     [file version.texi not included]

Copyright © 1996 Erich Boleyn Copyright © 1999, 2000, 2001 Free Software Foundation, Inc.

Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all copies.

Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this manual under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided also that the entire resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a permission notice identical to this one.

Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this manual into another language, under the above conditions for modified versions.

GRUB manual
***********

This is the documentation of GNU GRUB, the GRand Unified Bootloader, a flexible and powerful boot loader program for PCs.

This edition documents version VERSION.

Introduction to GRUB
********************

Overview
========

Briefly, a boot loader is the first software program that runs when a computer starts.  It is responsible for loading and transferring control to an operating system kernel software (such as the Linux or GNU Hurd kernel).  The kernel, in turn, initializes the rest of the operating system (e.g. a GNU system).

GNU GRUB is a very powerful boot loader, which can load a wide variety of free operating systems, as well as proprietary operating systems with chain-loading (chain-load is the mechanism for loading unsupported operating systems by loading another boot loader. It is typically used for loading DOS or Windows.). GRUB is designed to address the complexity of booting a personal computer; both the program and this manual are tightly bound to that computer platform, although porting to other platforms may be addressed in the future.

One of the important features in GRUB is flexibility; GRUB understands filesystems and kernel executable formats, so you can load an arbitrary operating system the way you like, without recording the physical position of your kernel on the disk.

Thus you can load the kernel just by specifying its file name and the drive (and the partition) where the kernel resides. To let GRUB know the drive and the file name, you can either type in them manually via the command-line interface (see Command-line interface), or use the nice menu interface (see Menu interface) through which you can easily select which OS it boots. To allow you to customize the menu, GRUB will load a preexisting configuration file (see Configuration). Note that you can not only enter the command-line interface whenever you like, but also you can edit specific menu entries prior to using them.

In the following chapters, you will learn how to specify a drive or a partition, and a file name (see Naming convention) to GRUB, how to install GRUB on your drive (see Installation), and how to boot your OSes (see Booting), step by step.

History of GRUB
===============

GRUB originated in 1995 when Erich Boleyn was trying to boot the GNU Hurd with the University of Utah's Mach 4 microkernel (now known as GNU Mach).  Erich and Brian Ford designed the Multiboot Specification (see Motivation (The Multiboot Specification)), because they were determined not to add to the large number of mutually-incompatible PC boot methods.

Erich then began modifying the FreeBSD boot loader so that it would understand Multiboot. He soon realized that it would be a lot easier to write his own boot loader from scratch than to keep working on the FreeBSD boot loader, and so GRUB was born.

Erich added many features to GRUB, but other priorities prevented him from keeping up with the demands of its quickly-expanding user base. In 1999, Gordon Matzigkeit and OKUJI Yoshinori adopted GRUB as an official GNU package, and opened its development by making the latest sources available via anonymous CVS. See Obtaining and Building GRUB, for more information.

GRUB features
=============

The primary requirement for GRUB is that it be compliant with the Multiboot Specification, which is described in Motivation (The Multiboot Specification).

The other goals, listed in approximate order of importance, are:

  * Basic functions must be straightforward for end-users.

  * Rich functionality to support kernel experts and designers.

  * Backward compatibility for booting FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, and Linux. Proprietary kernels (such as DOS, Windows NT, and OS/2) are supported via a chain-loading function.

Except for specific compatibility modes (chain-loading and the Linux piggyback format), all kernels will be started in much the same state as in the Multiboot Specification. Only kernels loaded at 1 megabyte or above are presently supported. Any attempt to load below that boundary will simply result in immediate failure and an error message reporting the problem.

In addition to the requirements above, GRUB has the following features (note that the Multiboot Specification doesn't require all the features that GRUB supports):

Recognize multiple executable formats
     Support many of the a.out variants plus ELF. Symbol tables are also loaded.

Support non-Multiboot kernels
     Support many of the various free 32-bit kernels that lack Multiboot compliance (primarily FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, and Linux). Chain-loading of other boot loaders is also supported.

Load multiples modules
     Fully support the Multiboot feature of loading multiple modules.

Load a configuration file
     Support a human-readable text configuration file with preset boot commands. You can also load another configuration file dynamically and embed a preset configuration file in a GRUB image file. The list of commands (see Commands) are a superset of those supported on the command-line. An example configuration file is provided in Configuration.

Provide a menu interface
     A menu interface listing the preset boot commands, with a programmable timeout, is available. There is no fixed limit on the number of boot entries, and the current implementation has space for several hundred.

Have a flexible command-line interface
     A fairly flexible command-line interface, accessible from the menu, is available to edit any preset commands, or write a new boot command set from scratch. If no configuration file is present, GRUB drops to the command-line.

     The list of commands (see Commands) are a subset of those supported for configuration files. Editing commands closely resembles the Bash command-line (see Command Line Editing (Bash Features)), with TAB-completion of commands, devices, partitions, and files in a directory depending on context.

Support multiple filesystem types
     Support multiple filesystem types transparently, plus a useful explicit blocklist notation. The currently supported filesystem types are BSD FFS, DOS FAT16 and FAT32, Minix fs, Linux ext2fs, and ReiserFS. See Filesystem, for more information.

Support automatic decompression
     Can decompress files which were compressed by gzip. This function is both automatic and transparent to the user (i.e. all functions operate upon the uncompressed contents of the specified files). This greatly reduces a file size and the loading time, a particularly major benefit for floppies. (There are a few pathological cases where loading a very badly organized ELF kernel might take longer, but in practice this never happen.)

     It is conceivable that some kernel modules should be loaded in a compressed state, so a different module-loading command can be specified to avoid uncompressing the modules.

Access data on any installed device
     Support reading data from any or all floppy or hard disk(s) recognized by the BIOS, independent of the setting of the root device.

Be independent of drive geometry translations
     Unlike many other boot loaders, GRUB makes the particular drive translation irrelevant. A drive installed and running with one translation may be converted to another translation without any adverse effects or changes in GRUB's configuration.

Detect all installed RAM
     GRUB can generally find all the installed RAM on a PC-compatible machine. It uses an advanced BIOS query technique for finding all memory regions. As described on the Multiboot Specification (see Motivation (The Multiboot Specification)), not all kernels make use of this information, but GRUB provides it for those who do.

Support Logical Block Address mode
     In traditional disk calls (called CHS mode), there is a geometry translation problem, that is, the BIOS cannot access over 1024 cylinders, so the accessible space is limited to at least 508 MB and to at most 8GB. GRUB can't universally solve this problem, as there is no standard interface used in all machines. However, several newer machines have the new interface, Logical Block Address (LBA) mode. GRUB automatically detects if LBA mode is available and uses it if available. In LBA mode, GRUB can access the entire disk.

Support network booting
     GRUB is basically a disk-based boot loader but also has network support. You can load OS images from a network by using the TFTP protocol.

Support remote terminals
     To support computers with no console, GRUB provides remote terminal support, so that you can control GRUB from a remote host. Only serial terminal support is implemented at the moment.

The role of a boot loader
=========================

The following is a quotation from Gordon Matzigkeit, a GRUB fanatic:

     Some people like to acknowledge both the operating system and kernel when they talk about their computers, so they might say they use ``GNU/Linux'' or ``GNU/Hurd''.  Other people seem to think that the kernel is the most important part of the system, so they like to call their GNU operating systems ``Linux systems.''

     I, personally, believe that this is a grave injustice, because the boot loader is the most important software of all. I used to refer to the above systems as either ``LILO'' (The LInux LOader, a boot loader that everybody uses, but nobody likes.) or ``GRUB'' systems.

     Unfortunately, nobody ever understood what I was talking about; now I just use the word ``GNU'' as a pseudonym for GRUB.

     So, if you ever hear people talking about their alleged ``GNU'' systems, remember that they are actually paying homage to the best boot loader around... GRUB!

We, the GRUB maintainers, do not (usually) encourage Gordon's level of fanaticism, but it helps to remember that boot loaders deserve recognition.  We hope that you enjoy using GNU GRUB as much as we did writing it.

Naming convention
*****************

The device syntax used in GRUB is a wee bit different from what you may have seen before in your operating system(s), and you need to know it so that you can specify a drive/partition.

Look at the following examples and explanations:

     (fd0)

First of all, GRUB requires that the device name is enclosed with ( and ). The fd part means that it is a floppy disk. The number 0 is the drive number, which is counted from zero. This expression means that GRUB will use the whole floppy disk.

     (hd0,1)

Here, hd means it is a hard disk drive. The first integer 0 indicates the drive number, that is, the first hard disk, while the second integer, 1, indicates the partition number (or the PC slice number in the BSD terminology). Once again, please note that the partition numbers are counted from zero, not from one. This expression means the second partition of the first hard disk drive. In this case, GRUB uses one partition of the disk, instead of the whole disk.

     (hd0,4)

This specifies the first extended partition of the first hard disk drive. Note that the partition numbers for extended partitions are counted from 4, regardless of the actual number of primary partitions on your hard disk.

     (hd1,a)

This means the BSD a partition of the second hard disk. If you need to specify which PC slice number should be used, use something like this: (hd1,0,a). If the PC slice number is omitted, GRUB searches for the first PC slice which has a BSD a partition.

Of course, to actually access the disks or partitions with GRUB, you need to use the device specification in a command, like root (fd0) or unhide (hd0,2). To help you find out which number is a partition you want, the GRUB command-line (see Command-line interface) options have argument completion. That means that, for example, you only need to type root (, followed by a TAB, and GRUB will display the list of drives, partitions, or file names, so it should be quite easy to determine the name of your target partition, even with minimal knowledge of the syntax.

Note that GRUB does not distinguish IDE from SCSI - it simply counts the drive numbers from zero, regardless of their type. Normally, any IDE drive number is less than any SCSI drive number, although that is not true if you change the boot sequence by swapping IDE and SCSI drives in your BIOS.

