Care to play with grub2-graphical?

Shaika-Dzari · 2009-02-06 01:54:29

Hello!

First of all, I'm not a TU or a dev so if I made some error setting up the repo, please tell me.

Add this line in your pacman.conf:

* for i686

[grub2-graphical]
Server = http://4nakama.net/arch/i686/

* for x86_64

[grub2-graphical]
Server = http://4nakama.net/arch/x86_64/

Install it with:

pacman -Sy grub2-gfxmenu-bzr

Follow FrozenFox indication after that.

####################################
To build it yourself, you need to setup a chroot 32.
Howto : http://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Arc … _Arch64.3F

Or you use a 32 bits installation of Archlinux (This is what I did).
This is the PKGBUILD i used: http://4nakama.net/arch/pkgbuild/PKGBUILD

Beware, grub2 did not really build under x86_64. What you actually do with this pkgbuild, you're building grub2 statically with lib32. This is why x86_64 pkg is bigger.

You you have any error, tell me. I will try to update the pkgbuild sometime.

FrozenFox · 2009-02-06 02:26:23

If it was supposed to be up already, your repository -appears- to be down, though the rest of the page can be accessed. Either that, or you can't access the /arch or /arch/i686 folders directly. If you're working on it, nevermind this comment

Thank you for the updated information. I have changed the main post to add some clarity and refer back to your post.

na12 · 2009-02-06 11:48:27

Does grub2-gfxmenu-bzr conflicting with splashy?

FrozenFox · 2009-02-06 15:28:56

Splashy? No, it shouldn't conflict, I can't fathom why it would. I'm pretty sure I used splashy with this before personally. I am currently using it with fbsplash on my pc, which is more or less the same as splashy but with some stuff built into the kernel. In case you or anyone else is confused and doesn't understand precisely what grub2 is, let me try to explain.. Grub2 is a graphical bootloader (skinnable os boot menu), whereas splashy is a graphical boot splash (skinnable os loading screen that starts after the boot menu). If you want to keep using splashy, when it comes to the step of adding your entries to grub.cfg, you need to remember to copy your corresponding splashy theme lines to your linux kernel line, ie "quiet vga=791 splash".

Your system as far as major customizable graphical possibilities shows up in this order:

0) (BIOS Loads..)
1) Graphical Boot Loader (boot menu: GRUB-*, GRUB2-*, SYSLINUX, LILO, etc)
ie: OS selector, http://grub.gibibit.com/Theme_ubuntu1_menu.jpg
2) Boot Splash (loading screen: SPLASHY, FBSPLASH/GENSPLASH, BOOTSPLASH )
ie: OS loading screen, http://home.arcor.de/helmut.schlattl/ge … silent.jpg
3) Login Screen Splash (login screen: GDM, KDM, XDM, SLIM)
ie: OS login screen, http://projects.gnome.org/gdm/images/2- … -Style.png
4) X Wallpaper (wallpaper shown extremely briefly *1-2 sec* before/after loading the login screen and as a default wallpaper for some window managers that dont have their own wallpaper deal, such as TWM that comes with X.org)
ie: OS wallpaper, black/color or http://dr-photoshop.com/zfile/tutorials … lpaper.jpg
5) Desktop Environment Splash (splash screen shown after you log in, while your desktop loads, if you use a larger environment like KDE or Gnome)
ie: GUI loading screen, http://zenstarstudio.com/install/full/ubuntu_0007.gif
6) Desktop Wallpaper (obviously you know what this one is)
ie: GUI wallpaper, http://staging.altonlabs.com/ubuntu/hardy.png
7) Then you can skin the style/color (QT) or appearance (GTK) of your major toolkits (GTK/QT) once everything is loaded.
ie: Program looks, http://www.silvestre.com.ar/wp-content/ … /myGtk.png

Hopefully this list eliminates any and all confusion, and allows for users who happen to come across this thread (whether looking for it or not, particularly from other distributions -- as I imagine most Archers know this already) to understand.

