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**Snowhog** · Dec 28, 2009, 02:51 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

See Qqmikes GRUB 2: A Guide for Users

**Spectrum** · Dec 28, 2009, 02:56 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

Originally posted by Snowhog

Thanks. I will try that.

**cdupree** · Dec 28, 2009, 05:40 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

I read the doc, and it's ridiculous! The doc tells me I can't edit /boot/grub/grub.cfg. I can edit /etc/grub/default, but that doesn't help because there are no entries for the OSs in there. All I want to do is remove two obsolete entries, but they don't appear in the files I'm allowed to edit.

It used to be trivial to edit the GRUB menu, now it doesn't seem possible. This is an upgrade? :P

**Snowhog** · Dec 28, 2009, 05:52 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

This Ubuntu wiki may be easier to follow: Grub 2 (1.97~beta4-1ubuntu4)

**cdupree** · Dec 28, 2009, 08:16 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

Sorry, I mis-stated. The doc is fine, it's the situation that's ridiculous. I used to be a tech writer and I know documentation often has to explain situations that are overly complicated, and this is one of those.

Thanks, I'll check out your pointers.

**Qqmike** · Dec 28, 2009, 08:32 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

and Dave's done a good job specifically with grub.cfg:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1195275

Any edits you make directly to grub.cfg will most likely be overwritten (=> gone) the next time update-grub (or grub-mkconfig) is run (either by you or by another program, like Synaptic).
If changes have been made to your system, sometimes to get a new grub.cfg, it works to run
sudo update-grub
(or sudo grub-mkconfig -o /boot/grub/grub.cfg)

Not sure what your situation is, but Dave probably covered it if it deals with grub.cfg.

**cdupree** · Dec 28, 2009, 09:21 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

Okay, I've checked out the three links you've provided. All are useful docs with helpful info.

But the new GRUB has apparently automated the process of finding OSs, eh? I can't find any files that list the various options I'm going to be presented on startup other than the file I'm not supposed to edit.

Situation: I installed a clean 9.10, not updated but from scratch. That gave me two choices in GRUB (OS plus memtest) plus the (gag) XP I'd already installed. Then I updated with the current bug fixes, which produced two more choices. How can I get rid of the two obsolete ones? I read the docs, and as a tech writer for 16 years and programmer for 9, I can't tell where the data I'm hoping to delete resides. In deletable form, that is. Certainly I can edit the file I'm not supposed to edit, but what kind of system requires me to do that?

**Snowhog** · Dec 28, 2009, 09:31 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

I'm not using Grub 2, but isn't 7. Removing Entries from Grub 2 - in Dave's Grub 2 Basics clear on this?

**cdupree** · Dec 28, 2009, 09:45 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

Dave's #7 is clearly explained but aimed at Ubuntu users with Synaptic. It doesn't specify which files contain the data I want to delete, and examining them hasn't produced any ideas either. In the relevant directory are these files:

00_header
05_debian_theme
10_linux
20_memtest86+
30_os-prober
40_custom
README

All but the last are scripts, which you can skip by removing execute permission. But what I want is not to skip all the Linuxes, rather to omit only the obsolete ones, which seem to be included in an on-the-fly generated list rather than a saved one.

It's likely I've misunderstood this, because if what I think is true turns out to be so, there's no longer a way to remove irrelevant items from the list that GRUB presents when you boot. And that's hard to believe.

So I'll try installing Synaptic and see if I can make his solution work.

Thanks again!

**Snowhog** · Dec 28, 2009, 09:52 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

Originally posted by cdupree

But what I want is not to skip all the Linuxes, rather to omit only the obsolete ones, which seem to be included in an on-the-fly generated list rather than a saved one.

By this (the underlined above), are you meaning the 'older' kernels that you have installed on your system? If 'yes,' then editing (I believe) the 10_linux script is what is required and comment out the parts that reference the older kernels.

Added:
This might be helpful: Mastering Grub 2 The Easy Way

**cdupree** · Dec 28, 2009, 09:59 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

Basically yes. I installed from the CD, which gave me one kernel and one memtest. Then as soon as I finished installing I did the required updates, which gave me another kernel and another memtest. With the XP entry I have five, which isn't too bad, but when I update again I'll have seven, and won't it get out of hand pretty soon?

Your proposed solution makes sense in the abstract, but I've appended the contents of the 10_linux script, and as far as I can see there's no mention of any particular kernel, only a description of how to find them. Am I missing something?