Now the question is, how to specify a file? Again, see this example:

     (hd0,0)/vmlinuz

This specifies the file named vmlinuz, found on the first partition of the first hard disk drive. Note that the argument completion works with file names, too.

That was easy, admit it. Do read the next chapter, to find out how to actually install GRUB on your drive.

Installation
************

First, you need to have GRUB itself properly installed on your system, (see Obtaining and Building GRUB) either from the source tarball, or as a package for your OS.

To use GRUB, you need to install it on your drive. There are two ways of doing that - either using the utility grub-install (see Invoking grub-install) on a UNIX-like OS, or by using the native Stage 2. These are quite similar, however, the utility might probe a wrong BIOS drive, so better be careful.

Also, if you install GRUB on a UNIX-like OS, please make sure that you have an emergency boot disk ready, so that you can rescue your computer if, by any chance, your hard drive becomes unusable (unbootable).

GRUB comes with boot images, which are normally installed in the directory /usr/share/grub/i386-pc. You need to copy the files stage1, stage2, and *stage1_5 to the directory /boot/grub. Here the directory where GRUB images are installed and the directory where GRUB will use to find them are called image directory and boot directory, respectively.

Creating a GRUB boot floppy
===========================

To create a GRUB boot floppy, you need to take the files stage1 and stage2 from the image directory, and write them to the first and the second block of the floppy disk, respectively.

Caution: This procedure will destroy any data currently stored on the floppy.

On a UNIX-like operating system, that is done with the following commands:

     # cd /usr/share/grub/i386-pc
     # dd if=stage1 of=/dev/fd0 bs=512 count=1
     1+0 records in
     1+0 records out
     # dd if=stage2 of=/dev/fd0 bs=512 seek=1
     153+1 records in
     153+1 records out
     #

The device file name may be different. Consult the manual for your OS.

Installing GRUB natively
========================

Caution: Installing GRUB's stage1 in this manner will erase the normal boot-sector used by an OS.

GRUB can currently boot GNU Mach, Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, and OpenBSD directly, so using it on a boot sector should be okay. But generally, it would be a good idea to back up the first sector of the partition on which you are installing GRUB's stage1. This isn't as important if you are installing GRUB on the first sector of a hard disk, since it's easy to reinitialize it (e.g. by running FDISK /MBR from DOS).

If you decide to install GRUB in the native environment, which is definitely desirable, you'll need to create the GRUB boot disk, and reboot your computer with it. Otherwise, see Installing GRUB using grub-install, for more details.

Once started, GRUB will show the command-line interface (see Command-line interface). First, set the GRUB's root device (Note that GRUB's root device doesn't necessarily mean your OS's root partition; if you need to specify a root partition for your OS, add the argument into the command kernel.) to the boot directory, like this:

     grub> root (hd0,0)

If you are not sure which partition actually holds these files, use the command find (see find), like this:

     grub> find /boot/grub/stage1

This will search for the file name /boot/grub/stage1 and show the devices which contain the file.

Once you've set the root device correctly, run the command setup (see setup):

     grub> setup (hd0)

This command will install GRUB on the MBR in the first drive. If you want to install GRUB into the boot sector of a partition instead of the MBR, specify a partition into which you want to install GRUB:

     grub> setup (hd0,0)

If you install GRUB into a partition or a drive other than the first one, you must chain-load GRUB from another boot loader. Refer to the manual for the boot loader to know how to chain-load GRUB.

Now you can boot GRUB without a GRUB floppy. See the chapter Booting to find out how to boot your operating systems from GRUB.

Installing GRUB using grub-install
==================================

Caution: This procedure is definitely deprecated, because there are several posibilities that your computer can be unbootable. For example, most operating systems don't tell GRUB how to map BIOS drives to OS devices correctly, GRUB merely guesses the mapping. This will succeed in most cases, but not always. So GRUB provides you with a user-defined map file called device map, which you must fix, if it is wrong. See Device map, for more details.

Unfortunately, if you do want to install GRUB under a UNIX-like OS (such as GNU), invoke the program grub-install (see Invoking grub-install) as the superuser (root).

The usage is basically very easy. You only need to specify one argument to the program, namely, where to install GRUB. The argument can be either of a device file or a GRUB's drive/partition. So, this will install GRUB into the MBR of the first IDE disk under Linux:

     # grub-install /dev/hda

Likewise, under Hurd, this has the same effect:

     # grub-install /dev/hd0

If it is the first BIOS drive, this is the same as well:

     # grub-install '(hd0)'

But all the above examples assume that you use GRUB images under the root directory. If you want GRUB to use images under a directory other than the root directory, you need to specify the option --root-directory. The typical usage is that you create a GRUB boot floppy with a filesystem. Here is an example:

     # mke2fs /dev/fd0
     # mount -t ext2 /dev/fd0 /mnt
     # grub-install --root-directory=/mnt '(fd0)'
     # umount /mnt

Another example is in case that you have a separate boot partition which is mounted at /boot. Since GRUB is a boot loader, it doesn't know anything about mountpoints at all. Thus, you need to run grub-install like this:

     # grub-install --root-directory=/boot /dev/hda

By the way, as noted above, it is quite difficult to guess BIOS drives correctly under a UNIX-like OS. Thus, grub-install will prompt you to check if it could really guess the correct mappings, after the installation. The format is defined in Device map. Please be careful enough. If the output is wrong, it is unlikely that your computer can boot with no problem.

Note that grub-install is actually just a shell script and the real task is done by the grub shell grub (see Invoking the grub shell). Therefore, you may run grub directly to install GRUB, without using grub-install. Don't do that, however, unless you are very familiar with the internals of GRUB. Installing a boot loader on a running OS may be extremely dangerous.

Booting
*******

For Multiboot-compliant kernels, GRUB can load them in a consistent way, but, for some free operating systems, you need to use some OS-specific magic.

How to boot operating systems
=============================

GRUB has two distinct boot methods. One of the two is to load an operating system directly, and the other is to chain-load another boot loader which then will load an operating system actually. Generally speaking, the former is desirable, because you don't need to install or maintain other boot loaders and GRUB is flexible enough to load an operating system from an arbitrary disk/partition. However, the latter is sometimes required, since GRUB doesn't support all the existing operating systems natively.

How to boot an OS directly with GRUB
------------------------------------

Multiboot (see Motivation (The Multiboot Specification)) is the native format supported by GRUB. For the sake of convenience, there are also support for Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD. If you want to boot other operating systems, you will have to chain-load them (see Chain-loading).

Generally, GRUB can boot any Multiboot-compliant OS in the following steps:

 1. Set GRUB's root device to the drive where the OS images are stored by the command root (see root).

 2. Load the kernel image by the command kernel (see kernel).

 3. If you need modules, load them with the command module (see module) or modulenounzip (see modulenounzip).

 4. Run the command boot (see boot).

Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD and OpenBSD can be booted in a similar manner. You can load a kernel image by the command kernel and then run the command boot. If the kernel requires some parameters, just append the parameters to kernel, after the file name of the kernel. Also, please refer to OS-specific notes, for the information on your OS-specific issues.

Load another boot loader to boot unsupported operating systems
--------------------------------------------------------------

If you want to boot an unsupported operating system (e.g. Windows 95), chain-load a boot loader for the operating system. Normally, the boot loader is embedded in the boot sector of the partition on which the operating system is installed.

 1. Set GRUB's root device to the partition by the command rootnoverify (see rootnoverify):

          grub> rootnoverify (hd0,0)

 2. Set the active flag in the partition by the command makeactive (This is not necessary for most of the modern operating systems.) (see makeactive):

          grub> makeactive

 3. Load the boot loader by the command chainloader (see chainloader):

          grub> chainloader +1

     +1 indicates that GRUB should read one sector from the start of the partition. The complete description about this syntax can be found in Block list syntax.

 4. Run the command boot (see boot).

However, DOS and Windows have some deficiencies, so you might have to use more complicated instructions. See DOS/Windows, for more information.

Some caveats on OS-specific issues
==================================

Here, we describe some caveats on several operating systems.

GNU/Hurd
--------

Since GNU/Hurd is Multiboot-compliant, it is easy to boot it; there is nothing special about it. But do not forget that you have to specify a root partition to the kernel.

 1. Set GRUB's root device to the same drive as GNU/Hurd's. Probably the command find /boot/gnumach or similar can help you (see find).

 2. Load the kernel and the module, like this:

          grub> kernel /boot/gnumach root=hd0s1
          grub> module /boot/serverboot

 3. Run the command boot (see boot).

GNU/Linux
---------

It is relatively easy to boot GNU/Linux from GRUB, because it somewhat resembles to boot a Multiboot-compliant OS.

 1. Set GRUB's root device to the same drive as GNU/Linux's. Probably the command find /vmlinuz or similar can help you (see find).

 2. Load the kernel:

          grub> kernel /vmlinuz root=/dev/hda1

     If you need to specify some kernel parameters, just append them to the command. For example, to set vga to ext, do this:

          grub> kernel /vmlinuz root=/dev/hda1 vga=ext

     See the documentation in the Linux source tree for the complete information on the available options.

 3. If you use an initrd, execute the command initrd (see initrd) after kernel:

          grub> initrd /initrd

 4. Finally, run the command boot (see boot).

Caution: If you use an initrd and specify the mem= option to the kernel, to let it use less than actual memory size, you will also have to specify the same memory size to GRUB. To let GRUB know the size, run the command uppermem before loading the kernel. See uppermem, for more information.

FreeBSD
-------

GRUB can load the kernel directly, either in ELF or a.out format. But this is not recommended, since FreeBSD's bootstrap interface sometimes changes heavily, so GRUB can't guarantee to pass kernel parameters correctly.

