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**Dat** · Nov 27, 2008, 04:37 PM

Re: need to recover my etc/fstab

sudo nano

instead of

sudo kate

That will allow you to edit the file via command line. It's a bit tougher to do but shouldn't be too hard to figure out. Not sure what you need to edit though. Hopefully one of the vets here can help you out with that.

**dibl** · Nov 27, 2008, 05:39 PM

Re: need to recover my etc/fstab

It looks to me like you have two unrelated issues -- or perhaps I'm not realizing how a dcop failure would be related to a borked /etc/fstab file. But it looks like two different problems -- dcop issues should not prevent a boot. Here's all about dcop:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DCOP

So, let's disregard the dcop issue, for the moment, and get the system booted and partitions mounted. First, there may be a close-to-correct /etc/fstab file in the directory, and labeled "fstab~" -- it's a file made by the system when you last changed fstab. So, if I were going to fix your system, I would do these things:

1. Boot a Kubuntu Live CD (or any other Linux Live CD). I'll assume it is Kubuntu.

2. Open the Konsole and issue

Code:

sudo blkid

and leave that output visible.

3. In the same Konsole window,

Code:

sudo mkdir /media/fixer

4. Now observe the output of the blkid command previously given, and note the device ID of the hard drive and partition where Kubuntu is installed. Let's say it is /dev/sdb2. Issue this command in the Konsole:

Code:

sudo mount -t ext3 /dev/sdb2 /media/fixer

5. Even though we don't think we'll ever need it, the professional approach is to back up safely the borked fstab file. So at the CLI you must "cd" to the /etc directory on the Kubuntu system -- the command you want is

Code:

cd /media/fixer/etc

Verify this is correct with

Code:

ls | more

You should be looking at the normal contents of the Linux /etc/ directory. Pressing the spacebar will allow the display output to advance one screen at a time. If it is correct (i.e. you see the normal /etc/ contents scrolling by), then we back up the old file with

Code:

sudo mv fstab fstab_bak27nov08

Now you can open Kate with Alt-F2 "kdesudo kate", browse to the /media/fixer directory, open the /etc folder and open the fstab~ file for editing.

Now observe the fstab file that is open in Kate, and compare what you see to the blkid output still in your Konsole (or run it again if it's long disappeared up the list), The UUID numbers associated with each partition need to match perfectly with their counterpart mount lines in fstab, and you need a mount line for each partition that you want to be mounted at boot time. The format of the mount lines is somewhat obvious, but of course there are variances in the length of the UUIDs for vfat and ntfs partitions, and those partitions need to show the appropriate filesystem type.

I hope this is helpful -- you're deep into a situation and I can't tell whether you have the experience with such technicalities to pull off the rescue, but this is the process that is needed. After the fstab file is edited, you use "File>Save As" to save it with the name "fstab", then shut down the Live CD session and try a normal boot into Kubuntu.

Post back if you get stuck along the way.

**tomcloyd** · Nov 27, 2008, 10:55 PM

Re: need to recover my etc/fstab

dibl - I'm very grateful for your detailed response. I think I can do this. There's little harm in trying. I very obviously erred in not backing up the fstab file before I changed it. I was going to - I thought of it, but got distracted and forgot. Bad thing to do. So, after a brief nap, I'll dive into this. Thanks again for your quick and detailed response.

**tomcloyd** · Nov 28, 2008, 05:18 AM

Re: need to recover my etc/fstab

I've not been able to successfully load Kubuntu from my 8.04.01 CD. From the initial options, I've been selecting the 'try Kubuntu on your computer' (paraphrase) option. I've tried at least 4 time. Sometimes it just freezes. Twice the screen has just streamed errors. It seems like something different happens each time, but there are SOME consistencies:

* I have yet to see the Kubuntu desktop appear. I don't have a sense that I've yet even gotten close to it.
* Each load attempt has appeared to be trying to access/use/ or

the hard drive. The front panel access light has flickered multiple times, and stayed on for some seconds multiple times. I don't understand this. It's supposed to be loading Kubuntu without affecting the HD, right? If it's trying to access the HD and the fstab file is messed up, could that be causing the failure to load the system? I'm clueless.
* Each load attempt has reported fsck errors, and protested about "file read" failures.
* At least 3 of the 4+ attempts have reported lots of "SQUASHFS error:..." message. On two of the attempts, these errors simply streamed across the monitor at very high speed. After some minutes of this I aborted the load attempt.

