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reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie?

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  reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Giovanni Gigante <giov-debian@deepsky.it> - 2016-07-05 15:40 +0200
    Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Don Armstrong <don@debian.org> - 2016-07-05 19:20 +0200
      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Marc Shapiro <marcnshap@gmail.com> - 2016-07-05 21:00 +0200
        Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Don Armstrong <don@debian.org> - 2016-07-05 23:50 +0200
          Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Jonathan Dowland <jmtd@debian.org> - 2016-07-06 11:00 +0200
            Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Don Armstrong <don@debian.org> - 2016-07-06 21:30 +0200
              Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2016-07-07 08:40 +0200
                Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Lisi Reisz <lisi.reisz@gmail.com> - 2016-07-07 11:40 +0200
                  Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-07 12:40 +0200
                    Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2016-07-07 12:50 +0200
                      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-07 13:30 +0200
                        Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Giovanni Gigante <giovanni.gigante@deepsky.it> - 2016-07-07 17:20 +0200
                          Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@fastmail.com> - 2016-07-08 02:40 +0200
                            Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Felix Miata <mrmazda@earthlink.net> - 2016-07-08 03:00 +0200
                              Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@fastmail.com> - 2016-07-09 15:10 +0200
                                Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Felix Miata <mrmazda@earthlink.net> - 2016-07-09 17:00 +0200
                                  Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@fastmail.com> - 2016-07-09 19:20 +0200
                                    Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-09 22:10 +0200
                                      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Erwan David <erwan@rail.eu.org> - 2016-07-09 22:10 +0200
                                        Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Felix Miata <mrmazda@earthlink.net> - 2016-07-09 22:40 +0200
                                        Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-10 00:20 +0200
                                          Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? <tomas@tuxteam.de> - 2016-07-10 10:40 +0200
                                            Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-10 13:20 +0200
                                      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@fastmail.com> - 2016-07-09 22:50 +0200
                                        Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-10 00:30 +0200
                                          Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@fastmail.com> - 2016-07-10 04:20 +0200
                                        Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Pascal Hambourg <pascal@plouf.fr.eu.org> - 2016-07-10 10:20 +0200
                                          Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@fastmail.com> - 2016-07-10 14:10 +0200
                                      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Felix Miata <mrmazda@earthlink.net> - 2016-07-10 00:50 +0200
                                      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Pascal Hambourg <pascal@plouf.fr.eu.org> - 2016-07-10 09:50 +0200
                                    Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Felix Miata <mrmazda@earthlink.net> - 2016-07-09 22:40 +0200
                                      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@fastmail.com> - 2016-07-09 23:10 +0200
                                        Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Richard Owlett <rowlett@cloud85.net> - 2016-07-10 15:40 +0200
                                          Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-10 16:30 +0200
                            Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Joel Roth <joelz@pobox.com> - 2016-07-10 08:40 +0200
                              UEFI bootloaders (was: Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to  jessie?) Joel Roth <joelz@pobox.com> - 2016-07-10 23:20 +0200
                                Re: UEFI bootloaders (was: Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie?) "Byung-Hee HWANG (황병희)" <soyeomul@doraji.xyz> - 2016-07-11 01:20 +0200
                Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? David Wright <deblis@lionunicorn.co.uk> - 2016-07-07 20:30 +0200
    Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Gary Dale <garydale@torfree.net> - 2016-07-07 20:50 +0200
      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? David Wright <deblis@lionunicorn.co.uk> - 2016-07-07 21:00 +0200
        Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Gary Dale <garydale@torfree.net> - 2016-07-07 21:20 +0200
          Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? David Wright <deblis@lionunicorn.co.uk> - 2016-07-07 21:40 +0200
          Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-07 23:20 +0200
            Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Gary Dale <garydale@torfree.net> - 2016-07-08 05:40 +0200
              Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-08 20:20 +0200
                Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Gary Dale <garydale@torfree.net> - 2016-07-08 21:10 +0200
                  Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-08 22:00 +0200
                    Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Gary Dale <garydale@torfree.net> - 2016-07-09 00:20 +0200
                      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-09 01:10 +0200
                        Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Gary Dale <garydale@torfree.net> - 2016-07-09 05:30 +0200
                Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? David Wright <deblis@lionunicorn.co.uk> - 2016-07-08 21:30 +0200
                  Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-08 22:20 +0200
                    Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? David Wright <deblis@lionunicorn.co.uk> - 2016-07-09 00:10 +0200
                      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Brian <ad44@cityscape.co.uk> - 2016-07-09 00:30 +0200
        Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Michael Milliman <michael.e.milliman@gmail.com> - 2016-07-07 21:40 +0200
          Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? rhkramer@gmail.com - 2016-07-08 00:50 +0200
            Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Michael Milliman <michael.e.milliman@gmail.com> - 2016-07-08 02:00 +0200
            Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Michael Milliman <michael.e.milliman@gmail.com> - 2016-07-08 02:00 +0200
            Re: enumerating with Grub* (was: reasons to ditch LILO before...) Felix Miata <mrmazda@earthlink.net> - 2016-07-08 02:10 +0200
              Re: enumerating with Grub* (was: reasons to ditch LILO before...) David Wright <deblis@lionunicorn.co.uk> - 2016-07-08 03:10 +0200
                Re: enumerating with Grub* (was: reasons to ditch LILO before...) rhkramer@gmail.com - 2016-07-08 04:20 +0200
                Re: enumerating with Grub* Felix Miata <mrmazda@earthlink.net> - 2016-07-08 05:00 +0200
                  Re: enumerating with Grub* David Wright <deblis@lionunicorn.co.uk> - 2016-07-08 07:20 +0200
                    Re: enumerating with Grub* Felix Miata <mrmazda@earthlink.net> - 2016-07-08 07:50 +0200
                      Re: enumerating with Grub* David Wright <deblis@lionunicorn.co.uk> - 2016-07-08 16:50 +0200
      Re: reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie? Felix Miata <mrmazda@earthlink.net> - 2016-07-08 06:10 +0200