Last edited by FrozenFox (2009-02-06 15:51:28)

Shaika-Dzari · 2009-02-06 23:02:38

FrozenFox wrote:

If it was supposed to be up already, your repository -appears- to be down, though the rest of the page can be accessed. Either that, or you can't access the /arch or /arch/i686 folders directly. If you're working on it, nevermind this comment
Thank you for the updated information. I have changed the main post to add some clarity and refer back to your post.

You can't browse the repositery with a web browser but pacman should be able to retreive the information and the package with the command I gave.

@+

FrozenFox · 2009-02-06 23:40:58

Ah, I see. Thanks

FrozenFox · 2009-02-11 15:36:51

I have a question for you guys.

I'm about to update the pkgbuild soon to add a few more parts to the conflicts= line (grub-gfx, grub-gfxmenu, grub2-svn, grub-915resolution) and I'm considering figuring out how to do post-install messages n such to alert the user to be sure and look at this thread, in addition to cleaning up the pkgbuild some, and submitting it to AUR.

Aur post -- Good idea, bad idea, neutral? Alternate suggestions? I think it would make it more convenient for users in general and Shaika-Dzari for his repo. I'm primarily concerned about people not reading the post-install message to refer to this thread (or perhaps a wiki entry if i or someone else feels like making one) and screwing up their machines. I suppose considering all that are currently on aur its not much to worry about though, and this is Arch anyway, hehe.

.. On that note, wiki entry? Or do the instructions seem to be too specific and lengthy for a wiki entry? Suggestions as far as that goes? Would be awesome if someone could make one or suggest a better way to format my post to fit the bill. More or less copy n pasting my post instructions seems rather.. unprofessional and unlike the wiki in general I've seen. With the huge number of visits to this thread (the most I've ever had for sure!), I think it may be useful.

Last edited by FrozenFox (2009-03-03 08:56:04)

mots · 2009-03-08 16:14:20

Hey, I tried to install grub2-graphical using your instructions, non-graphical boot seems to work fine, but with graphical boot activated, I get a black screen followed by a reboot... Help? (I have a seperate /boot, GPU's a 8800M GTX, if that helps)

Here's my grub.cfg:

insmod biosdisk
insmod pc
insmod font
insmod vbe
insmod gfxterm
insmod videotest
insmod tga
insmod png
insmod gfxmenu

set menuviewer="terminal"
#set menuviewer="gfxmenu"

#set theme="/boot/grub/themes/ubuntu2/theme.txt"
#set theme="/boot/grub/themes/ubuntu1/theme.txt"
#set theme="/boot/grub/themes/winter/theme.txt"
set theme="/grub/themes/proto/theme.txt"

# TODO: fix GRUB script parser -- it doesn't handle a space at the end of the line in a menu entry.

####################
#### BEGIN MENU ####

set timeout=8
#set default="3"
#set fallback="2 1"

# Entry 0 - Arch Linux
menuentry "Arch Linux|class=linuxmint,linux,os" {
    set root=(hd0,1)
    linux  /vmlinuz26 root=/dev/disk/by-uuid/e9f124f0-82ca-4d7e-ae3f-8ca40352ffb0 ro vga=869
    initrd /kernel26.img
}

