Bug 427818 – sys-boot/grub-0.97-r13 - script grub-install cannot find /dev/root

• Status: RESOLVED WONTFIX
• Product: Gentoo Linux

[Description Andreas Proteus 2012-07-23 22:51:14 UTC]

[Comment 1 Andreas Proteus 2012-07-23 23:01:43 UTC]

Created attachment 319040 [details]
emerge --info

[Comment 2 Andreas Proteus 2012-07-23 23:07:39 UTC]

# grub-install --no-floppy /dev/sda
/dev/root: Not found or not a block device.

Because /dev/root does not exist
# ls -l /dev/root
/bin/ls: cannot access /dev/root: No such file or directory

Yet:
# cat /proc/cmdline
root=/dev/sda2

From grub command line entering:
grub> root (hd0,1)   
grub> setup (hd0)    
grub> quit           
Works fine.

So the script grub-install appears to be broken.

[Comment 3 Andreas Proteus 2012-07-23 23:13:06 UTC]

Apologies for the mess but there is no way to edit.

[Comment 4 SpanKY 2012-10-12 18:44:55 UTC]

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 390519 ***

[Comment 5 William Hubbs 2012-10-14 21:07:13 UTC]

This is not a udev issue. Please see the tracker this bug blocks now for
information on how your package may be able to be fixed.

Thanks,

William

[Comment 6 Richard Yao (RETIRED) 2012-10-15 18:47:17 UTC]

We need to improve our documentation to tell users not use grub-install until someone finds time to write fairly invasive modifications to sys-boot/grub:0 to stop relying on /dev/root.

If you really want to use grub-install, do `ln -s /dev/sda /dev/root`. Otherwise, please use the grub shell.

[Comment 7 William Hubbs 2012-10-16 00:32:02 UTC]

(In reply to comment #6)
> We need to improve our documentation to tell users not use grub-install
> until someone finds time to write fairly invasive modifications to
> sys-boot/grub:0 to stop relying on /dev/root.

Also, we have grub-2 in ~arch, so when that hits stable there will be a big documentation update.

I'm not quite sure what is holding up grub-2 stabilization.

[Comment 8 Andreas K. Hüttel 2013-01-31 20:48:13 UTC]

(In reply to comment #6)
> We need to improve our documentation to tell users not use grub-install
> until someone finds time to write fairly invasive modifications to
> sys-boot/grub:0 to stop relying on /dev/root.
> 
> If you really want to use grub-install, do `ln -s /dev/sda /dev/root`.
> Otherwise, please use the grub shell.

I guess you mean `ln -s /dev/sdaX /dev/root` with sdaX the root partition. Anything else does not make sense.

[Comment 9 Richard Yao (RETIRED) 2013-01-31 21:35:11 UTC]

Created attachment 337508 [details, diff]
Patch to fix missing /dev/root

I have written a preliminary patch that should fix this, but it needs testing. I have not tested it at all (and do not have time for testing at the moment). If anyone wishes to volunteer, it would be much appreciated.

[Comment 10 Ian Stakenvicius (RETIRED) 2016-10-04 21:07:07 UTC]

Given the stage of grub:0 should this be revisited?  It's been quite a while since I recall the whole /dev/root situation and I don't remember if it was ever resolved another way or not..

[Comment 11 Mikle Kolyada (RETIRED) 2019-02-08 15:26:27 UTC]

grub:0 is gone