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#169754 — reasons to ditch LILO before upgrading to jessie?

Hello,
I am preparing my system for the upgrade from wheezy to jessie.
Since ancient ages, this system has been using LILO as the bootloader, 
because, long ago, it was the only bootloader that was recommended for 
my setup: this machine has two SATA disks in a software RAID 1 & LVM; 
that is, in /etc/lilo.conf I have:

boot=/dev/md0
root=/dev/mapper/vg00-rootlv
raid-extra-boot = mbr

My doubt is that I have read that LILO, besides being very old, is now 
unmantained. However, I see that the jessie installation manual still 
mentions it, so it does not seem deprecated yet.
So the question is: is there any serious reason to switch the system to 
GRUB before upgrading, or can I just keep my current setup and proceed 
to jessie?

Thanks
Giovanni

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#169767

On Tue, 05 Jul 2016, Giovanni Gigante wrote:
> I am preparing my system for the upgrade from wheezy to jessie.
> Since ancient ages, this system has been using LILO as the bootloader,
> because, long ago, it was the only bootloader that was recommended for my
> setup: this machine has two SATA disks in a software RAID 1 & LVM; that is,
> in /etc/lilo.conf I have:
> 
> boot=/dev/md0
> root=/dev/mapper/vg00-rootlv
> raid-extra-boot = mbr
> 
> My doubt is that I have read that LILO, besides being very old, is now
> unmantained. However, I see that the jessie installation manual still
> mentions it, so it does not seem deprecated yet. So the question is:
> is there any serious reason to switch the system to GRUB before
> upgrading, or can I just keep my current setup and proceed to jessie?

There's always the possibility that you'll discover a new bug with lilo
and newer kernels which no one else has seen, but that's probably fairly
unlikely.

In my experience, grub now works way more reliably than lilo ever did,
and it's worth switching. [I switched over *years* ago for precisely
this reason.] But your experience may vary.