Thus, we'd recommend loading the very flexible loader /boot/loader instead. See this example:

     grub> root (hd0,a)
     grub> kernel /boot/loader
     grub> boot

NetBSD
------

GRUB can load NetBSD a.out and ELF directly, follow these steps:

 1. Set GRUB's root device with root (see root).

 2. Load the kernel with kernel (see kernel). You should append the ugly option --type=netbsd, if you want to load an ELF kernel, like this:

          grub> kernel --type=netbsd /netbsd-elf

 3. Run boot (see boot).

For now, however, GRUB doesn't allow you to pass kernel parameters, so it may be better to chain-load it instead, for more information please see Chain-loading.

OpenBSD
-------

The booting instruction is exactly the same as for NetBSD (see NetBSD).

DOS/Windows
-----------

GRUB cannot boot DOS or Windows directly, so you must chain-load them (see Chain-loading). However, their boot loaders have some critical deficiencies, so it may not work to just chain-load them. To overcome the problems, GRUB provides you with two helper functions.

If you have installed DOS (or Windows) on a non-first hard disk, you have to use the disk swapping technique, because that OS cannot boot from any disks but the first one. The workaround used in GRUB is the command map (see map), like this:

     grub> map (hd0) (hd1)
     grub> map (hd1) (hd0)

This performs a virtual swap between your first and second hard drive.

Caution: This is effective only if DOS (or Windows) uses BIOS to access the swapped disks. If that OS uses a special driver for the disks, this probably won't work.

Another problem arises if you installed more than one set of DOS/Windows onto one disk, because they could be confused if there are more than one primary partitions for DOS/Windows. Certainly you should avoid doing this, but there is a solution if you do want to do so. Use the partition hiding/unhiding technique.

If GRUB hides a DOS (or Windows) partition (see hide), DOS (or Windows) will ignore the partition. If GRUB unhides a DOS (or Windows) partition (see unhide), DOS (or Windows) will detect the partition. Thus, if you have installed DOS (or Windows) on the first and the second partition of the first hard disk, and you want to boot the copy on the first partition, do the following:

     grub> unhide (hd0,0)
     grub> hide (hd0,1)
     grub> rootnoverify (hd0,0)
     grub> chainloader +1
     grub> makeactive
     grub> boot

SCO UnixWare
------------

It is known that the signature in the boot loader for SCO UnixWare is wrong, so you will have to specify the option --force to chainloader (see chainloader), like this:

     grub> rootnoverify (hd1,0)
     grub> chainloader --force +1
     grub> makeactive
     grub> boot

Configuration
*************

You probably noticed that you need to type several commands to boot your OS. There's a solution to that - GRUB provides a menu interface (see Menu interface) from which you can select an item (using arrow keys) that will do everything to boot an OS.

To enable the menu, you need a configuration file, menu.lst under the boot directory. We'll analyze an example file.

The file first contains some general settings, the menu interface related options. You can put these commands (see Menu-specific commands) before any of the items (starting with title (see title)).

     #
     # Sample boot menu configuration file
     #

As you may have guessed, these lines are comments. Lines starting with a hash character (#), and blank lines, are ignored by GRUB.

     # By default, boot the first entry.
     default 0

The first entry (here, counting starts with number zero, not one!) will be the default choice.

     # Boot automatically after 30 secs.
     timeout 30

As the comment says, GRUB will boot automatically in 30 seconds, unless interrupted with a keypress.

     # Fallback to the second entry.
     fallback 1

If, for any reason, the default entry doesn't work, fall back to the second one (this is rarely used, for obvious reasons).

Note that the complete descriptions of these commands, which are menu interface specific, can be found in Menu-specific commands. Other descriptions can be found in Commands.

Now, on to the actual OS definitions. You will see that each entry begins with a special command, title (see title), and the action is described after it. Note that there is no command boot (see boot) at the  end of each item. That is because GRUB automatically executes boot if it loads other commands successfully.

The argument for the command title is used to display a short title/description of the entry in the menu. Since title displays the argument as is, you can write basically anything in there.

     # For booting the GNU Hurd
     title  GNU/Hurd
     root   (hd0,0)
     kernel /boot/gnumach.gz root=hd0s1
     module /boot/serverboot.gz

This boots GNU/Hurd from the first hard disk.

     # For booting Linux
     title  GNU/Linux
     kernel (hd1,0)/vmlinuz root=/dev/hdb1

This boots GNU/Linux, but from the second hard disk.

     # For booting Mach (getting kernel from floppy)
     title  Utah Mach4 multiboot
     root   (hd0,2)
     pause  Insert the diskette now^G!!
     kernel (fd0)/boot/kernel root=hd0s3
     module (fd0)/boot/bootstrap

This boots Mach with a kernel on a floppy, but the root filesystem at hd0s3. It also contains a pause line (see pause), which will cause GRUB to display a prompt and delay, before actually executing the rest of the commands and booting.

     # For booting FreeBSD
     title  FreeBSD
     root   (hd0,2,a)
     kernel /boot/loader

This item will boot FreeBSD kernel loaded from the a partition of the third PC slice of the first hard disk.

     # For booting OS/2
     title OS/2
     root  (hd0,1)
     makeactive
     # chainload OS/2 bootloader from the first sector
     chainloader +1
     # This is similar to "chainload", but loads a specific file
     #chainloader /boot/chain.os2

This will boot OS/2, using a chain-loader (see Chain-loading).

     # For booting Windows NT or Windows95
     title Windows NT / Windows 95 boot menu
     root        (hd0,0)
     makeactive
     chainloader +1
     # For loading DOS if Windows NT is installed
     # chainload /bootsect.dos

The same as the above, but for Windows.

     # For installing GRUB into the hard disk
     title Install GRUB into the hard disk
     root    (hd0,0)
     setup   (hd0)

This will just (re)install GRUB onto the hard disk.

     # Change the colors.
     title Change the colors
     color light-green/brown blink-red/blue

In the last entry, the command color is used (see color), to change the menu colors (try it!). This command is somewhat special, because it can be used both in the command-line and in the menu. GRUB has several such commands, see General commands.

We hope that you now understand how to use the basic features of GRUB. To learn more about GRUB, see the following chapters.

Downloading OS images from a network
************************************

Although GRUB is a disk-based boot loader, it does provide network support. To use the network support, you need to enable at least one network driver in the GRUB build process. For more information please see netboot/README.netboot in the source distribution.

How to set up your network
==========================

GRUB requires a file server and optionally a server that will assign an IP address to the machine on which GRUB is running. For the former, only TFTP is supported at the moment. The latter is either BOOTP, DHCP or a RARP server (RARP is deprecated, since it cannot serve much information). It is not necessary to run both the servers on one computer. How to configure these servers is beyond the scope of this document, so please refer to the manuals specific to those protocols/servers.

If you decided to use a server to assign an IP address, set up the server and run bootp (see bootp), dhcp (see dhcp) or rarp (see rarp) for BOOTP, DHCP or RARP, respectively. Each command will show an assigned IP address, a netmask, an IP address for your TFTP server and a gateway. If any of the addresses is wrong or it causes an error, probably the configuration of your servers isn't set up properly.

Otherwise, run ifconfig, like this:

     grub> ifconfig --address=192.168.110.23 --server=192.168.110.14

You can also use ifconfig in conjugation with bootp, dhcp or rarp (e.g. to reassign the server address manually). See ifconfig, for more details.

Finally, download your OS images from your network. The network can be accessed using the network drive (nd). Everything else is very similar to the normal instructions (see Booting).

Here is an example:

     grub> bootp
     Probing... [NE*000]
     NE2000 base ...
     Address: 192.168.110.23    Netmask: 255.255.255.0
     Server: 192.168.110.14     Gateway: 192.168.110.1

     grub> root (nd)
     grub> kernel /tftproot/gnumach.gz root=sd0s1
     grub> module /tftproot/serverboot.gz
     grub> boot

Booting from a network
======================

It is sometimes very useful to boot from a network, especially, when you use a machine which has no local disk. In this case, you need to obtain a kind of Net Boot ROM, such as a PXE ROM or a free software package like Etherboot. Such a Boot ROM first boots the machine, sets up the network card installed into the machine, and downloads a second stage boot image from the network. Then, the second image will try to boot an operating system from the network actually.

GRUB provides two second stage images, nbgrub and pxegrub (see Images). Those images are the same as the normal Stage 2, except that they set up a network automatically, and try to load a configuration file from the network, if specified. The usage is very simple: If the machine has a PXE ROM, use pxegrub. If the machine has a NBI loader such as Etherboot, use nbgrub. There is no difference between them but their formats. As how to load a second stage image you want to use should be described in the manual on your Net Boot ROM, please refer to the manual, for more information.

However, there is one thing specific to GRUB. Namely, how to specify a configuration file in a BOOTP/DHCP server. For now, GRUB uses the tag 150, to get the name of a configuration file. This below is an example about a BOOTP configuration:

     .allhost:hd=/tmp:bf=null:\
             :ds=145.71.35.1 145.71.32.1:\
             :sm=255.255.254.0:\
             :gw=145.71.35.1:\
             :sa=145.71.35.5:

     foo:ht=1:ha=63655d0334a7:ip=145.71.35.127:\
             :bf=/nbgrub:\
             :tc=.allhost:\
             :T150="/tftpboot/menu.lst.foo":

See the manual about your BOOTP/DHCP server, for more information. The exact syntax should differ from the example, more or less.

Using GRUB via a serial line
****************************

This chapter describes how to use the serial terminal support in GRUB.

If you have many computers or computers with no display/keyboard, it would be very useful to control the computers with serial communications. To connect a computer with another via a serial line, you need to prepare a null-modem (cross) serial cable, and you may need to have multiport serial boards, if your computer doesn't have extra serial ports. In addition, a terminal emulator is also required, such as minicom. Refer to a manual of your operating system, for more information.

As for GRUB, the instruction to set up a serial terminal is quite simple. First of all, make sure that you haven't specified the option --disable-serial to the configure script when you built your GRUB images. If you get them in binary form, probably they have serial terminal support already.

Then, initialize your serial terminal after GRUB starts up. Here is an example:

     grub> serial --unit=0 --speed=9600
     grub> terminal serial

The command serial initializes the serial unit 0 with the speed 9600bps. The serial unit 0 is usually called COM1, so, if you want to use COM2, you must specify --unit=1 instead. This command accepts many other options, so please refer to serial, for more details.

