On Sun, 26 Oct 2008 09:40:46 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> YaST will let you do this.  I was just in there checking it out. :-)
> 
> Cool. Perhaps they improved that since I first tried it a couple years
> ago. I couldn't imagine nothing would do it. I'm pretty sure the
> command-line fdisk on Linux allows it too.

Oh, sure fdisk or cfdisk will let you change the active flag in a 
partition.

Jim

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On Sun, 26 Oct 2008 09:40:02 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>>> I'll eat my underwears if they do. :D
>> You'll have to video that one. ;-)
> 
> In my experience, the proper response is
>     GIF! GIF! GIF!

LOL

Jim

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On Sun, 26 Oct 2008 09:51:04 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>> I think this is because GRUB is actually a more complex piece of
>> software compared to LILO.
> 
> Yep.
> 
>> That's not how I remember it, but I generally didn't have multiple MS
>> OSes installed simultaneously.
> 
> Remember that MS was selling Xenix long before Linux was conceived.

True, but there again, the Xenix systems that I saw and worked on only 
ran Xenix....We actually used that for the "library" system in the 
computer lab at the school I went to.

Jim

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Jim Henderson wrote:
>>> Thing is, it shouldn't require a change to the active partition list.
>> It doesn't *require* it. It *allows* it.
> 
> No, I mean in order to boot a different partition.

Windows and GRUB are the same in this respect. If the active partition 
is, for some reason, unreadable, you won't get a menu to boot the other 
partition. However, you can use a non-OS tool (fdisk off a dos disk, 
say) to change the active partition and boot the other OS.

It's a two-stage boot. You're talking about the second stage. I'm 
talking about the first stage.

> Probably, yes - though it's probably easier to modify the Grub setup at 
> that point and just add the Windows install.  Most people I know who 
> install Windows second, though, use a VM rather than a native boot.

There are definitely more options now than there were, yes. :-)

> It means that GRUB on my system here is using the active partition.  I 
> don't know what's in the MBR on this laptop's hard drive, but the 
> settings when I go into YaST and look indicate that it's installed to the 
> first sector of the active partition.

It's most likely installed to both. It's a two-stage boot. Maybe that's 
what's confusing the conversation.

The first stage is to load the MBR off (basically) sector zero of the 
hard drive, which happens to include the partition table. The *stnadard* 
MBR then looks at the partition table, finds the active partition, moves 
itself out of the way, reads the first sector of the active partition 
into the same place it was, and jumps to it.

Only after that second step do you get any kind of menu. If you delete 
NTLDR or /boot off the active partition, you're not going to have an 
opportunity to boot off a different partition. With the standard MBR, 
you don't have to put NTLDR or /boot back, you just have to change the 
active flag.  Last I experiemented, the GRUB MBR booted the GRUB 
partition even if it wasn't marked active, which means if your GRUB 
partition is corrupt, you're SOL.

-- 
Darren New / San Diego, CA, USA (PST)

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On Sun, 26 Oct 2008 13:25:44 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> Jim Henderson wrote:
>>>> Thing is, it shouldn't require a change to the active partition list.
>>> It doesn't *require* it. It *allows* it.
>> 
>> No, I mean in order to boot a different partition.
> 
> Windows and GRUB are the same in this respect. If the active partition
> is, for some reason, unreadable, you won't get a menu to boot the other
> partition. However, you can use a non-OS tool (fdisk off a dos disk,
> say) to change the active partition and boot the other OS.
> 
> It's a two-stage boot. You're talking about the second stage. I'm
> talking about the first stage.

Oh, right - yes, and both platforms use the two-stage system these days.

>> Probably, yes - though it's probably easier to modify the Grub setup at
>> that point and just add the Windows install.  Most people I know who
>> install Windows second, though, use a VM rather than a native boot.
> 
> There are definitely more options now than there were, yes. :-)

Absolutely. :-)

>> It means that GRUB on my system here is using the active partition.  I
>> don't know what's in the MBR on this laptop's hard drive, but the
>> settings when I go into YaST and look indicate that it's installed to
>> the first sector of the active partition.
> 
> It's most likely installed to both. It's a two-stage boot. Maybe that's
> what's confusing the conversation.

Perhaps.

> The first stage is to load the MBR off (basically) sector zero of the
> hard drive, which happens to include the partition table. The *stnadard*
> MBR then looks at the partition table, finds the active partition, moves
> itself out of the way, reads the first sector of the active partition
> into the same place it was, and jumps to it.
>
> Only after that second step do you get any kind of menu. If you delete
> NTLDR or /boot off the active partition, you're not going to have an
> opportunity to boot off a different partition. With the standard MBR,
> you don't have to put NTLDR or /boot back, you just have to change the
> active flag.  Last I experiemented, the GRUB MBR booted the GRUB
> partition even if it wasn't marked active, which means if your GRUB
> partition is corrupt, you're SOL.

Well, only as far as that disk is - a bootable rescue disk can fix that, 
but also in my experience GRUB can get to a point where you can type in 
commands to boot the system.  I used to have to do that with RH9 systems 
I'd imaged on occasion.  So even if it didn't read the menu, I could get 
the system up to a point where I could fix the menu.