-- 
Don Armstrong                      https://www.donarmstrong.com

6: If we are one, then we can defeat 2.
  -- "The Prisoner (2009 Miniseries)" _Schizoid_

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#169769

On 07/05/2016 10:10 AM, Don Armstrong wrote:
> On Tue, 05 Jul 2016, Giovanni Gigante wrote:
>> I am preparing my system for the upgrade from wheezy to jessie.
>> Since ancient ages, this system has been using LILO as the bootloader,
>> because, long ago, it was the only bootloader that was recommended for my
>> setup: this machine has two SATA disks in a software RAID 1 & LVM; that is,
>> in /etc/lilo.conf I have:
>>
>> boot=/dev/md0
>> root=/dev/mapper/vg00-rootlv
>> raid-extra-boot = mbr
>>
>> My doubt is that I have read that LILO, besides being very old, is now
>> unmantained. However, I see that the jessie installation manual still
>> mentions it, so it does not seem deprecated yet. So the question is:
>> is there any serious reason to switch the system to GRUB before
>> upgrading, or can I just keep my current setup and proceed to jessie?
> There's always the possibility that you'll discover a new bug with lilo
> and newer kernels which no one else has seen, but that's probably fairly
> unlikely.
>
> In my experience, grub now works way more reliably than lilo ever did,
> and it's worth switching. [I switched over *years* ago for precisely
> this reason.] But your experience may vary.
>
>
I finally switched to Jessie (but still using SysV Init) a few months 
ago.  This box and its predecessors have uses lilo (and SysV Init) since 
Bo was a pup.  I have yet to see any real reason to switch from lilo to 
grub.  I have never had a problem with lilo and I like having a config 
that I can directly control and understand.  As Giovanni says, however, 
YMMV.

Marc

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#169773

On Tue, 05 Jul 2016, Marc Shapiro wrote:
> I finally switched to Jessie (but still using SysV Init) a few months
> ago. This box and its predecessors have uses lilo (and SysV Init)
> since Bo was a pup. I have yet to see any real reason to switch from
> lilo to grub. I have never had a problem with lilo and I like having a
> config that I can directly control and understand.

Grub's configuration is pretty simple; /etc/default/grub is pretty
straight forward, and the resultant configuration is also pretty easy to
understand as well.

Grub also has a lot more features than lilo has, including the ability
to boot from cd images (useful for updating bios), proper serial
support, the ability to boot any kernel even if it isn't listed in the
config, the ability to handle raid5 and raid6 filesystems, lvm, support
for UEFI, encrypted /boot, network booting, fallback support, etc.

There's a reason why no one is interested in maintaining lilo anymore.

-- 
Don Armstrong                      https://www.donarmstrong.com

He no longer wished to be dead. At the same time, it cannot be said
that he was glad to be alive. But at least he did not resent it. He
was alive, and the stubbornness of this fact had little by little
begun to fascinate him -- as if he had managed to outlive himself, as
if he were somehow living a posthumous life.
 -- Paul Auster _City of Glass_

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#169781

[Multipart message — attachments visible in raw view] — view raw

On Tue, Jul 05, 2016 at 04:46:32PM -0500, Don Armstrong wrote:
> On Tue, 05 Jul 2016, Marc Shapiro wrote:
> > I finally switched to Jessie (but still using SysV Init) a few months
> > ago. This box and its predecessors have uses lilo (and SysV Init)
> > since Bo was a pup. I have yet to see any real reason to switch from
> > lilo to grub. I have never had a problem with lilo and I like having a
> > config that I can directly control and understand.
> 
> Grub's configuration is pretty simple; /etc/default/grub is pretty
> straight forward, and the resultant configuration is also pretty easy to
> understand as well.

YMMV, I find it impenetrable.

> There's a reason why no one is interested in maintaining lilo anymore.

And another why some look for alternatives to Grub :)

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#169799

On Wed, 06 Jul 2016, Jonathan Dowland wrote:
> YMMV, I find it impenetrable.

I'm assuming you mean the generated configuration? It's literally just
some boilerplate for fancy splash screens, and then menu entries. Each
entry containing appropriate module loading, root configuration, kernel
and initrd loading, and then boot commands. All of which is generated
directly from /etc/grub.d/ and is pretty well documented[1].

