I hate grub

[sithlord48]

4GB can be fine for a vm it really depends on what your running in the vm and if it needs the ram. Vms can run fast enough where rebooting into another os becomes inconvenient.

I keep a separate /home partition and if i need to reinstall all my data is there if that is a roll back to an older version or update to a newer version it doesn't matter and does after i can just install my stuff and its back to "normal". TBH in the decade that i ran kubuntu i think i reinstalled instead of upgraded twice and those were because it was faster to reinstall then upgrade when kde3 was replaced with kde4 and kde4 with kde5.. I don't really distro hop much any more and im ok with trying stuff in a vm first. then if i like it ill just replace my system or if i need it enough i will run it on its own hardware. I guess i just don't like dual booting anymore.

I was talking about formatting removable drives that are used in other machines for instance that sd card that raspberry pis use to boot.
Thanks for all the replys and i wouldn't worry about getting to off topic as this is not a serious thread and we at KFN tend to do it alot...

[Flavio R. Cavalcanti]

We're going totally off-topic, but then. Just having a drink (of water, of course ;·) between fellow KDErs.
If you're studying new hardware... well I am too, in a way. What do you think of this?
It's got a quad-core 2.3 Ghz Intel cpu. Takes up to 32G RAM. 4 PCIe slots and two SATA 3 ones.
Fits in yer pocket, runs on 12V (solar panel and battery sound promising ;·) and costs around $100.
It's "out of stock, but will be available again"... last week. Which probably means within a few months, but... I want it

Six months ago I was thing about a i5 8th generation, with a better Motherboard ─ with more PCIe, Sata, USB options. ─ But I don't understand these things. I have to read more.

You're right, we are off the topic ─ which was "hate". ─ It is nice to go out of "hate". ;-)

[Don B. Cilly]

We're going totally off-topic, but then. Just having a drink (of water, of course ;·) between fellow KDErs.
If you're studying new hardware... well I am too, in a way. What do you think of this?
It's got a quad-core 2.3 Ghz Intel cpu. Takes up to 32G RAM. 4 PCIe slots and two SATA 3 ones.
Fits in yer pocket, runs on 12V (solar panel and battery sound promising ;·) and costs around $100.
It's "out of stock, but will be available again"... last week. Which probably means within a few months, but... I want it

[Flavio R. Cavalcanti]

Kde's partition manager is fine. It's just missing a couple of things, like changing UUIDs... and setting an ESP flag;·). Gparted has those.

Maybe, this was the main reason why I have left KDE Partition Manager.

I have seen a lot of my old screenshots with it, from 2016 to 2017 and indeed, I didn't find how to change UUID, back then.

But there is also a barrier to use different tools, when you need to pay all attention to what are you doing. It is safer to use just one tool, which you are familiar with.

4GB don't quite cut it with virtual machines.
They won't work very well unless you assign at least 4GB to them.

In any case, you can't expect them to work like a properly installed distro on HD.
Still, 8, or even 16GB of RAM are cheaper than a decent HD.
And they will improve your performance in many ways anyway. I have 8, which I find adequate for my use, VMs included,

I have searched for additional RAM, but my old Motherboard doesn't help. It has serious limitations, and the few (used) offers don't pay their cost.

It is really better to study a new hardware, which may start with 8 GB and allow to increase to 16 or 32 GB some months later.

[Don B. Cilly]

You know what I hate more than grub? DVDs
I keep my distros like this:



Saves space, they don't get scratched, they're faster...

Oh, and talking of VMs. I've just been playing with SolydK in one (not particularly impressed). It's like using it from a live DVS/USB.
Slow. And I have a decently fast SSD, and a quad-core 2Ghz CPU.

[Flavio R. Cavalcanti]

I tried installing Kubuntu 18 in legacy mode, I couldn't. Can't remember how or why exactly. Everything I had up to then, up to Kubuntu 16.04, was installed that way, and gave me no paritcular problems.
Well, using EFI didn't either, until I messed up a cloning and, well, long story.

I have had a problem with Installer since 16.10. ─ If I choose a non-English Language, it uses to crash later. ─ No problem if I choose a non-English Keyboard layout.

