, everyone who has a Gentoo installation under their belt understands the frustration. I vaguely remember that once upon a time I might have done some ranting of my own

@grub

You can use a single /boot partition for all your installations (for simplicity's sake). If you want to use /dev/sda5 as /boot, make sure you have one single instance of grub as well as all kernels on sda5. Then point root to (hd0,4).

Your grub.conf/menu.lst might look like this:

# Arch
root (hd0,4)
kernel /kernel-2.6.24-arch-r5 root=/dev/sda6

# Suse
root (hd0,4)
kernel /kernel-2.6.24-suse-r5 root=/dev/sda7

# Gentoo
root (hd0,4)
kernel /kernel-2.6.24-gentoo-r5 root=/dev/sda8

The partitions are just examples, of course.

[floke]

Zyko,

That's genius. Works perfectly.
Thanks very much!