Jim

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Darren New wrote:
> 
> Yeah. Funny enough, people complain about Vista not supporting hardware
> right, but don't think that's a problem for Linux. :-) "Just buy the
> right hardware to start with."  My machines tend to last a number of
> years, so "buy the right hardware" isn't always possible for me.
> 

To exactly how many pieces of hardware have you lost the support on
Linux while upgrading to a newer version of Linux? The difference
between Linux and Vista here is that if your device worked with Zoot
(RedHat 6.2) and 2.2 -series kernel, it most probably still works with
newest SuSE and 2.6 -series kernel - at least if you're still able to
physically plug the device in.

If your hw works with Linux now, it'll work for the number of years,
even if you do update your software. As far as I've understood, if your
hw works with 2k or XP, you can't be sure it'll still work with Vista.

And yes, I'll have to admit - em8300 -support took a while to work in
64-bit. That's the only case I've hit my head with.

-- 
Eero "Aero" Ahonen
   http://www.zbxt.net
      aer### [at] removethiszbxtnetinvalid

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Jim Henderson wrote:
> 
> I've also heard that some of the newer HP laserjet printers don't have 
> open specs so there aren't drivers yet for them.  That one I haven't 
> confirmed, just have heard about.

That must be the cheapest bonk-line LJ's. All real-printer LJ's I've
seen have talked PostScript and various PCL versions and are supported
very widely.

> 
> Jim


-- 
Eero "Aero" Ahonen
   http://www.zbxt.net
      aer### [at] removethiszbxtnetinvalid

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Jim Henderson wrote:
> 
> Oh, that's not Grub, that's SYSLINUX - Grub is hard-disk only to the best 
> of my knowledge.
> 

I'm not sure about CD-ROM, but at least Grub is able to boot via PXE.

> Jim


-- 
Eero "Aero" Ahonen
   http://www.zbxt.net
      aer### [at] removethiszbxtnetinvalid

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Eero Ahonen <aer### [at] removethiszbxtnetinvalid> wrote:
> To exactly how many pieces of hardware have you lost the support on
> Linux while upgrading to a newer version of Linux? The difference
> between Linux and Vista here is that if your device worked with Zoot
> (RedHat 6.2) and 2.2 -series kernel, it most probably still works with
> newest SuSE and 2.6 -series kernel - at least if you're still able to
> physically plug the device in.

  I think one advantage of Linux over Windows is that Linux has absolutely
no need to try to "sell" new versions of itself. This allows for a much
more gradual development of the entire system, and there's no need to
artificially make a "new version of linux" (if we even can rationally talk
about one) look&feel different from earlier versions. On the contrary, one
of the strengths of Linux is precisely that it doesn't need to try to be
different with each new version, so it can not only keep backwards
compatibility at software level, but also at the user interface level.
Any changes in usage are caused by necessity, not by an attempt to be
different for the sake of being different.

  Not so with Windows. Microsoft *must* sell a completely brand new version
of Windows each n years. Of course people wouldn't buy the new version if
it was basically identical to the old version, with just internal invisible
improvements, and perhaps a few new programs (which would work in the old
version anyways). Thus MS has to make new versions of Windows look&feel
different from earlier versions. MS has to create the illusion that the
new version is much better than the old version, and that people should
definitely upgrade. That sells.
  The sad thing that changing the look&feel often means artificial changes
which are not for the better. It also sometimes means breaking backwards
compatibility with older software and even hardware.
  Another way of selling the new version is to include something which
does not work in the older version (DirectX10 anyone?)

  The sad thing is that people are ready to conform.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:
> Eero Ahonen <aer### [at] removethiszbxtnetinvalid> wrote:
> > To exactly how many pieces of hardware have you lost the support on
> > Linux while upgrading to a newer version of Linux? The difference
> > between Linux and Vista here is that if your device worked with Zoot
> > (RedHat 6.2) and 2.2 -series kernel, it most probably still works with
> > newest SuSE and 2.6 -series kernel - at least if you're still able to
> > physically plug the device in.
>
>   I think one advantage of Linux over Windows is that Linux has absolutely
> no need to try to "sell" new versions of itself. This allows for a much
> more gradual development of the entire system, and there's no need to
> artificially make a "new version of linux" (if we even can rationally talk
> about one) look&feel different from earlier versions. On the contrary, one
> of the strengths of Linux is precisely that it doesn't need to try to be
> different with each new version, so it can not only keep backwards
> compatibility at software level, but also at the user interface level.
> Any changes in usage are caused by necessity, not by an attempt to be
> different for the sake of being different.
>
>   Not so with Windows. Microsoft *must* sell a completely brand new version
> of Windows each n years. Of course people wouldn't buy the new version if
> it was basically identical to the old version, with just internal invisible
> improvements, and perhaps a few new programs (which would work in the old
> version anyways). Thus MS has to make new versions of Windows look&feel
> different from earlier versions. MS has to create the illusion that the
> new version is much better than the old version, and that people should
> definitely upgrade. That sells.
>   The sad thing that changing the look&feel often means artificial changes
> which are not for the better. It also sometimes means breaking backwards
> compatibility with older software and even hardware.
>   Another way of selling the new version is to include something which
> does not work in the older version (DirectX10 anyone?)
>
>   The sad thing is that people are ready to conform.
>
> --
>                                                           - Warp

I wouldn't say it any better.

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