It's the same set of commands you can use to load almost any kernel from
almost any device almost anywhere on a system (or even the network), so
it's pretty useful to learn if you maintain machines which occasionally
need to do weird things.

1: https://www.gnu.org/software/grub/manual/html_node/Configuration.html
-- 
Don Armstrong                      https://www.donarmstrong.com

A Bill of Rights that means what the majority wants it to mean is worthless. 
 -- U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia

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#169824

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On Wed, Jul 06, 2016 at 02:23:39PM -0500, Don Armstrong wrote:
> On Wed, 06 Jul 2016, Jonathan Dowland wrote:
> > YMMV, I find it impenetrable.
> 
> I'm assuming you mean the generated configuration? It's literally just
> some boilerplate [...]

Let's make it impenetrable boilerplate, then.

FWIW, I concur with Jonathan. While I actively worked on my lilo.conf,
since grub (espeecially -2), I try to avoid touching the conf.

Wonderfully general, but (for me) wonderfully unusable.

Now don't get me wrong: without Grub, my box wouldn't boot, and chances
are that the "legacy" emulation of whatever monster bios is in there
is so buggy that Lilo wouldn't cope: therefore I am still full of thanks
and praise for the Grub authors for their hard work.

Still I do disagree on many of its design principles.

Regards
- -- tomás
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#169828

On Thursday 07 July 2016 07:33:57 tomas@tuxteam.de wrote:
> Let's make it (GRUB2) impenetrable boilerplate, then.

:-)  +1!

Lisi

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#169829

On Thu 07 Jul 2016 at 10:35:47 +0100, Lisi Reisz wrote:

> On Thursday 07 July 2016 07:33:57 tomas@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > Let's make it (GRUB2) impenetrable boilerplate, then.
> 
> :-)  +1!

It doesn't need to be penetrable, does it? The generated grub.cfg just
needs to boot the machine. In any case, it can easily be replaced by a
more readable five or six line version if desired.

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#169830

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On Thu, Jul 07, 2016 at 11:32:42AM +0100, Brian wrote:
> On Thu 07 Jul 2016 at 10:35:47 +0100, Lisi Reisz wrote:
> 
> > On Thursday 07 July 2016 07:33:57 tomas@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > > Let's make it (GRUB2) impenetrable boilerplate, then.
> > 
> > :-)  +1!

:-)

> It doesn't need to be penetrable, does it?

De gustibus non est disputandum.

To me, one of the attractions of the whole Free Software thing is its
"penetrability". I see that there's a force field among many poles,
functionality and "getting things done NOW" being two very valid ones
which sometimes are at odds with simplicity. And I readily admit that
preferences are extremely individual.

> The generated grub.cfg just needs to boot the machine. In any case,
> it can easily be replaced by a more readable five or six line version
> if desired.

Things get more complicated when you're in the position of "fixing"
it :-)

And please, again: the fact that I disagree with some Grub design
decisions shouldn't detract from the fact that I have utmost
respect for the Grub developers and packagers. Their hard work,
their decisions.

regards
- -- tomás
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#169831

On Thu 07 Jul 2016 at 12:44:40 +0200, tomas@tuxteam.de wrote:

> On Thu, Jul 07, 2016 at 11:32:42AM +0100, Brian wrote:
> > On Thu 07 Jul 2016 at 10:35:47 +0100, Lisi Reisz wrote:
> > 
> > > On Thursday 07 July 2016 07:33:57 tomas@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > > > Let's make it (GRUB2) impenetrable boilerplate, then.
> > > 
> > > :-)  +1!
> 
> :-)
> 
> > It doesn't need to be penetrable, does it?
> 
> De gustibus non est disputandum.
> 
> To me, one of the attractions of the whole Free Software thing is its
> "penetrability". I see that there's a force field among many poles,
> functionality and "getting things done NOW" being two very valid ones
> which sometimes are at odds with simplicity. And I readily admit that
> preferences are extremely individual.
> 
> > The generated grub.cfg just needs to boot the machine. In any case,
> > it can easily be replaced by a more readable five or six line version
> > if desired.
> 
> Things get more complicated when you're in the position of "fixing"
> it :-)

Admittedly, a generated grub.cfg or most of the files in /etc/grub.d
are not something I would recommend for bedtime reading. 