# Entry 2 - Windows XP
menuentry "Windows XP|class=windows xp,windows,os" {
    set root=(hd0,4)
    chainloader +1
}

####  END MENU  ####
####################

# Choose the font for gfxterm.
set gfxterm_font="Fixed 12"

# Load fonts.
# Generated with:
#  ls *.pf2 | perl -pe 's{^}{loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/}'
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/10x20.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/4x6.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/5x7.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/5x8.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/6x10.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/6x12.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/6x13B.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/6x13O.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/6x13.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/6x9.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/7x13B.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/7x13O.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/7x13.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/7x14B.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/7x14.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/8x13B.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/8x13O.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/8x13.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/9x15B.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/9x15.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/9x18B.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/9x18.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/anorexia.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/aqui.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/clR6x12.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/cure.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/drift.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/edges.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/fkp.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/gelly.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/glisp-bold.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/glisp.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-10.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-12.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-14.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-18.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-24.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-8.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-10.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-12.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-14.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-18.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-24.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-8.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/helvR12.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/kates.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/lime.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/mints-mild.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/mints-strong.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-10.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-12.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-14.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-18.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-24.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-8.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-10.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-12.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-14.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-18.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-24.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-8.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/nu.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/smoothansi.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/snap.pf2
loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/gnu-unifont-2008-04-06.pf2

FrozenFox · 2009-03-08 18:35:10

Hmm. Try setting the menuviewer back to gfxmenu and set the root to mount by the regular device name out of curiosity, instead of by UUID.

Also, in boriscougar's example on the second page, his theme line appears to be unchanged from the default and working properly:

set theme="/boot/grub/themes/ubuntu2/theme.txt"

The same follows for tehswift's example, whom I think is also on separate partitions, but his setup looks a little different, so I'm not fully sure.

If that doesn't help, you -might- have more luck with the new pkgbuilds i will be putting up soon. I meant to put them up days ago, but i've been rather lazy and haven't felt like typing up and checking instructions. I'm sorry I can't be of more direct help, as I'm using a combined / and /boot, but I may be switching soon myself, and will put up instructions accordingly if you're still interested and haven't gotten it to work by then.

Last edited by FrozenFox (2009-03-08 18:44:53)

mots · 2009-03-10 16:00:16

Hm, doesn't work that way either, it complains about not being able to find the theme file and then defaults to text mode...

FrozenFox · 2009-03-12 22:20:17

Mots and anyone else with separate / and /boot problems,

I've just installed fresh with my new pkgbuilds on separate / and /boot, and ran into the problem of it nagging about a missing theme, and subsequently solved it.

Here's what I did, and how I changed the file. The important info is #1 and #7.

--------
1) Installed Arch and edited /etc/fstab accordingly:
* / is 4 gb ext4, located at /dev/sdb10 in Arch, referred to in grub as (hd0,10)
* /boot is 1gb [major overkill!] ext4, located at /dev/sdb9 in Arch, referred to in grub as (hd0,9)
--------

2) Removed grub, and installed my 2 grub2-gfxmenu pkgbuilds included below this post [Yeah, I WILL start a new post on the end of this thread with better instructions.. later though. x_x The files are there!], grub2-gfxmenu-overlay and grub2-gfxmenu
3) Edited /boot/grub/grub.cfg to point to the right partition
4) Typed reboot -- OOPS, NOO NOT YET-- damn. Forgot to do "grub-install /dev/sdb". Well, crap. So i went into the arch livecd, and did all sorts of mounting and chroot magic to do grub-install /dev/sdb.
5) Okay, good? Rebooted.. nope. Apparently I forgot something. ..... on further inspection, I failed to mount sdb9 as /boot while chrooted, so it installed to a /boot folder in sdb10 and thus was wasted effort. Well, crap. So I repeated step 4, but remembered to do that.
6) Rebooted.. Yay, all good. Except no gfx theme, its nagging that it's missing. Text mode works fine, but the root= line was wrong, so I fixed it. All good.