The command terminal (see terminal) chooses which type of terminal you want to use. In that case above, the terminal will be a serial terminal, but you can also pass console to the command, like terminal serial console. In this case, a terminal in which you press any key will be selected as a GRUB terminal.

However, note that GRUB assumes that your terminal emulator is compatible with VT100 by default. This is true for most terminal emulators nowadays, but you should pass the option --dumb to the command, if your terminal emulator is not VT100-compatible or implements few VT100 escape sequences. If you specify the option, then GRUB doesn't provide you with the menu interface, because the menu requires several fancy features for your terminal. Instead, GRUB only gives you the hidden menu interface and the command-line interface (see Interface).

Protecting your computer from cracking
**************************************

You may be interested in how to prevent ordinary users from doing whatever they like, if you share your computer with other people. So this chapter describes how to improve the security of GRUB.

One thing which could be a security hole is that the user can do too many things with GRUB, because GRUB allows to modify its configuration and run arbitrary commands at run-time. For example, the user can read even /etc/passwd in the command-line interface by the command cat (see cat). So it is necessary to disable all the interactive operations.

Thus, GRUB provides password feature, so that only administrators can start the interactive operations (i.e. editing menu entries and entering the command-line interface). To use this feature, you need to run the command password in your configuration file (see password), like this:

     password --md5 PASSWORD

If this is specified, GRUB disallows any interactive control, until you press the key p and enter a correct password.  The option --md5 tells GRUB that PASSWORD is in MD5 format.  If it is omitted, GRUB assumes the PASSWORD is in clear text.

You can encrypt your password with the command md5crypt (see md5crypt). For example, run the grub shell (see Invoking the grub shell), and enter your password:

     grub> md5crypt
     Password: **********
     Encrypted: $1$U$JK7xFegdxWH6VuppCUSIb.

Then, cut and paste the encrypted password to your configuration file.

Also, you can specify an optional argument to password. See this example:

     password PASSWORD /boot/grub/menu-admin.lst

In this case, GRUB will load /boot/grub/menu-admin.lst as a configuration file when you enter the valid password.

Another thing which may be dangerous is that any user can choose any menu entry. Usually, this wouldn't be problematic, but you might want to permit only administrators to run some of your menu entries, such as an entry for booting an insecure OS like DOS.

GRUB provides the command lock (see lock). This command always fails until you enter a valid password, so you can use it, like this:

     title Boot DOS
     lock
     rootnoverify (hd0,1)
     makeactive
     chainload +1

You should insert lock right after title, because any user can execute commands in an entry, until GRUB encounters lock.

You can also use the command password instead of lock. In this case the boot process will ask for the password and stop if it was entered incorrectly.  Since the password takes its own PASSWORD argument this is useful if you want different passwords for different entries.

GRUB image files
****************

GRUB consists of several images: two essential stages, optional stages called Stage 1.5, and two network boot images. Here is a short overview of them. See Internals, for more details.

stage1
     This is an essential image used for booting up GRUB. Usually, this is embedded in a MBR or the boot sector of a partition. Because a PC boot sector is 512 bytes, the size of this image is exactly 512 bytes.

     All stage1 must do is to load Stage 2 or Stage 1.5 from a local disk. Because of the size restriction, stage1 encodes the location of Stage 2 (or Stage 1.5) in a block list format, so it never understand any filesystem structure.

stage2
     This is the core image of GRUB. This does all things but booting up itself. Usually, this is put in a filesystem, but that is not required.

e2fs_stage1_5
ffs_stage1_5
reiserfs_stage1_5
fat_stage1_5
minix_stage1_5

     These are called Stage 1.5, because the purpose is a bridge between stage1 and stage2, that is to say, Stage 1.5 is loaded by Stage 1 and Stage 1.5 loads Stage 2. The difference between stage1 and *_stage1_5 is that the former doesn't understand any filesystem but the latter does an filesystem (e.g. e2fs_stage1_5 understands ext2fs). So you can move the location of Stage 2 to another safely, even after GRUB has been installed.

     While Stage 2 cannot generally be embedded in a fixed area as the size is so large, Stage 1.5 can be installed into the area right after a MBR, or the boot loader area of a ReiserFS or a FFS.

nbgrub
     This is a network boot image for the Network Image Proposal used by some network boot loaders, such as Etherboot. This is mostly the same as Stage 2, but this also sets up a network and loads a configuration file from the network.

pxegrub
     This is another network boot image for the Preboot Execution Environment used by several Netboot ROMs. This is identical to nbgrub, except for the format.

Filesystem syntax and semantics
*******************************

GRUB uses a special syntax for specifying disk drives which can be accessed by BIOS. Because of BIOS limitations, GRUB cannot distinguish between IDE, ESDI, SCSI, or others. You must know yourself which BIOS device is equivalent to which OS device. Normally, that will be clear if you see the files in a device or use the command find (see find).

How to specify devices
======================

The device syntax is like this:

     (DEVICE[,PART-NUM][,BSD-SUBPART-LETTER])

[] means the parameter is optional. DEVICE should be either fd or hd followed by a digit, like fd0. But you can also set DEVICE to a hexadecimal or a decimal, which is a BIOS drive number, so the following are equivalent:

     (hd0)
     (0x80)
     (128)

PART-NUM represents the partition number of DEVICE, starting from zero for primary partitions and from four for extended partitions, and BSD-SUBPART-LETTER represents the BSD disklabel subpartition, such as a or e.

A shortcut for specifying BSD subpartitions is (DEVICE,BSD-SUBPART-LETTER), in this case, GRUB searches for the first PC partition containing a BSD disklabel, then finds the subpartition BSD-SUBPART-LETTER. Here is an example:

     (hd0,a)

The syntax like (hd0) represents using the entire disk (or the MBR when installing GRUB), while the syntax like (hd0,0) represents using the partition of the disk (or the boot sector of the partition when installing GRUB).

If you enabled the network support, the special drive, (nd), is also available. Before using the network drive, you must initialize the network. See Network, for more information.

How to specify files
====================

There are two ways to specify files, by absolute file name and by block list.

An absolute file name resembles a Unix absolute file name, using / for the directory separator (not \ as in DOS). One example is (hd0,0)/boot/grub/menu.lst. This means the file /boot/grub/menu.lst in the first partition of the first hard disk. If you omit the device name in an absolute file name, GRUB uses GRUB's root device implicitly. So if you set the root device to, say, (hd1,0) by the command root (see root), then /boot/kernel is the same as (hd1,0)/boot/kernel.

How to specify block lists
==========================

A block list is used for specifying a file that doesn't appear in the filesystem, like a chainloader. The syntax is [OFFSET]+LENGTH[,[OFFSET]+LENGTH].... Here is an example:

     0+100,200+1,300+300

This represents that GRUB should read blocks 0 through 99, block 200, and blocks 300 through 599. If you omit an offset, then GRUB assumes the offset is zero.

Like the file name syntax (see File name syntax), if a blocklist does not contain a device name, then GRUB uses GRUB's root device. So (hd0,1)+1 is the same as +1 when the root device is (hd0,1).

GRUB's user interface
*********************

GRUB has both a simple menu interface for choosing preset entries from a configuration file, and a highly flexible command-line for performing any desired combination of boot commands.

GRUB looks for its configuration file as soon as it is loaded. If one is found, then the full menu interface is activated using whatever entries were found in the file. If you choose the command-line menu option, or if the configuration file was not found, then GRUB drops to the command-line interface.

The flexible command-line interface
===================================

The command-line interface provides a prompt and after it an editable text area much like a command-line in Unix or DOS. Each command is immediately executed after it is entered (However, this behavior will be changed in the future version, in a user-invisible way.). The commands (see Command-line and menu entry commands) are a subset of those available in the configuration file, used with exactly the same syntax.

Cursor movement and editing of the text on the line can be done via a subset of the functions available in the Bash shell:

C-f
PC right key
     Move forward one character.

C-b
PC left key
     Move back one character.

C-a
HOME
     Move to the start of the line.

C-e
END
     Move the the end of the line.

C-d
DEL
     Delete the character underneath the cursor.

C-h
BS
     Delete the character to the left of the cursor.

C-k
     Kill the text from the current cursor position to the end of the line.

C-u
     Kill backward from the cursor to the beginning of the line.

C-y
     Yank the killed text back into the buffer at the cursor.

C-p
PC up key
     Move up through the history list.

C-n
PC down key
     Move down through the history list.

When typing commands interactively, if the cursor is within or before the first word in the command-line, pressing the TAB key (or C-i) will display a listing of the available commands, and if the cursor is after the first word, the TAB will provide a completion listing of disks, partitions, and file names depending on the context.

Note that you cannot use the completion functionality in the TFTP filesystem. This is because TFTP doesn't support file name listing for the security.

The simple menu interface
=========================

The menu interface is quite easy to use. Its commands are both reasonably intuitive and described on screen.

Basically, the menu interface provides a list of boot entries to the user to choose from. Use the arrow keys to select the entry of choice, then press RET to run it.  An optional timeout is available to boot the default entry (the first one if not set), which is aborted by pressing any key.

Commands are available to enter a bare command-line by pressing c (which operates exactly like the non-config-file version of GRUB, but allows one to return to the menu if desired by pressing ESC) or to edit any of the boot entries by pressing e.

If you protect the menu interface with a password (see Security), all you can do is choose an entry by pressing RET, or press p to enter the password.

Editing a menu entry
====================

The menu entry editor looks much like the main menu interface, but the lines in the menu are individual commands in the selected entry instead of entry names.

If an ESC is pressed in the editor, it aborts all the changes made to the configuration entry and returns to the main menu interface.

When a particular line is selected, the editor places the user at a special version of the GRUB command-line to edit that line.  When the user hits RET, GRUB replaces the line in question in the boot entry with the changes (unless it was aborted via ESC, in which case the changes are thrown away).

