How to update 10.04 partition through a live cd

[dabayman]

It seems after upgrading to alpha 2 of 10.04 I can't boot past the grub. Is there a way to update this partition to the new Beta (to see if the problem is solved with recent patches) by using a live cd? I can not get any access to the terminal at all. Not even in recovery.

Alternate Question: Is there a way to update through grub? Maybe that is easier.

Thanks in advance!

[doctordruidphd]

Re: How to update 10.04 partition through a live cd

A couple of things you might try:

1. Lucid is apparently very intolerant of things in its /etc/fstab file that are not actually there. If you have entries in fstab for external drives, etc, comment them out. Otherwise, the system will just hang and not boot.

2. Try booting your system with the 'nomodeset' kernel option. To do this, highlight the appropriate menu entry in grub, hit CTRL-E, move to the end of the line that starts with kernel, erase anything that says vga= or splash, and add nomodeset . Then hit CTRL-X to boot.

3. Another related issue might be to remove or rename your /etc/X11/xorg.conf file. That will kill any custom installed video drivers, but you might be able to get in with a text console.

To answer your question directly, yes, it is possible to update the system using chroot. But getting chroot to work for updating is more involved than just to get into the system. I use a whole script to do it, which I will post below, but you will have to modify it for your own system; don't attempt to use it without modification:

#!/bin/sh

sudo mkdir /mnt/Testing
sudo mount /dev/sda2 /mnt/Testing/
sudo mount -o bind /proc /mnt/Testing/proc
sudo mount -o bind /dev /mnt/Testing/dev
sudo mount -o bind /dev/pts /mnt/Testing/dev/pts
sudo mount -o bind /sys /mnt/Testing/sys
sudo mv /mnt/Testing/etc/resolv.conf /mnt/Testing/etc/resolv.conf.original
sudo cp /etc/resolv.conf /mnt/Testing/etc/resolv.conf
sudo chroot /mnt/Testing /bin/bash
sudo mv /mnt/Testing/etc/resolv.conf.original /mnt/Testing/etc/resolv.conf
exit

Note that this script will only work from a karmic system, as the way resolv.conf is handled in lucid is different. So I don't think (but don't know for sure) if this would work from a lucid live-cd.

[claydoh]

Re: How to update 10.04 partition through a live cd

You cannot upgrade from the live cd. You can from the alternate install disk

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/LucidUpgrades/Kubuntu