---------
7) Tweaked around with the grub.cfg file annd.. got it all working well. Here's a copy of my separate / and /boot grub.cfg, working properly. NOTE that it uses MY resolution/gfxmode, MY archfox theme and points to MY /boot partition, You will need to CHANGE THOSE THREE LINES and TWEAK THE MENUENTRIES to your correct setup [the --class format ONLY WORKS ON THE NEWER PKGBUILDS at the bottom of this thread. If you ARE NOT USING THOSE, then use the OLD STYLE MENU ENTRIES or grub will freak out.]. The differences are that I added a "set root=" line, and I changed all /boot/grub to say /grub (including allllll the font lines, all the theme lines, etc). I don't remember changing anything else, but I might have.
---------

set gfxmode=1024x768
insmod biosdisk
insmod pc
insmod font
insmod vbe
insmod gfxterm
insmod videotest
insmod tga
insmod png
insmod gfxmenu

#set menuviewer="terminal"
set menuviewer="gfxmenu"

# THIS IS THE /BOOT PARTITION
set root=(hd0,9)

#set theme="/grub/themes/ubuntu2/theme.txt"
#set theme="/grub/themes/ubuntu1/theme.txt"
#set theme="/grub/themes/winter/theme.txt"
#set theme="/grub/themes/proto/theme.txt"
set theme="/grub/themes/archfox/theme.txt"

# TODO: fix GRUB script parser -- it doesn't handle a space at the end of the line in a menu entry.

####################
#### BEGIN MENU ####

set timeout=8
set default="0"
set fallback="1"

# Entry 0 - Arch Overlord
menuentry "Arch Overlord" --class "linuxmint" --class "linux" --class "os" {
    set root=(hd0,9)
    linux /vmlinuz26 root=/dev/sdb10 ro
    initrd /kernel26.img
}

# Entry 1 - Arch Ext3
menuentry "Arch Ext3" --class "linuxmint" --class "linux" --class "os" {
    set root=(hd0,2)
    linux /boot/vmlinuz26 root=/dev/sdb2 ro quiet vga=795 splash
    initrd /boot/kernel26.img
}

# Entry 2 - Debian Lenny
menuentry "Debian Lenny" --class "debian" --class "linux" --class "os" {
    set root=(hd0,7)
    linux /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.26-1-686 root=/dev/sda7 ro quiet vga=795 splash nolapic irqpoll
    initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.26-1-686
}

# Entry 3 - Fedora Cambridge
menuentry "Fedora 10" --class "ubuntu" --class "linux" --class "os" {
    set root=(hd0,8)
    linux /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.27.12-170.2.5.fc10.i686 root=/dev/sdb8 ro quiet vga=795 splash nolapic irqpoll
    initrd /boot/initrd-2.6.27.12-170.2.5.fc10.i686.img
}

# Entry 4 - Windows 7 / XP
menuentry "Windows 7 / XP" --class "windows xp" --class "windows" --class "os" {
    set root=(hd0,1)
    chainloader +1
}

# Entry 5 - OSX Leopard
menuentry "OSX Leopard" --class "gentoo" --class "linux" --class "os" {
    set root=(hd1,2)
    #chainloader /usr/standalone/i386/boot.efi
    multiboot (hd1,2)/boot/boot_v9
}


####  END MENU  ####
####################

# Choose the font for gfxterm.
set gfxterm_font="Fixed 12"

# Load fonts.
# Generated with:
#  ls *.pf2 | perl -pe 's{^}{loadfont /boot/grub/fonts/}'
loadfont /grub/fonts/10x20.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/4x6.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/5x7.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/5x8.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/6x10.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/6x12.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/6x13B.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/6x13O.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/6x13.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/6x9.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/7x13B.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/7x13O.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/7x13.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/7x14B.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/7x14.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/8x13B.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/8x13O.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/8x13.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/9x15B.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/9x15.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/9x18B.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/9x18.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/anorexia.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/aqui.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/clR6x12.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/cure.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/drift.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/edges.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/fkp.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/gelly.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/glisp-bold.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/glisp.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-10.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-12.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-14.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-18.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-24.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-8.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-10.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-12.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-14.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-18.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-24.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/Helvetica-Bold-8.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/helvR12.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/kates.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/lime.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/mints-mild.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/mints-strong.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-10.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-12.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-14.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-18.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-24.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-8.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-10.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-12.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-14.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-18.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-24.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/New_Century_Schoolbook-Bold-8.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/nu.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/smoothansi.pf2
loadfont /grub/fonts/snap.pf2

Hope that helps

Oh, and yes. I do love mah boot menu. I'm adding opensolaris next. Unfortunately, I can't get freebsd or pcbsd to even load into the installer. I suspect it doesn't like my sata drive.

