Some grub questions

[Lennart Sorensen]

On Mon, Jan 02, 2006 at 08:51:10PM -0500, Paul Mora wrote:
> The initrd image file contains kernel modules that are required for the root
> filesystem  to be enabled on boot.  Most distributions compile the
> filesystem drivers as loadable modules instead of statically in the kernel.
> However, on boot, the kernel has no way of accessing these modules, because
> they sit on the disk.
> 
> The initrd image is, essentially, a very small root filesystem which just
> contains the modules needed to mount the root filesystem.  Once that's done,
> it gets tossed. (It's actually a gzip compressed ext2 filesystem; you can
> uncompress and mount it to see what's inside).
> 
> I have been googling about for update-grub scripts. The articles out

I believe update-grub is a debian invention.  It certainly is included
in the debian grub packages.  And debian has many update-X scripts
around for various things like update-modules, update-alternatives, etc.

> Not sure what you're looking for here.  Scripts that auto-update grub?

Scripts that are called when a new kernel is added to update the grub
menu automatically with your standard options.  Debian's kernel images
can have hooks to update-grub added to /etc/kernel-img.conf to do that.

> You're getting confused between the Linux "root" filesystem, and the GRUB
> "root" partition.  They are totally different.  In GRUB, the "root"
> directive always points to the partition where the kernel and initrd image
> files are located.  If, during installation, a partition was created for
> "/boot", then that's the device GRUB will use for the "root" directive.
> This is what Ubuntu does during installation.  If /boot is in the / (root)
> filesystem, then it will point there.

Len Sorensen
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