For example, recently, having messed up both sda and sdb, I booted K18 (on sdc) and fixed them from that. Which of course you could do from a live, but that being a "proper" installation...

Using a distro to fix another is frequently better than need to run a Live session. It may save a lot of time and work.

[P.S.] @Flavio, hadn't read your post - no need to burn clonezilla anywhere really - You can run it from any system that doesn't involve the partitions you want to work on. It's really small, basically just a shell script.

Ok, I have installed Clonezilla just now, in Arch. It is really light:

Packages (17) drbl-2.25.10-1  ecryptfs-utils-111-3  fuse3-3.6.1-1  lbzip2-2.5-4  lrzip-0.631-2  lzop-1.04-2  nilfs-utils-2.2.7-1
           ntfs-3g-2017.3.23-3  partclone-0.3.11-1  partimage-0.6.9-12  pbzip2-1.1.13-2  pigz-2.4-1  pixz-1.0.6-2
           progsreiserfs-0.3.0.5-9  screen-4.6.2-1  sshfs-3.5.2-1  clonezilla-3.27.16-2

Total Download Size:    4,51 MiB
Total Installed Size:  16,82 MiB

I will install it in the other distros, as time goes by. But I will download an ISO and burn it to a DVD, too. It may be a nice tool to have at hand.

[Don B. Cilly]

Kde's partition manager is fine. It's just missing a couple of things, like changing UUIDs... and setting an ESP flag;·). Gparted has those.
Of course you can use the command line for them, but you have to know how.

4GB don't quite cut it with virtual machines.
They won't work very well unless you assign at least 4GB to them.

In any case, you can't expect them to work like a properly installed distro on HD.
Still, 8, or even 16GB of RAM are cheaper than a decent HD.
And they will improve your performance in many ways anyway. I have 8, which I find adequate for my use, VMs included,

[Flavio R. Cavalcanti]

What an interesting thread.

There is no requirement for EFI in kubuntu or neon that I am aware of. If your machine is using it it will install in EFI mode. if you dont like that change your setting in the EFI to legacy mode.

I can't recall using clonezilla in any recent time. Personally i use dd but I can understand wanting a gui tool for it.

I don't get the hate for the kde partition tool since i have not had any issues with it that i can recall and i use it often to format things like usb sticks almost daily. What problems is everyone having with it ?

If you are booting several linux distros i would suggest you stop doing that use a vm or chroot from one distro there are options. You can do some fancy stuff with Vms like let them have their own devices or video cards. Honestly I've never really seen a real reason to do this. I could see in the past maybe to build for another distro or test there but outside of that i really can't see why anyone would do this. What Reasons do you all have for installing several different linux distos ?

I really don't remeber any serious problem with KDE Partition Manager. Just, I am used to use GParted, since 2007. When I try to use the KDE tool, I feel lost. It is not recommendable to feel lost when you are dealing with critical tasks.

Additionally, it is not practical to do partitioning from an installed distro. It is better to do it from a Live session, and it happens that most of Live ISOs have GParted. ─ There are many cases when I had to install a distro with IceWM, Xfce, MATE or Cinnamon, to replace them with KDE later.

Well, I don't know if my old 4 GB desktop would be enough to run a VM. Never tried. And I don't want to urgently assemble next one. I want to take the needed time to feel sure about the specs I will choose. Meanwhile, no problem to buy a new HDD, and another. They will be useful.

Computers are not my job, even if I have been using them since 1986, and I find it fun. But time investment has been often bigger than I had liked, along this time, so I had to deal with escape options.

I began to dualboot for safe ─ if happens a disaster to a distro, just restart and keep working with the other. ─ Finish your work and come back to fix when you have a time. Tomorrow, or next week, or next month. Work is absolute priority.

It was also true even when I deleted WinXP and could have 4 distros. Mint 18 KDE became better than Kubuntu 16.04, but when upgraded to 18.1 it became unuseful to my old hardware. I wanted to read, learn and try all possible things, before to give up and reinstall it. And, indeed, I have used all needed time from January to April 2017.

Once, KDE Neon became better than Kubuntu and Mint KDE. It was becoming my "main distro", but there came problems, one more time.

