Multiple OS With GRUB

Multiple Linux with grub

Terje J. Hanssen

While the SuSE Linux installations create a dual boot for Windows and Linux, it doesn't look to handle multiple Linux distros correspondingly.

This is how I have created diskslices for my five working OS, installed and preserved in the following (historical) order on the same workstation:

Windows 98 (/dev/hda6)
Windows 2000 Pro (dev/hda5)
Redhat 9 (/dev/hda8)
SuSE Linux 9.0 Pro (/dev/hda10)
Sun Java Desktop System (SJDSK based on SuSE8) (/dev/hda11)

I apply a common Linux swap disk partition (/dev/hda1) for all Linux distros 3-5, and separate root disk partitions as shown. I got no problem when I rezised a NTFS partition and created /dev/hda10 and /dev/hda11 with Linux partition program.

However, on another installation, when I rezised and splitted a reiser partition correspondingly, SuSE9 didn't longer find X11 and couldn't start KDE. I don't know if this really caused the problem, which I solved by reinstalling SuSe9.

So to the multiboot configuration file:

The Win2k installation created a dualboot for 1+2
RH9 installation with Grub bootloader created a dualboot for (1+2)+3
SuSE9 installation created a dual boot for (1+2)+4
SJDS installation created a dualboot for (1+2)+5

My tips is to mount the previous Linux root disk partition, copy&paste between the previous and current /boot/grub/menu.lst configuration files. As an example, here follows a copy of my edited SJDS/GRUB menu.lst:

gfxmenu (hd0,10)/boot/message
color white/blue black/light-gray
default 0
timeout 10

title Sun Java Desktop System 1.0 (2.4.19-4GB)
kernel (hd0,10)/boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/hda11 acpi=off hdc=ide-scsi vga=791
initrd (hd0,10)/boot/initrd

title SuSE Linux 9.0 Professional (2.4.21 opt.)
kernel (hd0,9)/boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/hda10 vga=0x317 splash=silent 
desktop hdc=ide-scsi hdclun=0 showopts
initrd (hd0,9)/boot/initrd

title Red Hat Linux 9.0 (2.4.20-8)
root (hd0,7)
kernel /vmlinuz-2.4.20-8 ro root=LABEL=/ hdc=ide-scsi
initrd /initrd-2.4.20-8.img

title Windows
root (hd0,1)
makeactive
chainloader +1

title Failsafe Sun Java Desktop System 1.0 (2.4.19-4GB)
kernel (hd0,10)/boot/vmlinuz.shipped root=/dev/hda11 ide=nodma apm=off 
acpi=off vga=normal nosmp noapic maxcpus=0 3
initrd (hd0,10)/boot/initrd.shipped

title Failsafe SuSE Linux 9.0 Professional (2.4.21 opt.)
kernel (hd0,9)/boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/hda10 showopts ide=nodma apm=off 
acpi=off vga=normal nosmp noapic maxcpus=0 3
initrd (hd0,9)/boot/initrd

title Memory Test SuSE Linux 9.0 Professional (2.4.21 opt.)
kernel (hd0,9)/boot/memtest.bin

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