One more thing, I'm aware I am a little verbose, so people tend to ignore bits of what I say. So, I underlined and capitalized info that skipping over would be a major problem for anyone who would. I'm not trying to 'yell'

***********************************************************************************************
***********************************************************************************************

Here are the 2 new pkgbuilds + associated files. I will post the direct text contents in a separate post later.

Also later, I will post further instructions for those who don't already know what to do beyond me simply saying "remove grub/grub2/grub2-gfxmenu/whatev, makepkg em, pacman -U em starting with the overlay, grub-install /dev/yourBootDrive, and edit your grub.cfg as necessary".

Here you go, grab and install both files:
[EDIT: I have updated the files here and redone the tutorial. Please go back to the first page of this thread and get the stuff there. The mistakes mentioned below this text should be gone. If you installed those, please install fresh again from the files given there on the main page.]

For those reading this, there is a typo in the install file post-install instructions for grub-gfxmenu. It should be /sbin/grub-install not /sbin/install-grub. I will fix that whenever I get this bloody machine operating again.

It also seems the permissions in the pkgbuild don't need to be set. You can remove -m 644 / -m644 stuff in there. It works either way, and I will fix this in the next pkgbuild, but in case you're one of those who wants to have everything perfect, there you go. It works, I just couldn't view permissions on pkg installed files unless done as root/sudo (should never happen!), it showed up as question marks. Removing the -m 644 and remake/reinstall fixes it, but I'm working on figuring out why/how.

If there's anything wrong with them or I forgot to include something in the tar files, let me know. They worked okay for me twice, via ext3 with / and /boot combined, and ext4 with / and /boot separate (with tweaking).

Last edited by FrozenFox (2009-04-05 21:17:53)

mots · 2009-03-14 14:59:41

Yay, it works now...
Well, kinda at least
Instead of text, I only get weird looking squares and selecting an entry takes forever... Care to share a prebuilt package? I think at least the first problem is caused by my build system...

FrozenFox · 2009-03-14 15:25:22

If you're getting weird looking squares, it means it can't find the fonts listed in grub.cfg.

I suggest:

1) Check and see if all those font files are indeed in /boot/grub or whatnot. I'm sure this is not the problem, but it doesn't hurt to look.
2) Check and make sure the ending part of your grub.cfg that lists all the fonts is set up like mine. If you used set root=(whatev) like I did earlier in the cfg file, you need to remove the prefix /boot from the font lines, probably. You may (but probably don't) need to point it to the correct font location by prefixing those lines with (hdX,Y) according to your setup.

At the moment, I broke my whole system repartitioning stuff and adding/removing some distros and I'm trying to fix it, so I can't upload the binaries.

*********************************************************************************************************************************************

Irrelevant rambling about system troubles, mostly unrelated to this thread, but posting in case anyone else has similar trouble:

EDIT: Cheezus crust, finally! It took me hours to get it working, but my system is running again.

Basically, I erased my boot partition in order to move it into a more permanent location on the hard drive (2nd primary partition), as I couldn't figure out how to move it without erasing it. Perhaps there's no way to do so, but I doubt that. It seems I forgot to mount something when I went through this process to chroot into arch so that I could reinstall grub2-gfxmenu and kernel26 on the new /boot. Unfortunately, after doing everything the first time, booting into it left me with nothing but a nag about sdb7 (root) not existing, block device could not be created, parse error, blah blah which was nonsense because sdb7 did exist and my grub.cfg was set up correctly. It couldn't boot my older ext3 partition i hadnt touched either, so it wasnt any fstab issue. After hours of screwing around and troubleshooting, I finally noticed an error when mkinitcpio was running that I missed every other time apparently: "find /sys/devices: no such file or directory" , which didn't show up when the fallback image was being created. Ffs. So what I should've done in the first place worked fine, just loaded normally into the fallback image and re-running mkinitcpio -p kernel26. I imagine it also would've worked if I mounted the appropriate stuff from the livecd to deal with that error, but I was pretty sick of being there. Anyway it works YAYZ.