> And please, again: the fact that I disagree with some Grub design
> decisions shouldn't detract from the fact that I have utmost
> respect for the Grub developers and packagers. Their hard work,
> their decisions.

Giovanni Gigante seems happy enough with LiLo and there appears to be
no definite indication that it would fail to boot an upgraded machine.
He could consider leaving it in place, reading the bug reports and
having a plan to install GRUB should something go wrong afterwards.

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#169837

Brian wrote:
> Giovanni Gigante seems happy enough with LiLo and there appears to be 
> no definite indication that it would fail to boot an upgraded machine. 
> He could consider leaving it in place, reading the bug reports and 
> having a plan to install GRUB should something go wrong afterwards.

At the end, I decided to try the upgrade to jessie with LiLo (24.1) in 
place. I thought that the probability of hitting some bug caused by the 
interaction between LiLo and the upgraded distribution was less than the 
probabily of causing some damage by switching the bootloader (for 
example, by messing up the RAID configuration) since I've never 
configured Grub before. Also, the golden heuristic of "if it ain't 
broke, don't fix it", and the fact that this particular Debian upgrade 
is also switching from the init scripts to systemd, so I did not want to 
introduce even more changes in the boot process for the moment.

Apparently, it worked.

Perhaps, in the future, I'll also upgrade the bootloader, one rainy 
afternoon :-)

gg

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#169862

On Thu, Jul 7, 2016, at 10:57, Giovanni Gigante wrote:
> 
> At the end, I decided to try the upgrade to jessie with LiLo (24.1) in 
> place. I thought that the probability of hitting some bug caused by the 
> interaction between LiLo and the upgraded distribution was less than the 
> probabily of causing some damage by switching the bootloader (for 
> example, by messing up the RAID configuration) since I've never 
> configured Grub before. Also, the golden heuristic of "if it ain't 
> broke, don't fix it", and the fact that this particular Debian upgrade 
> is also switching from the init scripts to systemd, so I did not want to 
> introduce even more changes in the boot process for the moment.
> 
> Apparently, it worked.
> 

I never doubted that it would.  I still use LILO with the latest jessie
kernels.

I maintain a web page for Debian users who use LILO, or who are thinking
of switching from GRUB to LILO:

   http://www.stevesdebianstuff.org/lilo.htm

I don't address the issue of software RAID though.  I've never tried it.
I have used LILO with hardware RAID.  It works just fine.  I'm using it
right now as I write this.

As far as LILO being unmaintained is concerned, I wouldn't be too concerned
about that.  I've been thinking about offering to maintain it myself.  I haven't
heard from Joachim lately.  Maybe I'll drop him another line.

The three main things I like about LILO are (1) I understand how it works,
(2) it is easy to configure, and (3) it doesn't use any unallocated sectors.

The main limitations to LILO's future viability, as I see it, are UEFI
and GPT.  LILO is heavily dependent on the traditional BIOS.  Most UEFI
systems have a CSM to provide a BIOS for forward compatibility, though it
is often disabled by default.  But some of the newest systems are starting
to ship with no CSM.  I won't buy one of those as long as I have a choice.
And GPT is needed to break the 2 TiB disk size limit.  But none of my disks
are anywhere near that big.

If your system has a BIOS and a traditional DOS-style partition table,
there's no reason not to use LILO, unless you just don't want to.
 
-- 
  .''`.     Stephen Powell    <zlinuxman@fastmail.com>
 : :'  :
 `. `'`
   `-

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#169863

Stephen Powell composed on 2016-07-07 20:30 (UTC-0400):

> If your system has a BIOS and a traditional DOS-style partition table,
> there's no reason not to use LILO, unless you just don't want to.