If you want to add a new line to the menu entry, press o if adding a line after the current line or press O if before the current line.

To delete a line, hit the key d. Although GRUB does not support undo unfortunately, you can do almost the same thing by just returning to the main menu.

The hidden menu interface
=========================

When your terminal is dumb or you request GRUB of hiding the menu interface explicitly with the command hiddenmenu (see hiddenmenu), GRUB doesn't show the menu interface (see Menu interface) and automatically boots the default entry, unless interrupted by pressing ESC.

When you interrupt the timeout and your terminal is dumb, GRUB falls back to the command-line interface (see Command-line interface).

The list of available commands
******************************

In this chapter, we list all commands that are available in GRUB.

Commands belong to different groups. A few can only be used in the global section of the configuration file (or ``menu''); most of them can be entered on the command-line and can be either used in the menu or in the menu entries.

The list of commands for the menu only
======================================

The semantics used in parsing the configuration file are the following:

  * The menu-specific commands have to be used before any others.

  * The files must be in plain-text format.

  * # at the beginning of a line in a configuration file means it is only a comment.

  * Options are separated by spaces.

  * All numbers can be either decimal or hexadecimal. A hexadecimal number must be preceded by 0x, and is case-insensitive.

  * Extra options or text at the end of the line is ignored unless otherwise specified.

  * Unrecognized commands are added to the current entry, except before entries start, where they are ignored.

These commands can only be used in the menu:

default
-------

 -- Command: default num
     Set the default entry to the entry number NUM. Numbering starts from 0, and the entry number 0 is the default if the command is not used.

     You can specify saved instead of a number. In this case, the default entry is the entry saved with the command savedefault. See savedefault, for more information.

fallback
--------

 -- Command: fallback num
     Go into unattended boot mode: if the default boot entry has any errors, instead of waiting for the user to do anything, immediately start over using the NUM entry (same numbering as the default command (see default)). This obviously won't help if the machine was rebooted by a kernel that GRUB loaded.

hiddenmenu
----------

 -- Command: hiddenmenu
     Don't display the menu. If the command is used, no menu will be displayed on the control terminal, and the default entry will be booted after the timeout expired. The user can still request the menu to be displayed by pressing ESC before the timeout expires. See also Hidden menu interface.

timeout
-------

 -- Command: timeout sec
     Set a timeout, in SEC seconds, before automatically booting the default entry (normally the first entry defined).

title
-----

 -- Command: title name ...
     Start a new boot entry, and set its name to the contents of the rest of the line, starting with the first non-space character.

The list of general commands
============================

Commands usable both in the menu and in the command-line.

bootp
-----

 -- Command: bootp
     Initialize a network device via the BOOTP protocol. This command is only available if GRUB is compiled with netboot support. See also Network.

color
-----

 -- Command: color normal [highlight]
     Change the menu colors. The color NORMAL is used for most lines in the menu (see Menu interface), and the color HIGHLIGHT is used to highlight the line where the cursor points. If you omit HIGHLIGHT, then the inverted color of NORMAL is used for the highlighted line. The format of a color is FOREGROUND/BACKGROUND. FOREGROUND and BACKGROUND are symbolic color names. A symbolic color name must be one of these:

       * black

       * blue

       * green

       * cyan

       * red

       * magenta

       * brown

       * light-gray

          These below can be specified only for the foreground.

       * dark-gray

       * light-blue

       * light-green

       * light-cyan

       * light-red

       * light-magenta

       * yellow

       * white

     But only the first eight names can be used for BACKGROUND. You can prefix blink- to FOREGROUND if you want a blinking foreground color.

     This command can be used in the configuration file and on the command line, so you may write something like this in your configuration file:

          # Set default colors.
          color light-gray/blue black/light-gray

          # Change the colors.
          title OS-BS like
          color magenta/blue black/magenta

device
------

 -- Command: device drive file
     In the grub shell, specify the file FILE as the actual drive for a BIOS drive DRIVE. You can use this command to create a disk image, and/or to fix the drives guessed by GRUB when GRUB fails to determine them correctly, like this:

          grub> device (fd0) /floppy-image
          grub> device (hd0) /dev/sd0

     This command can be used only in the grub shell (see Invoking the grub shell).

dhcp
----

 -- Command: dhcp
     Initialize a network device via the DHCP protocol. Currently, this command is just an alias for bootp, since the two protocols are very similar. This command is only available if GRUB is compiled with netboot support. See also Network.

hide
----

 -- Command: hide partition
     Hide the partition PARTITION by setting the hidden bit in its partition type code. This is useful only when booting DOS or Windows and multiple primary FAT partitions exist in one disk. See also DOS/Windows.

ifconfig
--------

 -- Command: ifconfig [--server=server] [--gateway=gateway] [--mask=mask] [--address=address]
     Configure the IP address, the netmask, the gateway, and the server address of a network device manually. The values must be in dotted decimal format, like 192.168.11.178. The order of the options is not important. This command shows current network configuration, if no option is specified. See also Network.

partnew
-------

 -- Command: partnew part type from to
     Create a new primary partition. PART is a partition specification in GRUB syntax (see Naming convention); TYPE is the partition type and must be a number in the range 0-0xff; FROM and TO are the starting and ending sectors, expressed as an absolute sector number.

parttype
--------

 -- Command: parttype part type
     Change the type of an existing partition.  PART is a partition specification in GRUB syntax (see Naming convention); TYPE is the new partition type and must be a number in the range 0-0xff.

password
--------

 -- Command: password [--md5] passwd [new-config-file]
     If used in the first section of a menu file, disable all interactive editing control (menu entry editor and command-line) and entries protected by the command lock. If the password PASSWD is entered, it loads the NEW-CONFIG-FILE as a new config file and restarts the GRUB Stage 2, if NEW-CONFIG-FILE is specified. Otherwise, GRUB will just unlock the privileged instructions. You can also use this command in the script section, in which case it will ask for the password, before continueing.  The option --md5 tells GRUB that PASSWD is encrypted with md5crypt (see md5crypt).

rarp
----

 -- Command: rarp
     Initialize a network device via the RARP protocol.  This command is only available if GRUB is compiled with netboot support. See also Network.

serial
------

 -- Command: serial [--unit=unit] [--port=port] [--speed=speed] [--word=word] [--parity=parity] [--stop=stop] [--device=dev]
     Initialize a serial device. UNIT is a number in the range 0-3 specifying which serial port to use; default is 0, that corresponds the port often called COM1. PORT is the I/O port where the UART is to be found; if specified it takes precedence over UNIT. SPEED is the transmission speed; default is 9600. WORD and STOP are the number of data bits and stop bits. Data bits must be in the range 5-8 and stop bits are 1 or 2. Default is 8 data bits and one stop bit. PARITY is one of no, odd, even and defaults to no. The option --device can only be used in the grub shell and is used to specify the tty device to be used in the host operating system (see Invoking the grub shell).

     The serial port is not used as a communication channel unless the terminal command is used (see terminal).

     This command is only available if GRUB is compiled with serial support. See also Serial terminal.

setkey
------

 -- Command: setkey [to_key from_key]
     Change the keyboard map. The key FROM_KEY is mapped to the key TO_KEY. If no argument is specified, reset key mappings. Note that this command does not exchange the keys. If you want to exchange the keys, run this command again with the arguments exchanged, like this:

          grub> setkey capslock control
          grub> setkey control capslock

     A key must be an alphabet, a digit, or one of these symbols: escape, exclam, at, numbersign, dollar, percent, caret, ampersand, asterisk, parenleft, parenright, minus, underscore, equal, plus, backspace, tab, bracketleft, braceleft, bracketright, braceright, enter, control, semicolon, colon, quote, doublequote, backquote, tilde, shift, backslash, bar, comma, less, period, greater, slash, question, alt, space, capslock, FX (X is a digit), and delete. This table describes to which character each of the symbols corresponds:

     exclam
          !

     at
          @

     numbersign
          #

     dollar
          $

     percent
          %

     caret
          ^

     ampersand
          &

     asterisk
          *

     parenleft
          (

     parenright
          )

     minus
          -

     underscore
          _

     equal
          =

     plus
          +

     bracketleft
          [

     braceleft
          {

     bracketright
          ]

     braceright
          }

     semicolon
          ;

     colon
          :

     quote
          '

     doublequote
          "

     backquote
          `

     tilde
          ~

     backslash
          \

     bar
          |

     comma
          ,

     less
          <

     period
          .

     greater
          >

     slash
          /

     question
          ?

     space

terminal
--------

 -- Command: terminal [--dumb] [--timeout=secs] [console] [serial]
     Select a terminal for user interaction. The terminal is assumed to be VT100-compatible unless --dumb is specified. If both console and serial are specified, then GRUB will use the one where a key is entered first or the first when the timeout expires. If neither are specified, the current setting is reported. This command is only available if GRUB is compiled with serial support. See also Serial terminal.

tftpserver
----------

 -- Command: tftpserver ipaddr
     Caution: This command exists only for backward compatibility. Use ifconfig (see ifconfig) instead.

     Override a TFTP server address returned by a BOOTP/DHCP/RARP server. The argument IPADDR must be in dotted decimal format, like 192.168.0.15.  This command is only available if GRUB is compiled with netboot support. See also Network.

unhide
------

 -- Command: unhide partition
     Unhide the partition PARTITION by clearing the hidden bit in its partition type code. This is useful only when booting DOS or Windows and multiple primary partitions exist in one disk. See also DOS/Windows.