Now, the original "main distro", Kubuntu 16.04, was no more supported. Just delete it, and keep working with any other installed distro. What about, if all distros were within its VM?

Maybe, one day I will deal with VM, for another reasons, but I think I will never leave dualbooting.

[Don B. Cilly]

I haven't had Windows on any machine, for some ten years

I do have Win7 in Virtualbox. One of those "free legal VMs" from Microsoft that expire in 90 days - and then don't.
I use it very rarely, when Wine can't cope.

I tried installing Kubuntu 18 in legacy mode, I couldn't. Can't remember how or why exactly. Everything I had up to then, up to Kubuntu 16.04, was installed that way, and gave me no paritcular problems.
Well, using EFI didn't either, until I messed up a cloning and, well, long story.

I have several distros installed (I do try others in VMs) because: Two are versions of the same one. The old one (neon unstable - almost an oxymoron ;·) is still there but hopefully not for long, as soon as I'm confident enough I'll reuse the partition for something else. One is K18.04. I keep it just in case i want to do things with it, and it's got stuff I haven't sorted/backed up yet. It has been useful.
For example, recently, having messed up both sda and sdb, I booted K18 (on sdc) and fixed them from that. Which of course you could do from a live, but that being a "proper" installation...
Another is K14.04 (historically my favourite distro) that I keep much for the same reason.
Then I have Kubuntu 13.something and Ubuntu 10.something that I keep... well, I haven't backed up some stuff on them, and I've got lots of space.
See, they just accumulate

The KDE partition manager, I don't hate.
I just find it rather silly that, when you install Kubuntu, it says, pretty much: your EFI partition does not have an ESP flag. Go back and set it. Or you can proceed without it, but your system may break, misbehave, explode, etc.
So you go back, and the partition manager does not have an esp flag anywhere. Gparted does, but it's not in the installation, is it...
So it seems to me that most people trying to install Kubuntu are looking at a choice between a potentially misbehaving system and having to pre-partition with Gparted.
And if they've never done it before, they do need ESP... ;·)

[P.S.] @Flavio, hadn't read your post - no need to burn clonezilla anywhere really - You can run it from any system that doesn't involve the partitions you want to work on. It's really small, basically just a shell script.

[Flavio R. Cavalcanti]

Well, I did try with gparted, but it seemed incredibly slow.
Clonezilla only copies used sectors, so if I have a 400 GB partition with only 30 GB of stuff on it, gparted will copy the whole 400 while clonezilla only 30.
Of course, you can leave it running, go do something else and come back to it when it's done, but... you know...

EFI, I wouldn't have touched it, except first Kubuntu 18 and then Neon absolutely demanded it. Couldn't find a way to install them without it.
I already mentioned the silly little caper with the esp partition flag and gparted.
I wonder how most people manage to install the latest Kubuntu/Neons without pre-partitioning with gparted... they probably ignore the dire warnings and hope for the best.

Anyway, I've leaned a lot from the clonezilla/UUID mess.
Which, BTW, whether you use one or the other to copy the partition, would produce the same errors, wouldn't they? I mean, they both copy the UUID.

So, if I ever have to do it again, I'll change the UUID before doing anything else and... hope for the best

Thanks, I didn't know Clonezilla, except for quick readings. I will download and burn it to a DVD and keep it as a nice tool. I have used GParted Live, but couldn't find a Screenshot utility in it. Then, used Knoppix, which gathers browser, Dolphin, GParted and many other useful tools, but it is a few heavy for my hardware. Nowadays, I use the most recently burned DVD that I can find at hand, with no matter what Live distro. Most of Live distros come with GParted.

Copying time has not been a big problem, as all my Root and Home partitions have just 25 GiB. But, yes, it is good to have a speeder tool.

I still don't have found any distro which absolutely demanded to use UEFI, but I didn't try so many distros ─ something as 20 or 25 installations, since 2017: ─ Kubuntu, Manjaro, openSUSE, Mint, Fedora, Mageia, Antergos, Sabayon, Arch (Revenge Installer, Arch Anywhere installer), Devuan, Slackware, Rosa, PCLinuxOS, antiX, MX Linux, LMDE, ─ some of them 2+ times.