Or, if you like to be able to boot without hunting down rescue media even 
though you forgot to "rerun" some configuration utility after a kernel 
upgrade. Once you understand how Grub's shell works, which includes command 
history and tab completion much the same as *ash, it is simple (maybe not so 
much in Grub2, which I don't use, as in Grub, which accounts for about 97% of 
my bootloader installations). Grub's shell has built-in help. With Grub, 
there's no reason to be scared when an expected boot menu doesn't show up.
-- 
"The wise are known for their understanding, and pleasant
words are persuasive." Proverbs 16:21 (New Living Translation)

  Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata  ***  http://fm.no-ip.com/

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#169909

On Thu, Jul 7, 2016, at 20:53, Felix Miata wrote:
> Stephen Powell composed on 2016-07-07 20:30 (UTC-0400):
> 
> > If your system has a BIOS and a traditional DOS-style partition table,
> > there's no reason not to use LILO, unless you just don't want to.
> 
> Or, if you like to be able to boot without hunting down rescue media even 
> though you forgot to "rerun" some configuration utility after a kernel 
> upgrade. Once you understand how Grub's shell works, which includes command 
> history and tab completion much the same as *ash, it is simple (maybe not so 
> much in Grub2, which I don't use, as in Grub, which accounts for about 97% of 
> my bootloader installations). Grub's shell has built-in help. With Grub, 
> there's no reason to be scared when an expected boot menu doesn't show up.
> ...

I've been using LILO for about 16 years, and I've never had to use rescue
media because I forgot to run lilo.  Modern Debian systems make sure that
lilo gets run when it needs to be run.  As for features, LILO has all the
features that I need.  Chiefly, it has the feature of being able to load the
Linux kernel into storage (and it's initial RAM file system image) and transfer
control to it.  It does one thing, and it does that one thing very well: it
loads the Linux kernel.  I believe in the KISS philosophy (Keep It Simple,
Stupid).  If you're happy with grub-legacy, great.  I'm happy for you.
Keep using it.  I'm happy with LILO, and I intend to keep using it.  And
apparently, the OP is happy with LILO too; and there's no reason, at least
at this point, why *he* shouldn't keep using it. 

Inside every large program is a small program struggling to get out -- Hoare's
law of large programs.

-- 
  .''`.     Stephen Powell    <zlinuxman@fastmail.com>
 : :'  :
 `. `'`
   `-

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#169910

Stephen Powell composed on 2016-07-09 08:58 (UTC-0400):

> As for features, LILO has all the features that I need.

One feature it never acquired AFAIK, which Grub shares with Syslinux, is the 
ability to edit the kernel cmdline at boot time, before kernel load. With 
problematic hardware, problematic BIOS, and pre-release kernel and distro 
versions, that ability is a big troubleshooting convenience. It's one of the 
features that facilitated my decision to migrate from OS/2 to Linux as 
primary OS.
-- 
"The wise are known for their understanding, and pleasant
words are persuasive." Proverbs 16:21 (New Living Translation)

  Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata  ***  http://fm.no-ip.com/

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#169912

On Sat, Jul 9, 2016, at 10:53, Felix Miata wrote:
> Stephen Powell composed on 2016-07-09 08:58 (UTC-0400):
> 
>> As for features, LILO has all the features that I need.
> 
> One feature it never acquired AFAIK, which Grub shares with Syslinux, is the 
> ability to edit the kernel cmdline at boot time, before kernel load. With 
> problematic hardware, problematic BIOS, and pre-release kernel and distro 
> versions, that ability is a big troubleshooting convenience. It's one of the 
> features that facilitated my decision to migrate from OS/2 to Linux as 
> primary OS.

Not true.  I use the traditional text-mode interface of LILO (install=text).
To supply kernel options during boot, press the Shift key (by itself) before
the "delay" timer expires to get a boot prompt ("boot:").  Then type the
label of the kernel you want followed by the desired boot parameters.
For example,

   Linux single

to boot the kernel in single-user mode.  Or

   Linux forcepae

to get a PAE-requiring kernel to boot on a Banias-class Pentium M or
Celeron M processor, if you forgot to specify

   append="forcepae"

in /etc/lilo.conf before running lilo.  If you can't remember the names of
your kernel labels, press the Tab key at a "boot:" prompt.  LILO will
display the names of your kernel labels followed by another "boot:" prompt.