The list of command-line and menu entry commands
================================================

These commands are usable in the command-line and in menu entries.  If you forget a command, you can run the command help (see help).

blocklist
---------

 -- Command: blocklist file
     Print the block list notation of the file FILE. See Block list syntax.

boot
----

 -- Command: boot
     Boot the OS/chain-loader which has been loaded. Only necessary if running the fully interactive command-line (it is implicit at the end of a menu entry).

cat
---

 -- Command: cat file
     Display the contents of the file FILE. This command may be useful to remind you of your OS's root partition:

          grub> cat /etc/fstab

chainloader
-----------

 -- Command: chainloader [--force] file
     Load FILE as a chain-loader. Like any other file loaded by the filesystem code, it can use the blocklist notation to grab the first sector of the current partition with +1. If you specify the option --force, then load FILE forcibly, whether it has a correct signature or not. This is required when you want to load a defective boot loader, such as SCO UnixWare 7.1 (see SCO UnixWare).

cmp
---

 -- Command: cmp file1 file2
     Compare the file FILE1 with the file FILE2. If they differ in size, print the sizes like this:

          Differ in size: 0x1234 [foo], 0x4321 [bar]

     If the sizes are equal but the bytes at an offset differ, then print the bytes like this:

          Differ at the offset 777: 0xbe [foo], 0xef [bar]

     If they are completely identical, nothing will be printed.

configfile
----------

 -- Command: configfile file
     Load FILE as a configuration file.

debug
-----

 -- Command: debug
     Toggle debug mode (by default it is off). When debug mode is on, some extra messages are printed to show disk activity. This global debug flag is mainly useful for GRUB developers when testing new code.

displayapm
----------

 -- Command: displayapm
     Display APM BIOS information.

displaymem
----------

 -- Command: displaymem
     Display what GRUB thinks the system address space map of the machine is, including all regions of physical RAM installed. GRUB's upper/lower memory display uses the standard BIOS interface for the available memory in the first megabyte, or lower memory, and a synthesized number from various BIOS interfaces of the memory starting at 1MB and going up to the first chipset hole for upper memory (the standard PC upper memory interface is limited to reporting a maximum of 64MB).

embed
-----

 -- Command: embed stage1_5 device
     Embed the Stage 1.5 STAGE1_5 in the sectors after the MBR if DEVICE is a drive, or in the boot loader area if DEVICE is a FFS partition or a ReiserFS partition. (The latter feature has not been implemented yet.) Print the number of sectors which STAGE1_5 occupies, if successful.

     Usually, you don't need to run this command directly. See setup.

find
----

 -- Command: find filename
     Search for the file name FILENAME in all of partitions and print the list of the devices which contain the file. The file name FILENAME should be an absolute file name like /boot/grub/stage1.

fstest
------

 -- Command: fstest
     Toggle filesystem test mode. Filesystem test mode, when turned on, prints out data corresponding to all the device reads and what values are being sent to the low-level routines. The format is <PARTITION-OFFSET-SECTOR, BYTE-OFFSET, BYTE-LENGTH> for high-level reads inside a partition, and [DISK-OFFSET-SECTOR] for low-level sector requests from the disk. Filesystem test mode is turned off by any use of the install (see install) or testload (see testload) commands.

geometry
--------

 -- Command: geometry drive [cylinder head sector [total_sector]]
     Print the information for the drive DRIVE. In the grub shell, you can set the geometry of the drive arbitrarily. The number of the cylinders, the one of the heads, the one of the sectors and the one of the total sectors are set to CYLINDER, HEAD, SECTOR and TOTAL_SECTOR, respectively. If you omit TOTAL_SECTOR, then it will be calculated based on the C/H/S values automatically.

halt
----

 -- Command: halt --no-apm
     The command halts the computer. If the --no-apm option is specified, no APM BIOS call is performed. Otherwise, the computer is shut down using APM.

help
----

 -- Command: help [pattern ...]
     Display helpful information about builtin commands. If you do not specify PATTERN, this command shows short descriptions of all available commands.  If you specify any PATTERNS, it displays longer information about each of the commands which match those PATTERNS.

impsprobe
---------

 -- Command: impsprobe
     Probe the Intel Multiprocessor Specification 1.1 or 1.4 configuration table and boot the various CPUs which are found into a tight loop. This command can be used only in the Stage 2.

initrd
------

 -- Command: initrd file ...
     Load an initial ramdisk for a Linux format boot image and set the appropriate parameters in the Linux setup area in memory. See also GNU/Linux.

install
-------

 -- Command: install [--force-lba] [--stage2=os_stage2_file] stage1_file [d] dest_dev stage2_file [addr] [p] [config_file] [real_config_file]
     This command is fairly complex, and you should not use this command unless you are familiar with GRUB. Use setup (see setup) instead.

     In short, it will perform a full install presuming the Stage 2 or Stage 1.5 (They're loaded the same way, so we will refer to the Stage 1.5 as a Stage 2 from now on.) is in its final install location.

     In slightly more detail, it will load STAGE1_FILE, validate that it is a GRUB Stage 1 of the right version number, install a blocklist for loading STAGE2_FILE as a Stage 2. If the option d is present, the Stage 1 will always look for the actual disk STAGE2_FILE was installed on, rather than using the booting drive. The Stage 2 will be loaded at address ADDR, which must be 0x8000 for a true Stage 2, and 0x2000 for a Stage 1.5. If ADDR is not present, GRUB will determine the address automatically. It then writes the completed Stage 1 to the first block of the device DEST_DEV. If the options p or CONFIG_FILE are present, then it reads the first block of stage2, modifies it with the values of the partition STAGE2_FILE was found on (for p) or places the string CONFIG_FILE into the area telling the stage2 where to look for a configuration file at boot time. Likewise, if REAL_CONFIG_FILE is present and STAGE2_FILE is a Stage 1.5, then the Stage 2 CONFIG_FILE is patched with the configuration file name REAL_CONFIG_FILE. This command preserves the DOS BPB (and for hard disks, the partition table) of the sector the Stage 1 is to be installed into.

     Caution: Several buggy BIOSes don't pass a booting drive properly when booting from a hard disk drive. Therefore, you will have to specify the option d, whether your Stage2 resides at the booting drive or not, if you have such a BIOS unfortunately. We know these are defective in that:

          Fujitsu LifeBook 400 BIOS version 31J0103A

          HP Vectra XU 6/200 BIOS version GG.06.11

     Caution2: A number of BIOSes don't return a correct LBA support bitmap even if they do have the support. So GRUB provides a solution to ignore the wrong bitmap, that is, the option --force-lba. Don't use this option if you know that your BIOS doesn't have LBA support.

     Caution3: You must specify the option --stage2 in the grub shell, if you cannot unmount the filesystem where your stage2 file resides. The argument should be the file name in your operating system.

ioprobe
-------

 -- Command: ioprobe drive
     Probe I/O ports used for the drive DRIVE. This command will list the I/O ports on the screen. For technical information, see Internals.

kernel
------

 -- Command: kernel [--type=type] [--no-mem-option] file ...
     Attempt to load the primary boot image (Multiboot a.out or ELF, Linux zImage or bzImage, FreeBSD a.out, NetBSD a.out, etc.) from FILE. The rest of the line is passed verbatim as the kernel command-line. Any modules must be reloaded after using this command.

     This command also accepts the option --type so that you can specify the kernel type of FILE explicitly. The argument TYPE must be one of these: netbsd, freebsd, openbsd, linux, biglinux, and multiboot. However, you need to specify it only if you want to load a NetBSD ELF kernel, because GRUB can automatically determine a kernel type in the other cases, quite safely.

     The option --no-mem-option is effective only for Linux. If the option is specified, GRUB doesn't pass the option mem= to the kernel.

lock
----

 -- Command: lock
     Prevent normal users from executing arbitrary menu entries. You must use the command password if you really want this command to be useful (see password).

     This command is used in a menu, as shown in this example:

          title This entry is too dangerous to be executed by normal users
          lock
          root (hd0,a)
          kernel /no-security-os

     See also Security.

makeactive
----------

 -- Command: makeactive
     Set the active partition on the root disk to GRUB's root device. This command is limited to primary PC partitions on a hard disk.

map
---

 -- Command: map to_drive from_drive
     Map the drive FROM_DRIVE to the drive TO_DRIVE. This is necessary when you chain-load some operating systems, such as DOS, if such an OS resides at a non-first drive. Here is an example:

          grub> map (hd0) (hd1)
          grub> map (hd1) (hd0)

     The example exchanges the order between the first hard disk and the second hard disk. See also DOS/Windows.

md5crypt
--------

 -- Command: md5crypt
     Prompt to enter a password, and encrypt it in MD5 format. The encrypted password can be used with the command password (see password). See also Security.

module
------

 -- Command: module file ...
     Load a boot module FILE for a Multiboot format boot image (no interpretation of the file contents are made, so that user of this command must know what the kernel in question expects). The rest of the line is passed as the module command-line, like the kernel command. You must load a Multiboot kernel image before loading any module. See also modulenounzip.

modulenounzip
-------------

 -- Command: modulenounzip file ...
     The same as module (see module), except that automatic decompression is disabled.

pause
-----

 -- Command: pause message ...
     Print the MESSAGE, then wait until a key is pressed. Note that placing ^G (ASCII code 7) in the message will cause the speaker to emit the standard beep sound, which is useful when prompting the user to change floppies.

quit
----

 -- Command: quit
     Exit from the grub shell grub (see Invoking the grub shell). This command can be used only in the grub shell.

reboot
------

 -- Command: reboot
     Reboot the computer.

read
----

 -- Command: read addr
     Read a 32-bit value from memory at address ADDR and display it in hex format.

root
----

 -- Command: root device [hdbias]
     Set the current root device to the device DEVICE, then attempt to mount it to get the partition size (for passing the partition descriptor in ES:ESI, used by some chain-loaded boot loaders), the BSD drive-type (for booting BSD kernels using their native boot format), and correctly determine the PC partition where a BSD sub-partition is located. The optional HDBIAS parameter is a number to tell a BSD kernel how many BIOS drive numbers are on controllers before the current one. For example, if there is an IDE disk and a SCSI disk, and your FreeBSD root partition is on the SCSI disk, then use a 1 for HDBIAS.

