very basic questions on upgrades

[g.]

Hi,

I have a very stupid problem. I made the last upgrade and so the linux-headers have been also upgraded.

During the upgrading I was prompting on what to do with the /boot/grub/menu.lst and I kept my former one.

Now, how to retrieve the menu.lst that I did not use?

Also, is there a command that list me the last upgrade that I made?

Thanks,
g.

[Rog131]

Re: very basic questions on upgrades

Now, how to retrieve the menu.lst that I did not use?

If you want to update/upgrade the menu.lst:

sudo update-grub

man update-grub

NAME
update-grub - program to generate GRUB’s menu.lst file

SYNOPSIS
update-grub [-y]

OPTIONS
-y Assume ’yes’ on all questions.

DESCRIPTION

update-grub is a program used to generate the menu.lst file used by the grub bootloader. It works by looking in /boot for all files which start with "vmlinuz-". They will be treated as kernels, and grub menu entries will be created for each. It will also create the initial menu.lst if none exists, after prompting the user. It will also add initrd lines for ramdisk images found with the same version as kernels found. e.g. /boot/vmlinuz-2.4.5 and /boot/initrd-2.4.5 will cause a line of "initrd=/boot/initrd-2.4.5 or similar to be added for the kernel entry in the menu.lst.

If you want to edit the menu.lst:

It is a text file -> you could edit it with a text editor:

kdesudo kate /boot/grub/menu.lst

There is a dedicated editor: kgrubeditor - graphical editor for GRUB boot manager settings

A tool to view and edit the menu.lst file of the GRUB boot manager. It offers
many features and it is the perfect solution for those who want to change the
way GRUB works, without messing with the menu.lst file.

This is the KDE 4 version of QGRUBEditor

After the installation: System Settings > Advanced > Grub Editor

Backup the menu.lst before you edit !


If you want to clean the menu.lst > HOWTO: Removing unnecessary entries from the grub menu list (a.k.a removing old kernel packages and rewriting new menu.lst)


More of the Grub > HOW TO: GRUB Methods - Toolkit

Also, is there a command that list me the last upgrade that I made?

What package manager are you using ? ( FAQ: Package Managers)


The Synaptic is keeping log of packages that are installed through it.
Synaptic > File > History


As the Ubuntu is Debian based it is using the dpkg -> /var/log/dpkg.log

Checking installed/updated/removed packages from the dpkg log:

Recent status log:

grep "status installed" /var/log/dpkg.log

grep upgrade /var/log/dpkg.log

grep remove /var/log/dpkg.log

A bit older dpkg log:

grep "status installed" /var/log/dpkg.log.1

grep upgrade /var/log/dpkg.log.1

grep remove /var/log/dpkg.log.1

The oldest logs - rotated dpkg logs (packed): dpkg.log.2.gz, dpkg.log.3.gz...

Earlier > Topic: Update Logs

[g.]

Re: very basic questions on upgrades

thanks a lot, I did not know where the various kernel versions where saved...

what is strange is that in my /boot' directory I can see

ls -l /boot/vml*
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 2340384 2009-04-02 00:09 /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.27-11-generic
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 3522336 2009-04-17 05:34 /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-11-generic
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 3509024 2009-06-02 11:24 /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-13-generic

that correctly shows also the last kernel update. If I run

sudo update-grub
Searching for GRUB installation directory ... found: /boot/grub
Searching for default file ... found: /boot/grub/default
Testing for an existing GRUB menu.lst file ... found: /boot/grub/menu.lst
Searching for splash image ... none found, skipping ...
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-13-generic
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-11-generic
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.27-11-generic
Found kernel: /boot/memtest86+.bin
Updating /boot/grub/menu.lst ... done

still is fine. but my menu.lst file is not changed.

I will modify it by hand.

Thanks,
g.

[Rog131]

Re: very basic questions on upgrades

still is fine. but my menu.lst file is not changed.

