No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

diederick76 · 2013-06-06 20:05:02

My computer won't boot anymore. Like many others report, it stops after

ERROR: Root device mounted successfully, but /sbin/init does not exist.
Bailing out, you are on your own. Good luck.

sh: can't access tty; job control turned off
[rootfs /]#

When I do:

# mount

I see that /dev/sda3, my root partition, is mounted on /new_root. I cd there and recognize that this is indeed my root partition by the files on /opt. But /sbin/init is there:

lrwxrwxrwx	1 0	0	7 May 29 09:38 init -> busybox

My boot partition is /dev/sda1, which is not mounted, but I when I mount it on /new_root/boot I can see that my /boot/grub/grub.cfg is correct. It refers to the partition by uid, but to make sure I've tried replacing it with /dev/sda3 as mentioned in https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=115358 (but directly by editing the line in grub2). The result is the same as above.

When I boot with a live cd (my three year old motherboard doesn't support usb booting :-/ ) I can chroot into the system and work from there. But reinstalling sysvinit, as mentioned in https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=145145 and https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?id=145145 sounds to me like a deprecated solution, isn't it? (the rest of the thread isn't very helpful, and the poster can't chroot, which I can).

Since I have a working internet connection when I chroot, I tried installing syslinux but that also has the same effect. So I installed grub-bios again. Still no /sbin/init.

Can someone tell me how to proceed?

Thanks a lot for any help!

Last edited by diederick76 (2013-06-12 19:10:40)

Scimmia · 2013-06-06 20:07:55

Did you get the new "filesystem" package installed? Are /bin and /sbin symlinks to usr/bin?

Tell us exactly what you did before things stopped working.

Last edited by Scimmia (2013-06-06 20:08:59)

lucke · 2013-06-06 20:13:16

Try init=/usr/lib/systemd/systemd.

diederick76 · 2013-06-06 20:17:11

I think I did, but reinstalled it to be sure (2013.05-2). Both /bin and /sbin are symlinks to usr/bin.

Scimmia · 2013-06-06 20:20:32

Alright, so it's not the same issue we've seen so many times over the last couple of days.

Next question, were you booting with systemd or sysvinit/initscripts before all of this happened? sysvinit and initscripts generally need to be removed before the upgrade, but if you were still using them, you should have transitioned over to systemd before trying anything.

diederick76 · 2013-06-06 20:28:22

I have been using systemd for months. However, I did upgrade from grub.0.97 to grub2 yesterday and didn't try to boot after that, until tonight.

Scimmia · 2013-06-06 20:30:48

Do you have systemd-sysvcompat installed? That's needed unless you pass the init= kernel parameter.

ElNinijo · 2013-06-06 21:00:51

when grub start you have to push "e" and find line with the kernel
then after word quit you try write this: init=/usr/lib/systemd/systemd.
then ctrl+x and system should start,
when you log in you have to instal systemd-sysvcompat, then reboot ind everything should be ok

Last edited by ElNinijo (2013-06-06 21:01:06)

diederick76 · 2013-06-07 05:04:16

Thanks, I will try that when I get home. But I find it odd that Arch should replace sysvinit with systemd and then make a compatibility layer necessary. Or is that only because of grub-bios?

Scimmia · 2013-06-07 13:27:50

The "compatibility layer" is just a few symlinks.

diederick76 · 2013-06-07 15:28:59

When I see the grub menu, I press e. Then I see these lines:

# (0) Arch Linux
menuentry 'Arch Linux' {
  set root='(hd0,3)'; set legacy_hdbias='0'
  legacy_kernel   '/vmlinuz-linux' '/vmlinuz-linux' 'root=/dev/sda3' 'ro' ''
  legacy_initrd '/initramfs-linux.img' '/initramfs-linux.img'
  
  # (1) Arch Linux
}

I don't see the word "quit", so I'm sure I misunderstood, because adding " init=/usr/lib/systemd/systemd" at the blank line below legacy_initrd, and then pressing ctrl+x gives the same results as above, and the computer doesn't boot.

Then I try booting the iso and chrooting into the system to install systemd-sysvcompat, but that complains about conflicting files:

systemd-sysvcompat: /usr/share/man/man8/halt.8.gz exists in filesystem

Also poweroff, reboot, runlevel, shutdown and telinit man pages are already there. pacman -Qo Reveals no package owns these files, so I move them to /root/tmp/. Then installing goes without problem.

I reboot and all is OK as ElNinijo told me :-) !

Thanks a lot! However, I still wonder who's man pages those were.

Scimmia · 2013-06-07 15:56:44

Those were part of the sysvinit package. They should have been removed when you removed it.