     See also rootnoverify.

rootnoverify
------------

 -- Command: rootnoverify device [hdbias]
     Similar to root (see root), but don't attempt to mount the partition. This is useful for when an OS is outside of the area of the disk that GRUB can read, but setting the correct root device is still desired. Note that the items mentioned in root above which derived from attempting the mount will not work correctly.

savedefault
-----------

 -- Command: savedefault
     Save the current menu entry as a default entry. Here is an example:

          default saved
          timeout 10

          title GNU/Linux
          root (hd0,0)
          kernel /boot/vmlinuz root=/dev/sda1 vga=ext
          initrd /boot/initrd
          savedefault

          title FreeBSD
          root (hd0,a)
          kernel /boot/loader
          savedefault

     With this configuration, GRUB will choose the entry booted previously as the default entry. See also default.

setup
-----

 -- Command: setup [--force-lba] [--stage2=os_stage2_file] [--prefix=dir] install_device [image_device]
     Set up the installation of GRUB automatically. This command uses the more flexible command install (see install) in the backend and installs GRUB into the device INSTALL_DEVICE. If IMAGE_DEVICE is specified, then find the GRUB images (see Images) in the device IMAGE_DEVICE, otherwise use the current root device, which can be set by the command root. If INSTALL_DEVICE is a hard disk, then embed a Stage 1.5 in the disk if possible.

     The option --prefix specifies the directory under which GRUB images are put. If it is not specified, GRUB automatically searches them in /boot/grub and /grub.

     The options --force-lba and --stage2 are just passed to install if specified. See install, for more information.

testload
--------

 -- Command: testload file
     Read the entire contents of FILE in several different ways and compares them, to test the filesystem code. The output is somewhat cryptic, but if no errors are reported and the final i=X, filepos=Y reading has X and Y equal, then it is definitely consistent, and very likely works correctly subject to a consistent offset error. If this test succeeds, then a good next step is to try loading a kernel.

testvbe
-------

 -- Command: testvbe mode
     Test the VESA BIOS EXTENSION mode MODE. This command will switch your video card to the graphics mode, and show an endless animation. Hit any key to return. See also vbeprobe.

uppermem
--------

 -- Command: uppermem kbytes
     Force GRUB to assume that only KBYTES kilobytes of upper memory are installed. Any system address range maps are discarded.

     Caution: This should be used with great caution, and should only be necessary on some old machines. GRUB's BIOS probe can pick up all RAM on all new machines the author has ever heard of. It can also be used for debugging purposes to lie to an OS.

vbeprobe
--------

 -- Command: vbeprobe [mode]
     Probe VESA BIOS EXTENSION information. If the mode MODE is specified, show only the information about MODE. Otherwise, this command lists up available VBE modes on the screen. See also testvbe.

Error messages reported by GRUB
*******************************

This chapter describes error messages reported by GRUB when you encounter trouble. See Invoking the grub shell, if your problem is specific to the grub shell.

Errors reported by the Stage 1
==============================

The general way that the Stage 1 handles errors is to print an error string and then halt. Pressing CTRL-ALT-DEL will reboot.

The following is a comprehensive list of error messages for the Stage 1:

Hard Disk Error
     The stage2 or stage1.5 is being read from a hard disk, and the attempt to determine the size and geometry of the hard disk failed.

Floppy Error
     The stage2 or stage1.5 is being read from a floppy disk, and the attempt to determine the size and geometry of the floppy disk failed. It's listed as a separate error since the probe sequence is different than for hard disks.

Read Error
     A disk read error happened while trying to read the stage2 or stage1.5.

Geom Error
     The location of the stage2 or stage1.5 is not in the portion of the disk supported directly by the BIOS read calls.  This could occur because the BIOS translated geometry has been changed by the user or the disk is moved to another machine or controller after installation, or GRUB was not installed using itself (if it was, the Stage 2 version of this error would have been seen during that process and it would not have completed the install).

Errors reported by the Stage 1.5
================================

The general way that the Stage 1.5 handles errors is to print an error number in the form Error NUM and then halt. Pressing CTRL-ALT-DEL will reboot.

The error numbers correspond to the errors reported by Stage 2. See Stage2 errors.

Errors reported by the Stage 2
==============================

The general way that the Stage 2 handles errors is to abort the operation in question, print an error string, then (if possible) either continue based on the fact that an error occurred or wait for the user to deal with the error.

The following is a comprehensive list of error messages for the Stage 2 (error numbers for the Stage 1.5 are listed before the colon in each description):

1 : Filename must be either an absolute filename or blocklist
     This error is returned if a file name is requested which doesn't fit the syntax/rules listed in the Filesystem.

2 : Bad file or directory type
     This error is returned if a file requested is not a regular file, but something like a symbolic link, directory, or FIFO.

3 : Bad or corrupt data while decompressing file
     This error is returned if the run-length decompression code gets an internal error. This is usually from a corrupt file.

4 : Bad or incompatible header in compressed file
     This error is returned if the file header for a supposedly compressed file is bad.

5 : Partition table invalid or corrupt
     This error is returned if the sanity checks on the integrity of the partition table fail. This is a bad sign.

6 : Mismatched or corrupt version of stage1/stage2
     This error is returned if the install command is pointed to incompatible or corrupt versions of the stage1 or stage2. It can't detect corruption in general, but this is a sanity check on the version numbers, which should be correct.

7 : Loading below 1MB is not supported
     This error is returned if the lowest address in a kernel is below the 1MB boundary. The Linux zImage format is a special case and can be handled since it has a fixed loading address and maximum size.

8 : Kernel must be loaded before booting
     This error is returned if GRUB is told to execute the boot sequence without having a kernel to start.

9 : Unknown boot failure
     This error is returned if the boot attempt did not succeed for reasons which are unknown.

10 : Unsupported Multiboot features requested
     This error is returned when the Multiboot features word in the Multiboot header requires a feature that is not recognized. The point of this is that the kernel requires special handling which GRUB is likely unable to provide.

11 : Unrecognized device string
     This error is returned if a device string was expected, and the string encountered didn't fit the syntax/rules listed in the Filesystem.

12 : Invalid device requested
     This error is returned if a device string is recognizable but does not fall under the other device errors.

13 : Invalid or unsupported executable format
     This error is returned if the kernel image being loaded is not recognized as Multiboot or one of the supported native formats (Linux zImage or bzImage, FreeBSD, or NetBSD).

14 : Filesystem compatibility error, cannot read whole file
     Some of the filesystem reading code in GRUB has limits on the length of the files it can read. This error is returned when the user runs into such a limit.

15 : File not found
     This error is returned if the specified file name cannot be found, but everything else (like the disk/partition info) is OK.

16 : Inconsistent filesystem structure
     This error is returned by the filesystem code to denote an internal error caused by the sanity checks of the filesystem structure on disk not matching what it expects. This is usually caused by a corrupt filesystem or bugs in the code handling it in GRUB.

17 : Cannot mount selected partition
     This error is returned if the partition requested exists, but the filesystem type cannot be recognized by GRUB.

18 : Selected cylinder exceeds maximum supported by BIOS
     This error is returned when a read is attempted at a linear block address beyond the end of the BIOS translated area. This generally happens if your disk is larger than the BIOS can handle (512MB for (E)IDE disks on older machines or larger than 8GB in general).

19 : Linux kernel must be loaded before initrd
     This error is returned if the initrd command is used before loading a Linux kernel. Similar to the above error, it only makes sense in that case anyway.

20 : Multiboot kernel must be loaded before modules
     This error is returned if the module load command is used before loading a Multiboot kernel. It only makes sense in this case anyway, as GRUB has no idea how to communicate the presence of location of such modules to a non-Multiboot-aware kernel.

21 : Selected disk does not exist
     This error is returned if the device part of a device- or full file name refers to a disk or BIOS device that is not present or not recognized by the BIOS in the system.

22 : No such partition
     This error is returned if a partition is requested in the device part of a device- or full file name which isn't on the selected disk.

23 : Error while parsing number
     This error is returned if GRUB was expecting to read a number and encountered bad data.

24 : Attempt to access block outside partition
     This error is returned if a linear block address is outside of the disk partition. This generally happens because of a corrupt filesystem on the disk or a bug in the code handling it in GRUB (it's a great debugging tool).

25 : Disk read error
     This error is returned if there is a disk read error when trying to probe or read data from a particular disk.

26 : Too many symbolic links
     This error is returned if the link count is beyond the maximum (currently 5), possibly the symbolic links are looped.

27 : Unrecognized command
     This error is returned if an unrecognized command is entered into the command-line or in a boot sequence section of a configuration file and that entry is selected.

28 : Selected item cannot fit into memory
     This error is returned if a kernel, module, or raw file load command is either trying to load its data such that it won't fit into memory or it is simply too big.

29 : Disk write error
     This error is returned if there is a disk write error when trying to write to a particular disk. This would generally only occur during an install of set active partition command.

30 : Invalid argument
     This error is returned if an argument specified to a command is invalid.

31 : File is not sector aligned
     This error may occur only when you access a ReiserFS partition by block-lists (e.g. the command install). In this case, you should mount the partition with the -o notail option.

32 : Must be authenticated
     This error is returned if you try to run a locked entry. You should enter a correct password before running such an entry.

Invoking the grub shell
***********************

This chapter documents the grub shell grub. Note that the grub shell is an emulator; it doesn't run under the native environment, so it sometimes does something wrong. Therefore, you shouldn't trust it too much. If there is anything wrong with it, don't hesitate to try the native GRUB environment, especially when it guesses a wrong map between BIOS drives and OS devices.

Introduction into the grub shell
================================

You can use the command grub for installing GRUB under your operating systems and for a testbed when you add a new feature into GRUB or when fix a bug. grub is almost the same as the Stage 2, and, in fact, it shares the source code with the Stage 2 and you can use the same commands (see Commands) in grub. It is emulated by replacing BIOS calls with UNIX system calls and libc functions.

The command grub accepts the following options:

--help
     Print a summary of the command-line options and exit.