Hmm - looking what is happening at here:

sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

Reading package lists...
Building dependency tree...
Reading state information...
The following NEW packages will be installed
linux-headers-2.6.28-13 linux-headers-2.6.28-13-generic
linux-image-2.6.28-13-generic linux-restricted-modules-2.6.28-13-generic
...
Setting up linux-image-2.6.28-13-generic (2.6.28-13.44) ...
Running depmod.
update-initramfs: Generating /boot/initrd.img-2.6.28-13-generic
Running postinst hook script /sbin/update-grub.
Searching for GRUB installation directory ... found: /boot/grub
Searching for default file ... found: /boot/grub/default
Testing for an existing GRUB menu.lst file ... found: /boot/grub/menu.lst
Searching for splash image ... none found, skipping ...
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-13-generic
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-11-generic
Found kernel: /boot/memtest86+.bin

I have a manually edited menu.lst => query " What would you like to do about menu.lst"


Yes, new version is fine.

Replacing config file /var/run/grub/menu.lst with new version
Updating /boot/grub/menu.lst ... done

=> Updated Grub menu.lst



Pure guess

Maybe the "update-grub" needs to run the depmod & update-initramfs before ??
Something like:

sudo depmod && sudo sudo update-initramfs -u && sudo update-grub

man depmod

NAME
depmod - program to generate modules.dep and map files.

SYNOPSIS
depmod [ -b basedir ] [ -e ] [ -F System.map ] [ -n ] [ -v ] [ version ] [ -A ]

depmod [ -e ] [ -FSystem.map ] [ -n ] [ -v ] [ version ] [ filename ... ]

DESCRIPTION

Linux kernel modules can provide services (called "symbols") for other modules to use (using EXPORT_SYMBOL in the code). If a second module uses this symbol, that second module clearly depends on the first module. These dependencies can get quite complex.

depmod creates a list of module dependencies, by reading each module under /lib/modules/version and determining what symbols it exports, and what symbols it needs. By default this list is written to modules.dep in the same directory. If filenames are given on the command line, only those modules are examined (which is rarely useful, unless all modules are listed).

man update-initramfs

NAME
update-initramfs - generate an initramfs image

SYNOPSIS
update-initramfs [-k version] [-c] [-u] [-t] [-v] [-b] [-h]

DESCRIPTION

The update-initramfs script manages your initramfs images on your local box. It keeps track of the existing initramfs archives in /boot. There are three modes of operation create, update or delete. You must at least specify one of those modes.

The initramfs is a gzipped cpio archive. At boot time, the kernel unpacks that archive into RAM disk, mounts and uses it as initial root file system. All finding of the root device happens in this early userspace.

OPTIONS
...
-u This mode updates an existing initramfs.
...

[Rog131]

Re: very basic questions on upgrades

Testing

Removing (moving): /boot/initrd.img-2.6.28-13-generic
Editing the menu.lst: Removing the "kernel 2.6.28-13 " lines.


Test #1 - konsole:

sudo update-grub

Searching for GRUB installation directory ... found: /boot/grub
Searching for default file ... found: /boot/grub/default
Testing for an existing GRUB menu.lst file ... found: /boot/grub/menu.lst
Searching for splash image ... none found, skipping ...
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-13-generic
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-11-generic
Found kernel: /boot/memtest86+.bin
Updating /boot/grub/menu.lst ... done

The menu.lst is not updated.


Test #2 - konsole:

sudo update-initramfs -u && sudo update-grub

update-initramfs: Generating /boot/initrd.img-2.6.28-13-generic
Searching for GRUB installation directory ... found: /boot/grub
Searching for default file ... found: /boot/grub/default
Testing for an existing GRUB menu.lst file ... found: /boot/grub/menu.lst
Searching for splash image ... none found, skipping ...
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-13-generic
Found kernel: /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.28-11-generic
Found kernel: /boot/memtest86+.bin
Replacing config file /var/run/grub/menu.lst with new version
Updating /boot/grub/menu.lst ... done

The menu.lst is updated..

[g.]

Re: very basic questions on upgrades

thanks!