I ran the available check of the load disk. No errors found.
I ran the available memory check for some minutes. No errors found.

I'm currently running WinXP just fine. No errors reported on load.

What are my options?

**tomcloyd** · Nov 28, 2008, 07:12 AM

Re: need to recover my etc/fstab

UPDATE:

After sending my last email, I decided to just check that my CD reader was working - for some reason. I was still in WinXP. I had my Kubuntu live CD available, so I loaded that. Up came a screen I'd never before seen, offering among other things, to install Kubuntu inside WinXP. I did that successfully. I found, as I'd hoped, that I had access (after a little work with the System Administration's Mount Point Editor - if I'd used that a while back I not be in this pickle, maybe) to ALL partitions on the HD. In other words, THIS Kubuntu install could give me access to the files of the other!

I followed your instructions, using blkid to get the UUIDs for all partitions. I checked them again those in the current fstab file in my REGULAR (not the one now in Windows) Kubuntu install. Working very carefully, I simply could not see any error in the UUIDs.

Here's the contents of the current UUID-error-free fstab file (sda3 is the Kubuntu sys. files partition, and sda5 is /home):

# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# <file system> <mount point> <type> <options> <dump> <pass>
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
# /dev/sda3
UUID=887a1b60-ef60-42ee-b3be-a2e5a587fcb9 / ext3 nouser,relatime,errors=remount-ro,atime,auto,rw,dev,exec,suid 0 1
# /dev/sda5
UUID=8cc98eb1-c2d1-43e3-84f9-9728ca4a04e5 /home ext3 nouser,relatime,atime,auto,rw,dev,exec,suid 0 2
# /dev/sda2
UUID=33a6cf95-470d-46a7-b35d-ef32dbd01f4a none swap sw 0 0
/dev/scd0 /media/cdrom0 udf,iso9660 user,utf8,atime,noauto,rw,dev,exec,suid 0 0
# /dec/sda1 - entered by use of "System settings > Disk and filesystems editing of partition 1
UUID=861C20741C206203 /media/windows auto nouser,atime,auto,rw,nodev,noexec,nosuid 0 0

To the extend that I understand them, the other parameters are fine.

So...why can't I boot directly into Kubuntu from grub?

I'm going to look at the dcop issue - but you said that shouldn't be preventing a boot.

Any ideas what to do next?

**dibl** · Nov 28, 2008, 07:53 AM

Re: need to recover my etc/fstab

Originally posted by tomcloyd

# /dec/sda1 - entered by use of "System settings > Disk and filesystems editing of partition 1
UUID=861C20741C206203 /media/windows auto nouser,atime,auto,rw,nodev,noexec,nosuid 0 0

This is the one that you added. It doesn't look that bad -- "auto" could be changed to "ntfs" and maybe it needs a "umask=0022" option, but it should be workable.

OK, so, back to the original problem. You said you booted into Recovery mode before. If you can do that, does it present a "Fix X" option on the recovery menu? If so, try that. Once the script runs, then I think it offers you a "continue booting normally" option, so give that one a try.

**tomcloyd** · Nov 28, 2008, 07:15 PM

Re: need to recover my etc/fstab

Thanks for your response!

I left my fstab alone. (The comment line you read in that file excerpt in your last email was manually added by me; the mount command itself was generated by the Mount Point Editor, when I originally edited the file a number of weeks ago. It worked fine after that, until I upgraded to the new kernal.)

So...I booted into recovery mode, then ran the xfix option a couple of times, then resumed normal booting. It didn't help. I saw again this error msg:

"Error calling up interprocess communications for KDE. /home/tomc/DCOPServer_tom-desktop__0 Check to see that 'dcopserver' program is running."

I "OK"d the error msg and continued the boot process. A console window appeared, with a command line. I did "locate dcopserver" to verify that something called that was installed (it was), then did "sudo dcopserver". It appeared that some process was running, as I didn't get the command line back. I cancelled the console window and continued.

The screen blanked, then an account logon came on again. I attempted to boot into my normal Kubuntu. This time I got a somewhat different error msg:

"Error calling up interprocess communications for KDE. Could not open network socket. Please check that the 'dcopserver' is running."

Do you have any ideas what to try next?

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