I had done something along these lines (livecd):
(set up partitions properly in a gparted livecd, including a new blank ext4 /boot at sdb4)
(started networking first via the /arch/setup installer and exited. couldve used dhcpcd manually but that would've made too much sense.)
mkdir /mnt/root
mount -t ext4 /dev/sdb7 /mnt/root (sdb7 is the root partition)
mount -t proc none /mnt/root/proc
(i probably needed to mount the sysfs deal about now or something, mount -t sysfs sys /mnt/root/sysfs. oops.)
mount -o bind /dev /mnt/root/dev
pacman -Sw kernel26 kernel26-firmware
mkdir /mnt/root/tmp/mytmp
chmod 777 -R /mnt/root/tmp/mytmp (i 777ed it because i needed to build my grub2-gfxmenu packages)
cp /var/cache/pacman/pkg/kernel26* /mnt/root/tmp/mytmp
(mounted my partition containing a backup copy of the two grub2-gfxmenu packages/files)
(copied the above grub2-gfxmenu stuff with 777 permissions to /mnt/root/tmp/mytmp and built it with makepkg -c in that dir)
chroot /mnt/root
mount /dev/sdb4 /boot (sdb7 is the boot partition)
pacman -U /mnt/root/tmp/mytmp/kernel26*
pacman -U /mnt/root/tmp/mytmp/grub2-gfxmenu*
grub-install /dev/sdb (my booted drive is sdb in arch)
(nano /boot/grub/grub.cfg and fix the grub.cfg to point to the correct partitions. temporarily just arch, semi-broken, graphical not working due to separate /boot)
(nano /etc/fstab to correct the changed partition structure. UUID was no longer valid)
(rebooted into the fallback partition, ran mkinitcpio -p kernel26. woudlnt have been necessary probably if I mounted the right stuff earlier. whatever, its working!)
(restored full graphical grub.cfg for separate /boot partitions from my sample in this thread, hehe)

jeez. what a pain. but it's all good again.

Last edited by FrozenFox (2009-04-17 23:32:59)

fettouhi · 2009-03-16 19:51:59

Does thus package work if you run RAID 0 via fake-RAID? Because I can't the grub-gfx package to work on my RAID 0 machine, i.e. the splash screen in grub dowsn't appear at all not matter what I try. So I was looing for something else to try in order to get a splash screen.

Regards

André

FrozenFox · 2009-03-16 21:38:00

fettouhi wrote:

Does thus package work if you run RAID 0 via fake-RAID? Because I can't the grub-gfx package to work on my RAID 0 machine, i.e. the splash screen in grub dowsn't appear at all not matter what I try. So I was looing for something else to try in order to get a splash screen.
Regards
André

I couldn't say whether this works with such setups, as I've not done it or know anyone else who has, but I imagine it's possible. You may want to research the normal "grub2" support for such setups. If normal grub2 will work, this probably will too with a little tweaking to grub.cfg, as this package is simply grub2 with patches to support graphical menus.

On another note, I was confused by your question there for a moment. I read grub-gfx too quickly and I think "splash screen" threw me off. My understanding of a "splash screen" is that it refers to an image or series of images temporarily shown on-screen while a program (or series of programs like an operating system) is loading, as opposed to a theme/skin for a single program that is already loaded and running (like an os selector such as grub2-gfxmenu). Forgive me if this is not what you intended, but another user on this thread was confused regarding this matter, so just to clarify, see my post a little ways above if you're in the same boat or there was just a miscommunication/misunderstanding . On that note, you can have splashy/fbsplash/gensplash working after grub2-gfxmenu's selection with the correct grub.cfg kernel line entry.