- ced

_________________________________________________

#! /bin/sh -e

# grub-mkconfig helper script.
# Copyright (C) 2006,2007,2008,2009 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
#
# GRUB is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
# it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
# the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
# (at your option) any later version.
#
# GRUB is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
# but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
# MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
# GNU General Public License for more details.
#
# You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
# along with GRUB. If not, see <http://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.

prefix=/usr
exec_prefix=${prefix}
libdir=${exec_prefix}/lib
. ${libdir}/grub/grub-mkconfig_lib

if [ "x${GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR}" = "x" ] ; then
OS=GNU/Linux
else
OS="${GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR}"
fi

# loop-AES arranges things so that /dev/loop/X can be our root device, but
# the initrds that Linux uses don't like that.
case ${GRUB_DEVICE} in
/dev/loop/*|/dev/loop[0-9])
GRUB_DEVICE=`losetup ${GRUB_DEVICE} | sed -e "s/^[^(]*($[^)]\+$).*/\1/"`
# We can't cope with devices loop-mounted from files here.
case ${GRUB_DEVICE} in
/dev/*) ;;
*) exit 0 ;;
esac
;;
esac

if [ "x${GRUB_DEVICE_UUID}" = "x" ] || [ "x${GRUB_DISABLE_LINUX_UUID}" = "xtrue" ] \
|| ! test -e "/dev/disk/by-uuid/${GRUB_DEVICE_UUID}" \
|| [ "`grub-probe -t abstraction --device ${GRUB_DEVICE} | sed -e 's,.*$lvm$.*,\1,'`" = "lvm" ] ; then
LINUX_ROOT_DEVICE=${GRUB_DEVICE}
else
LINUX_ROOT_DEVICE=UUID=${GRUB_DEVICE_UUID}
fi

# add crashkernel option if we have the required tools
if [ -x "/usr/bin/makedumpfile" ] && [ -x "/sbin/kexec" ]; then
GRUB_CMDLINE_EXTRA="$GRUB_CMDLINE_EXTRA crashkernel=384M-2G:64M,2G-:128M"
fi

linux_entry ()
{
cat << EOF
menuentry "$1" {
recordfail=1
if [ -n \${have_grubenv} ]; then save_env recordfail; fi
EOF
if [ "x$3" = "xquiet" ]; then
cat << EOF
set quiet=1
EOF
fi
save_default_entry | sed -e "s/^/\t/"
prepare_grub_to_access_device ${GRUB_DEVICE_BOOT} | sed -e "s/^/\t/"
cat << EOF
linux ${rel_dirname}/${basename} root=${linux_root_device_thisversion} ro $2
EOF
if test -n "${initrd}" ; then
cat << EOF
initrd ${rel_dirname}/${initrd}
EOF
fi
cat << EOF
}
EOF
}

list=`for i in /boot/vmlinu[xz]-* /vmlinu[xz]-* ; do
if grub_file_is_not_garbage "$i" ; then echo -n "$i " ; fi
done`

while [ "x$list" != "x" ] ; do
linux=`version_find_latest $list`
echo "Found linux image: $linux" >&2
basename=`basename $linux`
dirname=`dirname $linux`
rel_dirname=`make_system_path_relative_to_its_root $dirname`
version=`echo $basename | sed -e "s,^[^0-9]*-,,g"`
alt_version=`echo $version | sed -e "s,\.old$,,g"`
linux_root_device_thisversion="${LINUX_ROOT_DEVICE }"

initrd=
for i in "initrd.img-${version}" "initrd-${version}.img" \
"initrd-${version}" "initrd.img-${alt_version}" \
"initrd-${alt_version}.img" "initrd-${alt_version}"; do
if test -e "${dirname}/${i}" ; then
initrd="$i"
break
fi
done
if test -n "${initrd}" ; then
echo "Found initrd image: ${dirname}/${initrd}" >&2
else
# "UUID=" magic is parsed by initrds. Since there's no initrd, it can't work here.
linux_root_device_thisversion=${GRUB_DEVICE}
fi

linux_entry "${OS}, Linux ${version}" \
"${GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX} ${GRUB_CMDLINE_EXTRA} ${GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT}" \
quiet
if [ "x${GRUB_DISABLE_LINUX_RECOVERY}" != "xtrue" ]; then
linux_entry "${OS}, Linux ${version} (recovery mode)" \
"single ${GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX}"
fi

list=`echo $list | tr ' ' '\n' | grep -vx $linux | tr '\n' ' '`
done

**Snowhog** · Dec 28, 2009, 10:10 PM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

Blech! Seeing the script really enforces my strong desire to stick with Grub legacy as long as possible.

This post might be of interest to you: #howmany for grub 2

**cdupree** · Dec 29, 2009, 12:02 AM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

Downloading Synaptic and following the directions you linked to removed the obsolete kernel entries. But chmod'ing the executable bit off the script didn't prevent the memtest stuff from showing up, not that this matters.

So I consider the new GRUB to suck royally, but I'm not quite as bad off as I thought. Thanks for the pointers!

**kubicle** · Dec 29, 2009, 01:58 AM

Re: How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

The easiest way to remove "obsolete" kernel entries is to remove the "obsolete" kernel image packages with your chosen package manager...this will automatically remove the entries from grub.

Grub2 takes a little re-learning, but grub wasn't all bliss either. The Debian way of configuring grub with the configuration and the actual menu items in the same file (with the single/double commenting) has caused some headache for some users I'm sure.

I like the idea of having separate files for the finished menu configuration (/boot/grub/grub.cfg), the scripts/rules to create one (/etc/grub.d/*) and the configuration options (/etc/default/grub).

Ideally, one should be able to only edit configuration in /etc/default/grub...and let the automagiks handle the rest. I don't think Grub2 is there yet, but it's the way forward to reaching that goal.

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How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

How to configure grub? Cannot find menu.lst or grub.conf

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