Problems dual booting FC7 and UBUNTU

[Scrib]

Hi all,

I want to dual boot FC7 with UBUNTU so i can compare the two OS's. I installed UBUNTU first, using half the disk space and leaving half the disk space free (unpartitioned).

I then installed Fedora into the free unpartitioned space using the "install FC7 to free space" option in the install menu. Both installs worked fine, but when I booted Fedora for the first time there was no option in the boot menu to load UBUNTU.

UBUNTU is still installed still - i think (not sure how to check), so how do i modify the boot menu to include it as a start up option. With my Windows hat on I'd simply edit the boot.ini. I guess I need to do something simular here? Or have a done it wrong?

[bob]

No, the problem isn't yours; it's really that Fedora does not do the best job at finding other linux distros when setting up Grub. Actually, Debian-based distros have done the best job for me and I'm currently using Ubuntu's grub.conf to control 7 distros.

So, you have several options: If you have wisely saved a printed copy of your Ubuntu /boot/grub/menu.lst, you could add the entries into Fedora's /boot/grub/grub.conf and solve the problem. Chances are that you didn't (but you should always make a copy in the future). So, perhaps the easiest way is to first print off Fedora's grub.conf...just in case.. and then grab your Ubuntu Live CD and follow this link: http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=491649

Alternatively, you can get a little more involved and perhaps use Knoppix as a Live CD to find and mount both the Fedora and Ubuntu distros and then copy the Ubuntu menu.lst and paste it into the Fedora grub.conf. ...or just write it down and edit it later on.

There's other ways too, but at least one of those should work for you.

In the future, look for an option when setting up grub to leave it on the root partition rather than overwriting the mbr (master boot record) every time. Ubuntu is picky and insists on overwriting the mbr, but Fedora does have that option under Advanced settings during the install. That way, you'll still boot from the original grub, which will then pass the boot over to Fedora's grub to complete the boot.

[lmo]

Fedora's version of grub reads the file /boot/grub/grub.conf to show the menu of OS's to boot.
Ubuntu's version of grub reads the file /boot/grub/menu.lst to show the menu of OS's to boot.

I hope that Fedora didn't blow up /boot/grub/menu.lst by making it a symlink.
Check that with:

ls -l /boot/grub/{menu.lst,grub.conf}

If /boot/grub/menu.lst is in tact, find the section that boots Ubuntu and add it into /boot/grub/grub.conf

If that doesn't seem doable, post the output of:

/sbin/fdisk -l
cat /boot/grub/grub.conf

and declare which partition Fedora is installed on and which partition Ubuntu is installed on.

[Scrib]

Bob - I might start from scratch anyway.

After reading your post would you suggest installing Ubuntu first and then taking copies of the menu.lst? And if so what do I do when instal FC7?

Yuor help is much appeciated.

[bob]

If you're going to do it over, I'd install Fedora first and then let Ubuntu take over the mbr. It will find the Fedora install and you'll have a good grub. Plus there will be an option with Ubuntu's install to let you automatically mount Fedora, so you'll be able to easily load anything from Fedora into Ubuntu.

Consider leaving some free space, in case you want to add a third distro later on, and also I'd set up both Fedora and Ubuntu as ext3 rather than LVM, since then you can use the same swap space for both distros.

[Scrib]

hummm. I'm stuck again. I've totally wiped the HDD and installed fedora7 onto the first half of the disk. Then I booted from the UBUNTU live CD and selected "Install" to install UBuntu onto the second half of the HDD.

The problem is that the UBUNTU install does not see the Fedora partition at all and all the disk space is taken up with a 106mb ext3 partition (which I assume is the Fedora7 swap or boot loader) and the rest of the HDD is "Unknown".

I've got a feeling I should have instaled Fedora into a ext3 partition and not used the default (which i guess isn't ext3 partition and UBUNTU does not recognise it).

Is there a way round this or do I have to start again, again?

[lmo]

When install f7, don't let it use the whole disk. Better yet, don't let it use LVM.
I think custom partitioning is the way to go.

[Seve]

Hello:
If you want to give it another try
Install ubuntu first and it's grub will be installed on the mbr of the drive.
Then, install Fedora and when you do, use a custom layout [do not use LVM]
on the free space where you want to install Fedora, create a :
/boot < -- default size of 100mb is fine
/ < ------ where the OS goes ~10 gig is fine
/home <---- any size you like
No need to create a swap as you can share the one created by ubuntu.
and when it comes time to install the boot-loader for Fedora make sure you install it to the /boot partition of your Fedora installation.
I will be something like /dev/sdaX [for example] and not /dev/sda
Once you are finished, you can amend your ubuntu grub and use the chainloader +1 to pass off the boot process to Fedora.

Seve

[bob]

Yes, I first partition my drive with Gparted Live: http://gparted.sourceforge.net/livecd.php to set up exactly what I want and, personally, I use ext3 for the partitions and no more than a gig for swap. Once set up, you should be able to install first Fedora (custom install, when you get to the partitioning & point to the right one) and then Ubuntu. Ubuntu will then see Fedora and the install should go okay.

[Scrib]

Looks like we cracked it. I installed FC7 first WITHOUT VLM and used ext3 instead. Then installed UBUNTU, which then saw the FC7 partitions.

To sweeten the deal the boot loader now displays both OS's and I can boot either.

Thanks guys.

What is VLM anyhow?

[bob]

Logical Volume Manager: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logical_Volume_Manager_(Linux) And, Congrats!