Last edited by FrozenFox (2009-03-16 21:41:27)

fettouhi · 2009-03-17 07:22:03

FrozenFox wrote:

fettouhi wrote:
Does thus package work if you run RAID 0 via fake-RAID? Because I can't the grub-gfx package to work on my RAID 0 machine, i.e. the splash screen in grub dowsn't appear at all not matter what I try. So I was looing for something else to try in order to get a splash screen.
Regards
André
I couldn't say whether this works with such setups, as I've not done it or know anyone else who has, but I imagine it's possible. You may want to research the normal "grub2" support for such setups. If normal grub2 will work, this probably will too with a little tweaking to grub.cfg, as this package is simply grub2 with patches to support graphical menus.
On another note, I was confused by your question there for a moment. I read grub-gfx too quickly and I think "splash screen" threw me off. My understanding of a "splash screen" is that it refers to an image or series of images temporarily shown on-screen while a program (or series of programs like an operating system) is loading, as opposed to a theme/skin for a single program that is already loaded and running (like an os selector such as grub2-gfxmenu). Forgive me if this is not what you intended, but another user on this thread was confused regarding this matter, so just to clarify, see my post a little ways above if you're in the same boat or there was just a miscommunication/misunderstanding . On that note, you can have splashy/fbsplash/gensplash working after grub2-gfxmenu's selection with the correct grub.cfg kernel line entry.

Ups, sorry about that. But what I am talking about is getting a background theme/skin for grub working. I can't get working with grub-gfx on my RAID 0. It was working fine on my old machine (not using RAID) but on this new machine it just doesn't show up and grub itself works fine.

Regards

André

FrozenFox · 2009-03-17 08:07:22

Huh. Weird. I suspect you would need to open the grub config file (menu.lst for grub, grub.cfg for grub2) and explicitly point it to your drive where the theme part is, such as my sample grub.cfg a few posts up from here. If the line was like "theme=/boot/grub/x" you might need to change it to "theme=(hdX,Y)/grub/x" or something, basically. In my sample file, I just pointed all lined by default using set root = , and got rid of the /boot prefix.

Last edited by FrozenFox (2009-03-17 08:13:09)

fettouhi · 2009-03-17 11:01:45

FrozenFox wrote:

Huh. Weird. I suspect you would need to open the grub config file (menu.lst for grub, grub.cfg for grub2) and explicitly point it to your drive where the theme part is, such as my sample grub.cfg a few posts up from here. If the line was like "theme=/boot/grub/x" you might need to change it to "theme=(hdX,Y)/grub/x" or something, basically. In my sample file, I just pointed all lined by default using set root = , and got rid of the /boot prefix.

I tried all those things you just suggested but nothing works...

Regards

André

FrozenFox · 2009-03-17 18:50:13

Hm, sorry, I'm not sure how to help you then

fettouhi · 2009-03-18 19:22:11

FrozenFox wrote:

Hm, sorry, I'm not sure how to help you then

Just a quick question, the theme=(hdX,Y)/grub/x line should (hdX,Y) be the root partition or partition where grub is installed?

Regards

André

FrozenFox · 2009-03-18 20:50:31

Grub installs to /boot, so it should point to whatever partition contains /boot. If /boot is on a separate partition, the theme lines shouldn't have "/boot" in them; it should only be there if /boot is on the same partition as /.