I've never used the menu-based interface of LILO, but I'm sure that there
is a way to supply kernel options at boot time with the menu-based interface
as well.

See my LILO web page at

   http://www.stevesdebianstuff.org/lilo.htm

for more information.

P.S.  I used to use OS/2 as well.  But I switched because OS/2, after Warp 4,
was more or less abandoned by IBM.  Besides, Linux is free.  If I had known
about Linux back then, I would probably have gone straight from DOS to Linux.

-- 
  .''`.     Stephen Powell    <zlinuxman@fastmail.com>
 : :'  :
 `. `'`
   `-

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#169914

On Sat 09 Jul 2016 at 13:19:08 -0400, Stephen Powell wrote:

> On Sat, Jul 9, 2016, at 10:53, Felix Miata wrote:
> > Stephen Powell composed on 2016-07-09 08:58 (UTC-0400):
> > 
> >> As for features, LILO has all the features that I need.
> > 
> > One feature it never acquired AFAIK, which Grub shares with Syslinux, is the 
> > ability to edit the kernel cmdline at boot time, before kernel load. With 
> > problematic hardware, problematic BIOS, and pre-release kernel and distro 
> > versions, that ability is a big troubleshooting convenience. It's one of the 
> > features that facilitated my decision to migrate from OS/2 to Linux as 
> > primary OS.
> 
> Not true.  I use the traditional text-mode interface of LILO (install=text).
> To supply kernel options during boot, press the Shift key (by itself) before
> the "delay" timer expires to get a boot prompt ("boot:").  Then type the
> label of the kernel you want followed by the desired boot parameters.
> For example,
> 
>    Linux single
> 
> to boot the kernel in single-user mode.  Or
> 
>    Linux forcepae
> 
> to get a PAE-requiring kernel to boot on a Banias-class Pentium M or
> Celeron M processor, if you forgot to specify
> 
>    append="forcepae"
> 
> in /etc/lilo.conf before running lilo.  If you can't remember the names of
> your kernel labels, press the Tab key at a "boot:" prompt.  LILO will
> display the names of your kernel labels followed by another "boot:" prompt.
> 
> I've never used the menu-based interface of LILO, but I'm sure that there
> is a way to supply kernel options at boot time with the menu-based interface
> as well.
> 
> See my LILO web page at
> 
>    http://www.stevesdebianstuff.org/lilo.htm
> 
> for more information.

All well and good but the installer inexplicably offers a choice between
GRUB and LILO. The installer manual is unhelpful on which to choose. A
newcomer wouldn't have a clue. We do them no service with this retrograde
offering. Get rid of it.

What is the point of a choice? Just offer GRUB; it is the bootloader for
Debian and  has many advantages over LILO in todayss Linux ecosystem.
People who have a great desire to use LILO can search it out.

Unmaintained in Debian, The bit-rot starts here.

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#169915

Le 09/07/2016 à 22:00, Brian a écrit :
>
> What is the point of a choice? Just offer GRUB; it is the bootloader for
> Debian and  has many advantages over LILO in todayss Linux ecosystem.
> People who have a great desire to use LILO can search it out.
>
> Unmaintained in Debian, The bit-rot starts here.
>

What is the point of a choice, just use the windows provided with your PC...

Linux and debian is just about choice given to the user to use what
he/she thinks is better for him/her.

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#169916

Erwan David composed on 2016-07-09 22:05 (UTC+0200):

> Brian composed:

>> What is the point of a choice? Just offer GRUB; it is the bootloader for
>> Debian...

> What is the point of a choice, just use the windows provided with your PC...

:-D

> Linux and debian is just about choice given to the user to use what
> he/she thinks is better for him/her.

+++
-- 
"The wise are known for their understanding, and pleasant
words are persuasive." Proverbs 16:21 (New Living Translation)

  Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata  ***  http://fm.no-ip.com/

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