Always, to pre-existent partitions ─ and some times, pre-formatted.

I have installed Kubuntu 18.04 Disco Dingo at its development starts, back in November 2018. I have selected "Manual" option, in order just to choose pre-existent "/" and "/home" partitions (and disable other 11 Swap partitions).

Here is a report, unhappily in Portuguese, although there is a Translate button at the top of right column:

https://byteria.blogspot.com/2018/11...ily-build.html

This was my latest Kubuntu installation. After Disco Dingo release, I have just upgraded it to new 19.10 Eoan Ermine development branch:

https://byteria.blogspot.com/2019/05...nt-branch.html

Because Kubuntu 16.04 LTS was no more supported, I have replaced it with Eoan Ermine ─ by moving (cloning) it from SSD to HDD:

https://byteria.blogspot.com/2019/06...s-ssd-hdd.html

Since November, I have installed only Sabayon and Mageia. Still, no problem with BIOS and MBR.

I could'nt achieve to run a KDE Neon Live session for a long time, since April 2016, when I have installed it twice in a week (User and Unstable; then keeping just User Edition).

KDE Neon has been accidentally deleted in 2017 and I could'nt run a new Live session! Downloaded and burned many ISOs to DVD and Pendrive, with different tools, but the only thing I could do was to "Install" ─ never "Try".

Tried KDE Neon ISOs again in 2018 and 2019, and could'nt run even "Install". So, I had to upgrade that old installation of KDE Neon, from Xenial to Bionic base.

Yes, "cloning" will always preserve all characteristics, ─ including UUID. ─ The only change is to "grow", if the target partition is bigger.

Changing UUID is a lot of work. Now, I always prefer to unplug origin device, ─ and it is not a problem with BIOS and MBR. ─ Maybe, UEFI would complicate.

[sithlord48]

What an interesting thread.

There is no requirement for EFI in kubuntu or neon that I am aware of. If your machine is using it it will install in EFI mode. if you dont like that change your setting in the EFI to legacy mode.

I can't recall using clonezilla in any recent time. Personally i use dd but I can understand wanting a gui tool for it.

I don't get the hate for the kde partition tool since i have not had any issues with it that i can recall and i use it often to format things like usb sticks almost daily. What problems is everyone having with it ?

If you are booting several linux distros i would suggest you stop doing that use a vm or chroot from one distro there are options. You can do some fancy stuff with Vms like let them have their own devices or video cards. Honestly I've never really seen a real reason to do this. I could see in the past maybe to build for another distro or test there but outside of that i really can't see why anyone would do this. What Reasons do you all have for installing several different linux distos ?

[oshunluvr]

IME if an EFI partition is detected, the installer will default to an EFI install. If you have a GRUB BIOS partition instead of EFI (or a clean slate), then the installer will not ask for an EFI partition and install without it. I doubt you can have a hybrid boot setup. I suppose if you had Windows on one disk along with EFI and installed grub to another disk (while the EFI disk was unplugged) you may be able to boot Windows somehow from a custom GRUB.

Sounds like a lot of trouble for no real benefit.

The best solution IMO is to run Windows in a VM where it belongs and leave the hardware to a real OS.

[Don B. Cilly]

Well, I did try with gparted, but it seemed incredibly slow.
Clonezilla only copies used sectors, so if I have a 400 GB partition with only 30 GB of stuff on it, gparted will copy the whole 400 while clonezilla only 30.
Of course, you can leave it running, go do something else and come back to it when it's done, but... you know...

EFI, I wouldn't have touched it, except first Kubuntu 18 and then Neon absolutely demanded it. Couldn't find a way to install them without it.
I already mentioned the silly little caper with the esp partition flag and gparted.
I wonder how most people manage to install the latest Kubuntu/Neons without pre-partitioning with gparted... they probably ignore the dire warnings and hope for the best.

Anyway, I've leaned a lot from the clonezilla/UUID mess.
Which, BTW, whether you use one or the other to copy the partition, would produce the same errors, wouldn't they? I mean, they both copy the UUID.

So, if I ever have to do it again, I'll change the UUID before doing anything else and... hope for the best

[Flavio R. Cavalcanti]

Your "water cooler" is wellcome, as an opportunity to exchange ideas and experiences. I have read your 2 other (specific) topics, too.

