Installing GRUB 2 on a CompactFlash card

Installing GRUB 2 on a CompactFlash card

[Colin D Bennett]

I want to install GRUB 2 on a CompactFlash card, which I will boot on
my Mini-ITX VIA C3 system for testing, by attaching the CF card to an
IDE-CF adapter.

Before I run grub-install, I wanted to get a confirmation that I'm
doing the right thing, so I don't end up wiping out my development
system's boot partition or something.  Here's my setup:

 Development workstation:
  Running Linux.
  Hard drives on /dev/hdXX and /dev/sdXX.
  The CompactFlash card will appear as /dev/sdc or something.
    (let's assume it's /dev/sdc)

 Target system:
  IDE controller - connected to IDE-CompactFlash adapter.


If I create one partition on the CF card, for GRUB, I assume I should
set up my grub.cfg to refer to it as (hd0,1) since this will only be
used on the TARGET SYSTEM, right?

Then on my development workstation I will do:
   grub-install /dev/sdc

But will this affect my development workstation's "/boot" ?  I want to
install only to my CompactFlash card; is this possible without messing
with my dev machine's filesystem?

If I have /dev/sdc1 (the CF card's partition) mounted
at /media/grubtest, can I just do
   grub-install --root-directory=/media/grubtest /dev/sdc


Thanks!
Colin

Re: Installing GRUB 2 on a CompactFlash card

[Pavel Roskin]

Quoting Colin D Bennett <colin@gibibit.com>:

> If I create one partition on the CF card, for GRUB, I assume I should
> set up my grub.cfg to refer to it as (hd0,1) since this will only be
> used on the TARGET SYSTEM, right?

I suggest that you use the current GRUB from CVS and use UUID to refer  
to any drives.  update-grub will generate the new style grub.cfg, but  
be sure to back up your current grub.cfg in case it gets overwritten.

> Then on my development workstation I will do:
>    grub-install /dev/sdc
>
> But will this affect my development workstation's "/boot" ?

I don't think current GRUB will allow you to do that, but if  
cross-device installs were supported, it would indeed overwrite  
/boot/grub

> I want to
> install only to my CompactFlash card; is this possible without messing
> with my dev machine's filesystem?

Yes, I did it several times.

> If I have /dev/sdc1 (the CF card's partition) mounted
> at /media/grubtest, can I just do
>    grub-install --root-directory=/media/grubtest /dev/sdc

Yes, that should work.

In case you are not sure if the system boot was affected, I suggest  
that you reinstall grub on your hard drive the way it was installed  
before attempting a reboot.  Also make the rescue image with  
grub-mkrescue, write it to a CD and keep it handy in case you need to  
recover anything.

-- 
Regards,
Pavel Roskin

Re: Installing GRUB 2 on a CompactFlash card

[Pavel Roskin]

On Fri, 2008-06-06 at 02:11 -0400, Pavel Roskin wrote:
> Quoting Colin D Bennett <colin@gibibit.com>:
> 
> > If I create one partition on the CF card, for GRUB, I assume I should
> > set up my grub.cfg to refer to it as (hd0,1) since this will only be
> > used on the TARGET SYSTEM, right?
> 
> I suggest that you use the current GRUB from CVS and use UUID to refer  
> to any drives.  update-grub will generate the new style grub.cfg, but  
> be sure to back up your current grub.cfg in case it gets overwritten.
> 
> > Then on my development workstation I will do:
> >    grub-install /dev/sdc
> >
> > But will this affect my development workstation's "/boot" ?
> 
> I don't think current GRUB will allow you to do that, but if  
> cross-device installs were supported, it would indeed overwrite  
> /boot/grub

P.S. Current GRUB is broken.  Please use the version as of June 5.  If
ext3 is involved, use the version from May 19.  That won't have UUID,
but it would be safer.

Things may be fixed soon, even hours from now, but I cannot give any
promises.  Sorry for inconvenience.

-- 
Regards,
Pavel Roskin

Re: Installing GRUB 2 on a CompactFlash card

[Colin D Bennett]

On Fri, 06 Jun 2008 18:57:39 -0400
Pavel Roskin <proski@gnu.org> wrote:

> On Fri, 2008-06-06 at 02:11 -0400, Pavel Roskin wrote:
> > Quoting Colin D Bennett <colin@gibibit.com>:
> > 
> > > If I create one partition on the CF card, for GRUB, I assume I
> > > should set up my grub.cfg to refer to it as (hd0,1) since this
> > > will only be used on the TARGET SYSTEM, right?
> > 
> > I suggest that you use the current GRUB from CVS and use UUID to
> > refer to any drives.  update-grub will generate the new style
> > grub.cfg, but be sure to back up your current grub.cfg in case it
> > gets overwritten.
> > 
> > > Then on my development workstation I will do:
> > >    grub-install /dev/sdc
> > >
> > > But will this affect my development workstation's "/boot" ?
> > 
> > I don't think current GRUB will allow you to do that, but if  
> > cross-device installs were supported, it would indeed overwrite  
> > /boot/grub
> 
> P.S. Current GRUB is broken.  Please use the version as of June 5.  If
> ext3 is involved, use the version from May 19.  That won't have UUID,
> but it would be safer.
> 
> Things may be fixed soon, even hours from now, but I cannot give any
> promises.  Sorry for inconvenience.

What is the problem with post-June 5 GRUB?  Has it been fixed?  I will
use June 5 CVS for now then.

Re: Installing GRUB 2 on a CompactFlash card

[Pavel Roskin]

On Mon, 2008-06-09 at 07:30 -0700, Colin D Bennett wrote:
> On Fri, 06 Jun 2008 18:57:39 -0400
> Pavel Roskin <proski@gnu.org> wrote:
> 
> > P.S. Current GRUB is broken.  Please use the version as of June 5.  If
> > ext3 is involved, use the version from May 19.  That won't have UUID,
> > but it would be safer.
> > 
> > Things may be fixed soon, even hours from now, but I cannot give any
> > promises.  Sorry for inconvenience.
> 
> What is the problem with post-June 5 GRUB?  Has it been fixed?  I will
> use June 5 CVS for now then.

It's fixed now.  It was an incorrect change to the code handling
partitions in userspace utilities.

-- 
Regards,
Pavel Roskin