Convergence · 2013-06-11 19:03:07

I'm still having trouble. adding the "init=/...." is a quick fix to allow you to boot once right? The real fix is to install the sysinit compatibility layer?

This is where I am now:
I got the first of Elinijo's instructions to work by putting "init=..." onto the kernel line after the word quiet. There is some forward progress at this point, it no longer tells me that I'm on my own, but I get a screen full of errors that look like:

systemd-tmpfiles[150]: failed to create file /var/log/lastlog

and a whole bunch of other files that can't be created including other log files, and /tmp/.ice-unix (says it's a read only file system). The final error is "fsck failed with error code 8"

any help?

cfr · 2013-06-11 20:49:08

Post fstab and the output of lsblk -f.

Convergence · 2013-06-11 21:41:45

I don't have keyboard support. I can use an install disk to get the fstab, but that might take a while. If I can chroot into the system, I'll try to run lsblk.

Edit:
Apparently I was wrong when I said that I didn't have keyboard support. I don't have access to bash or something like that, ctrl-alt-dlt works just fine.

Last edited by Convergence (2013-06-11 23:07:43)

Convergence · 2013-06-11 22:24:19

fstab:

# 
# /etc/fstab: static file system information
#
# <file system> <dir>   <type>  <options>       <dump>  <pass>
tmpfs           /tmp    tmpfs   nodev,nosuid    0       0
#LABEL=homey /home ext4 defaults 0 1
#LABEL=rooty / ext4 defaults 0 1
LABEL=homey /home ext4 defaults 0 1
LABEL=rooty / ext4 defaults 0 1

I can't chroot into my system from this rescudisk because my normal install is 64 bit, and this is 32 bit. one of those days.

Convergence · 2013-06-11 22:47:05

So, I have chrooted into the environment from an OLD arch install disk, and have run lsblk -f. Here is my attempt at manually typing what I see on the screen of my desktop (I'm on my gf's laptop).

sda
-sda1
sdb
-sdb1
-sdb2
sdc
-sdc1
-sdc2
sr0
loop100
loop101
-arch_root-image
loop102
-arch_root-image
loop103
loop104
-arch_lib-modules
loop105
-arch_lib-modules
loop106
loop107
-arch_usr-share
loop108
arch_usr-share
loop109
loop110

I typed this manually, so it might have a minor error or two. If there is an easy way to copy and post something like this from a computer that doesn't have X, I don't know it.

Convergence · 2013-06-11 23:38:23

OK, I have an idea. I was multitiasking while I performed the system upgrade. I was following the instructions about preparing your system for moving all binaries to /usr/bin, and I jumped the gun a little. As soon as "pacman -Syu --ignore filesystem,bash" was done executing, I typed reboot out of habit. I realized right away that I had screwed up, but thought that it would be easy enough to recover.

When I edited post #15 above, I realized that the keyboard was in fact working, but bash was not. Could the problem be that I did not execute the last two commands? ( pacman -S bash && pacman -Su )

cfr · 2013-06-11 23:50:29

That could, indeed, be the problem. In that case, you just need to run those commands from the live environment chrooted. Or, if that doesn't work you can use e.g. pacstrap to do the work without needing to chroot.

Convergence · 2013-06-12 00:26:19

ugh. I might have to wait until the weekend. I'm in the middle of final exams.

Convergence · 2013-06-12 01:43:53

Yep, that was the problem. I gave up earlier b/c the ancient arch install disk was kind of a pain to work with. I thought I'd try it with the most recent version, and it was a piece of cake. Thanks.

cfr · 2013-06-12 19:05:40

Don't forget to mark your thread [solved] by editing your original post and tagging the subject line. Thanks!

Arch Linux

#1 2013-06-06 20:05:02

No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#2 2013-06-06 20:07:55

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#3 2013-06-06 20:13:16

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#4 2013-06-06 20:17:11

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#5 2013-06-06 20:20:32

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#6 2013-06-06 20:28:22

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#7 2013-06-06 20:30:48

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#8 2013-06-06 21:00:51

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#9 2013-06-07 05:04:16

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#10 2013-06-07 13:27:50

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#11 2013-06-07 15:28:59

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#12 2013-06-07 15:56:44

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#13 2013-06-11 19:03:07

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#14 2013-06-11 20:49:08

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#15 2013-06-11 21:41:45

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#16 2013-06-11 22:24:19

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#17 2013-06-11 22:47:05

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#18 2013-06-11 23:38:23

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#19 2013-06-11 23:50:29

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#20 2013-06-12 00:26:19

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#21 2013-06-12 01:43:53

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

#22 2013-06-12 19:05:40

Re: No /sbin/init after update and grub2 installation [solved]

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