I can understand some (or almost all) of your problems, I guess ─ and I am avoiding some of them, just by keeping my very very old hardware (10 years) for some months more.

In one word, I am trying to understand all I can, in order to never use UEFI, after to get next new hardware.

From this very old hardware point of view, ─ with old BIOS hardware and with MBR partitioning, ─ Grub has been reasonably useful, even if it sometimes has got mad.

By the way, I don't use Clonezilla, ─ just GParted running from a Live session, ─ to clone (move) installed distros from a HDD to another.

GParted is more simple, so I can deal with less variables.

(Yes, I prefer GParted, ─ instead of KDE Partition Manager, ─ although I always use KDE desktop).

If I want to test the clone before to remove the original distro, I need to change the UUID, ─ of both "/" and "/home" clones, ─ then run Grub again in order to recognize them (and distinguish them from the original ones).

But, before to run Grub, I have to replace old UUIDs with new ones, in a few system files, within the clone:

/etc/fstab
/etc/default/grub ---- in the case of openSUSE, Mageia, PCLinuxOS, Manjaro
/etc/initramfs-tools/conf.d/resume ---- in the case of Devuan
… (may be there other cases)

Yes, Kubuntu needs less manual work than other distros.

If the clone work fine and I want to keep it, I still need to reinstall the last Kernel, so it will incorporate the new "/" UUID.

Another way is just to unplug device with the original ones, for a while, ─ so you may test the clone without so much manual work.

If it is all right, just run a new Live session, ─ with original device plugged again, ─ and format the original partitions.

Then, run Grub again, and be happy.

In my very old hardware I have 4 devices (3 HDD + 1 SSD) and I "dualboot" 12 installed distros.

It was fine with just Kubuntu and Mint, as they are very similar, and their Grub "understand" one each other. ─ Adding Debian didn't create any big problem.

Adding a former KDE Neon did create a little problem. Nothing really serious.

When I started to try non-buntu distros, there were some problems. ─ Kubuntu-Mint-Debian's Grub didn't work to run Manjaro or Arch, for example. ─ So, I had to set Manjaro-Arch's Grub to manage my Boot Menu.

Then, I could'nt allow other distro's Grub to overwrite Manjaro-Arch's Grub at sda Master Boot Record (MBR), every time there is a Kernel update.

It is relatively easy to tell Kubuntu-Mint-Debian's Grub not to write to MBR:

[#]sudo dpkg-reconfigure grub[/#]

or

[#]sudo dpkg-reconfigure grub-pc[/#]

and select sdb, sdc, or none.

Installing openSUSE in a BtrFS partition, ─ without a separate /boot partition, ─ brought a new problem, as some distro's Grub didn't read BtrFS partitions.

tl;tr ─ Summary: ─ Now I have a Grub by Mageia at sda; and a Grub by openSUSE at sdb, and both can run any other distro. ─ If I need, just press DEL at Boot and run BIOS Setup to boot from sdb.

12 distros' Grub detecting 12 distros may drive Grub crazy. ─ There is a lot of sed and paste activity, and you may end up with some enormous grub.cfg files.

So, I have set 10 distro's Grub not to detect the other distros ─ by editing /etc/default/grub file:

[#]GRUB_DISABLE_OS_PROBER=true[/#]

Each distro's Grub will detect just itself ─ in order to Mageia's and openSUSE's Grub read them.

(Slackware didn't install its own Grub, and it was a problem to Mageia's and openSUSE's Grub to correctly detect it ─ until I manually installed Slackware's Grub).

So, you can see how Grub is simple, itself. It has been a lot of fun.

Now, I cannot figure how could it be with UEFI and a Fat32 ESP partition. ─ Many people says it is very simple! No problem! ─ But I have seen tons of people crying everywhere. I am really afraid.

By the way, all my distros are installed within MBR primary partitions, ─ 3 for each device.

Some years ago, I had also a distro installed in a logical partition, ─ but back then, there were just 2 distros (Mint and Kubuntu).

[oshunluvr]

Yeah, just conversation. My mum never bought me an SSD...