Ie,

/boot is /dev/sdb4 and / is /dev/sdb6, thus grub is on sdb4:

theme=(hd0,4)/grub/themes/blahblahthemelocation

/boot and / are both on /dev/sdb5

theme=(hd0,5)/boot/grub/themes/blahblahthemelocation

Last edited by FrozenFox (2009-03-18 20:53:19)

fettouhi · 2009-03-19 11:49:07

On my installation I didn't make a separate /boot partition so /boot is part of root. Maybe the problem I'm having with the splash screen is that my theme= doesn't point to the right partition. Since I'm running RAID 0 my partitions aren't called /dev/sda1 and etc. but they are names /dev/ide_baaddideei_Volume01, /dev/ide_baaddideei_Volume02 and /dev/ide_baaddideei_Volume03. /dev/ide_baaddideei_Volume0 is the RAID 0 itself and /dev/ide_baaddideei_Volume01 is / and /dev/ide_baaddideei_Volume02 is swap and /dev/ide_baaddideei_Volume03 is /home. So I should be able to point at the beckground theme with

theme=/dev/ide_baaddideei_Volume01/boot/grub/themes/blahblahthemelocation or

theme=(hd0,1)/boot/grub/themes/blahblahthemelocation

I'm a bit confused about this.

Regards

André

Yaro · 2009-04-05 09:08:42

I'm confused. How exactly do I install this? Do I need to run a command like install-grub or does the command to install this from that repository do everything for me?

FrozenFox · 2009-04-05 20:56:03

All: Sorry for being a little lazy on updating this, but there it is, ready to go, files and tutorial mostly redone from scratch. Please check the files on the original post to make sure they work for you and report any problems. Also, I will attach the text file stuff of the packages a little later. I'm sick of typing all this crap up

Fettouhi: I'm sorry I'm not of much help there. I've never used such a setup. However, what you are asking whether you should try is precisely what I would attempt, the one prefixed by (hdX,Y) [I dont think it can be done using /dev/, but I really don't know]. I have no clue at all if it would work. If you would want to try, by all means do and tell us if it works or not. It wouldn't be very difficult to change back, so it couldn't hurt to try.

Yaro: Blah. You finally pushed me to do what I'd been putting off for weeks. I've completely redone the instructions from scratch, redone the pkgbuilds from mostly scratch, redone the links, etc. Check the main thread. You should see NOTES B-10 then INSTALLATION Group G if you get a binary from somewhere, which there probably won't be any for at least a few days (such as whenever Shaika-Dzari updates his repository). If you still have questions, ask again

Shaika-Dzari: Please update your repository if all works well for you to remove the -bzr packages. I haven't tested the 64 bit stuff because I don't have such a processor, but I took pieces from the official grub one and your sample to try to make a coherent pkgbuild piece for 64 bit, and it SHOULD work properly.

Last edited by FrozenFox (2009-04-05 21:22:32)

Yaro · 2009-04-05 22:37:04

I followed the new instructions and got this:

grub-setup: error: Cannot read `/boot/grub/core.img' correctly

Arch Linux

#51 2009-02-06 01:54:29

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#52 2009-02-06 02:26:23

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#53 2009-02-06 11:48:27

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#54 2009-02-06 15:28:56

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#55 2009-02-06 23:02:38

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#56 2009-02-06 23:40:58

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#57 2009-02-11 15:36:51

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#58 2009-03-08 16:14:20

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#59 2009-03-08 18:35:10

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#60 2009-03-10 16:00:16

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#61 2009-03-12 22:20:17

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#62 2009-03-14 14:59:41

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#63 2009-03-14 15:25:22

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#64 2009-03-16 19:51:59

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#65 2009-03-16 21:38:00

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#66 2009-03-17 07:22:03

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#67 2009-03-17 08:07:22

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#68 2009-03-17 11:01:45

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#69 2009-03-17 18:50:13

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#70 2009-03-18 19:22:11

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#71 2009-03-18 20:50:31

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#72 2009-03-19 11:49:07

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#73 2009-04-05 09:08:42

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#74 2009-04-05 20:56:03

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

#75 2009-04-05 22:37:04

Re: Care to play with grub2-graphical?

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