[vox-tech] new kernel won't install

[Richard Harke]

It isn't really a matter of symlinks. lilo (boot time) doesn't understand
file systems at all. The system time lilo that you run as part of installing
does know how to find the file in its file system and can create a
absolute hardware address to be used by the boot time lilo. GRUB knows
how to read some file systems (probably most of them now) and can
find menu.lst from which it finds the various kernels that are installed.
Whether lilo or grub, I think symlinks would be a bad idea. Many systems
use a boot partition which is put first on the drive to avoid problems
with BIOS limitations (1024 cyl) A symlink might point to a place that
is unreachable at boot time. Even for grub. I believe it is installed for just
the file system in use and a link into another type file system wouldn't
work.

Richard Harke


On Saturday 21 August 2004 15:48, Mark K. Kim wrote:
> On Sat, 21 Aug 2004, Nick Schmalenberger wrote:
> [snip]
>
> > If lilo.conf just points to /vmlinuz, why would it have to be
> > updated with every new kernel? Wouldn't the old kernel image just be
> > replaced by the new kernel image, and the link changed?
>
> [snip]
>
> When you run `lilo`, Lilo makes note of where the real kernel is on the
> disk, not the symlink, then boots that kernel next time the computer
> boots.  It does this because Lilo doesn't understand symlinks.
>
> Grub does understand symlinks, on the other hand.  This has a drawback,
> however, that Grub has to be able to read the partition table, file
> system, etc., and any corruption in any of the above prevents Grub from
> running the kernel at all.  It also makes Grub bigger, and finding
> space on the computer to store all the boot code is a little of a
> juggling act.
>
> Lilo, on the other hand, doesn't have either of those problems.  Simpler
> design ideally makes Lilo more likely to work properly, and Grub more
> prone to breakage, but Grub more user-friendly to use than Lilo.  In
> practice, though, both has problems and both are less than user-friendly
> (IMO...)
>
> -Mark