--version
     Print the version number of GRUB and exit.

--verbose
     Print some verbose messages for debugging purpose.

--device-map=FILE
     Use the device map file FILE. The format is described in Device map.

--no-floppy
     Do not probe any floppy drive. This option has no effect if the option --device-map is specified (see Device map).

--probe-second-floppy
     Probe the second floppy drive. If this option is not specified, the grub shell does not probe it, as that sometimes takes a long time. If you specify the device map file (see Device map), the grub shell just ignores this option.

--config-file=FILE
     Read the configuration file FILE instead of /boot/grub/menu.lst. The format is the same as the normal GRUB syntax. See Filesystem, for more information.

--boot-drive=DRIVE
     Set the stage2 BOOT_DRIVE to DRIVE. This argument should be an integer (decimal, octal or hexadecimal).

--install-partition=PAR
     Set the stage2 INSTALL_PARTITION to PAR. This argument should be an integer (decimal, octal or hexadecimal).

--no-config-file
     Do not use the configuration file even if it can be read.

--no-curses
     Do not use the curses interface even if it is available.

--batch
     This option has the same meaning as --no-config-file --no-curses.

--read-only
     Disable writing to any disk.

--hold
     Wait until a debugger will attach. This option is useful when you want to debug the startup code.

How to install GRUB via grub
============================

The installation procedure is the same as under the native Stage 2. See Installation, for more information. The command grub-specific information is described here.

What you should be careful about is buffer cache. grub makes use of raw devices instead of filesystems that your operating systems serve, so there exists a potential problem that some cache inconsistency may corrupt your filesystems. What we recommend is:

  * If you can unmount drives to which GRUB may write any amount of data, unmount them before running grub.

  * If a drive cannot be unmounted but can be mounted with the read-only flag, mount it in read-only mode. That should be secure.

  * If a drive must be mounted with the read-write flag, make sure that any activity is not being done on it during running the command grub.

  * Reboot your operating system as soon as possible. Probably that is not required if you follow these rules above, but reboot is the most secure way.

In addition, enter the command quit when you finish the installation. That is very important because quit makes the buffer cache consistent. Do not push C-c.

If you want to install GRUB non-interactively, specify --batch option in the command-line. This is a simple example:

     #!/bin/sh

     # Use /usr/sbin/grub if you are on an older system.
     /sbin/grub --batch <<EOT 1>/dev/null 2>/dev/null
     root (hd0,0)
     setup (hd0)
     quit
     EOT

The map between BIOS drives and OS devices
==========================================

When you specify the option --device-map (see Basic usage), the grub shell creates the device map file automatically unless it already exists. The file name /boot/grub/device.map is preferred.

If the device map file exists, the grub shell reads it to map BIOS drives to OS devices. This file consists of lines like this:

     DEVICE FILE

DEVICE is a drive, which syntax is the same as the one in GRUB (see Device syntax), and FILE is an OS's file, which is normally a device file.

The reason why the grub shell gives you the device map file is that it cannot guess the map between BIOS drives and OS devices correctly in some environments. For example, if you exchange the boot sequence between IDE and SCSI in your BIOS, it mistakes the order.

Thus, edit the file if the grub shell makes a mistake. You can put any comments in the file if needed, as the grub shell assumes that a line is just a comment if the first character is #.

Invoking grub-install
*********************

The program grub-install installs GRUB on your drive by the grub shell (see Invoking the grub shell). You must specify the device name on which you want to install GRUB, like this:

     grub-install INSTALL_DEVICE

The device name INSTALL_DEVICE is an OS device name or a GRUB device name.

grub-install accepts the following options:

--help
     Print a summary of the command-line options and exit.

--version
     Print the version number of GRUB and exit.

--force-lba
     Force GRUB to use LBA mode even for a buggy BIOS. Use this option only if your BIOS doesn't work in LBA mode even though it supports LBA mode.

--root-directory=DIR
     Install GRUB images under the directory DIR instead of the root directory. This option is useful when you want to install GRUB into a separate partition or a removable disk. Here is an example when you have a separate boot partition which is mounted on /boot:

          grub-install --root-directory=/boot '(hd0)'

--grub-shell=FILE
     Use FILE as the grub shell. You can append arbitrary options to FILE after the file name, like this:

          grub-install --grub-shell="grub --read-only" /dev/fd0

--recheck
     Recheck the device map, even if /boot/grub/device.map already exists. You should use this option whenever you add/remove a disk into/from your computer.

Invoking grub-md5-crypt
***********************

The program grub-md5-crypt encrypts a password in MD5 format. This is just a frontend of the grub shell (see Invoking the grub shell). Passwords encrypted by this program can be used with the command password (see password).

grub-md5-crypt accepts the following options:

--help
     Print a summary of the command-line options and exit.

--version
     Print the version information and exit.

--grub-shell=FILE
     Use FILE as the grub shell.

Invoking mbchk
**************

The program mbchk checks for the format of a Multiboot kernel. We recommend using this program before booting your own kernel by GRUB.

mbchk accepts the following options:

--help
     Print a summary of the command-line options and exit.

--version
     Print the version number of GRUB and exit.

--quiet
     Suppress all normal output.

Frequently asked questions
**************************

How does GNU GRUB differ from Erich's original GRUB?

     GNU GRUB is the successor of Erich's great GRUB. He couldn't work on GRUB because of some other tasks, so the current maintainers OKUJI Yoshinori and Gordon Matzigkeit took over the maintainership, and opened the development in order for everybody to participate it.

     Technically speaking, GNU GRUB has many features that are not seen in the original GRUB. For example, GNU GRUB can be installed on UNIX-like operating system (such as GNU/Hurd) via the grub shell /sbin/grub (or /usr/sbin/grub on older systems), it supports Logical Block Address (LBA) mode that solves the 1024 cylinders problem, and TAB completes a file name when it's unique. Of course, many bug fixes are done as well, so it is recommended to use GNU GRUB.

Can GRUB boot my operating system from over 8GB hard disks?

     That depends on your BIOS and your operating system. You must make sure that your drive is accessible in LBA mode. Generally, that is configurable in BIOS setting utility. Read the manual for your BIOS for more information.

     Furthermore, some operating systems (i.e. DOS) cannot access any large disk, so the problem is not solved by any kind of boot loader. GNU/Hurd and GNU/Linux can surely boot from such a large disk.

Can I put Stage2 into a partition which is over 1024 cylinders?

     Yes, if your BIOS supports the LBA mode.

How to create a GRUB boot floppy with the menu interface?

     The easiest way is:

      1. Create filesystem in your floppy disk. For example:

               $ mke2fs /dev/fd0

      2. Mount it on somewhere, say, /mnt.

      3. Copy the GRUB images to /mnt/boot/grub. Only stage1, stage2 and menu.lst are necessary. You may not copy stage1.5s.

      4. Run the following command (substitute /usr/sbin/grub for /sbin/grub if you are using an older system):

               $ /sbin/grub --batch <<EOT
               root (fd0)
               setup (fd0)
               quit
               EOT

How to specify a partition?

     See Device syntax.

GRUB does not recognize my GNU/Hurd partition.

     I don't know why, but the authors of FDISK programs have assigned the partition type 0x63 to GNU Hurd incorrectly. A partition type should mean what format is used in the partition, such as filesystem and BSD slices, and should not be used to represent what operating system owns the partition. So use 0x83 if the partition contains ext2fs filesystem, and use 0xA5 if the partition contains ffs filesystem, whether the partition owner is Hurd or not. We will use 0x63 for GNU Hurd filesystem that has not been implemented yet.

I've installed a recent version of binutils, but GRUB still crashes.

     Please check for the version of your binutils by this command:

          ld -v

     This will show two versions, but only the latter is important. If the version is identical with what you have installed, the installation was not bad.

     Well, please try:

          gcc -Wl,-v 2>&1 | grep "GNU ld"

     If this is not identical with the result above, you should specify the directory where you have installed binutils for the script configure, like this:

          ./configure --with-binutils=/usr/local/bin

     If you follow the instructions above but GRUB still crashes, probably there is a serious bug in GRUB. See Reporting bugs.

GRUB hangs up when accessing my SCSI disk.

     Check if you have turned on the support for INT 13 extension (LBA). If so, disable the support and see if GRUB can now access your SCSI disk. This will make it clear that your SCSI BIOS sucks.

     For now, we know the following doesn't provide working LBA mode:

          Adaptec AIC-7880

     In the case where you have such a SCSI controller unfortunately, you cannot use the LBA mode, though GRUB still works fine in the CHS mode (so the well-known 1024 cylinders problem comes again to you).

     Caution: Actually it has not been verified yet if this bug is due to the SCSI BIOS or GRUB itself, frankly speaking. Because the developers haven't seen it by their own eyes. This is why it is desirable that you investigate the cause seriously if you have the skill.

How can I specify an arbitrary memory size to Linux?

     Pass a mem= option to your Linux kernel, like this:

          grub> kernel /vmlinuz mem=128M

     You may pass other options in the same way. See GNU/Linux, for more details.

I have a separate boot partition and GRUB doesn't recognize it.

     This is often reported as a bug, but this is not a bug really. This is a feature.

     Because GRUB is a boot loader and it normally runs under no operating system, it doesn't know where a partition is mounted under your operating systems. So, if you have the partition /boot and you install GRUB images into the directory /boot/grub, GRUB recognizes that the images lies under the directory /grub but not /boot/grub. That's fine, since there is no guarantee that all of your operating systems mount the same partition as /boot.

     There are several solutions for this situation.

      1. Install GRUB into the directory /boot/boot/grub instead of /boot/grub. This may sound ugly but should work fine.

      2. Create a symbolic link before installing GRUB, like cd /boot && ln -s . boot. This works only if the filesystem of the boot partition supports symbolic links and GRUB supports the feature as well.

      3. Install GRUB with the command install, to specify the paths of GRUB images explicitly. Here is an example:

               grub> root (hd0,1)
               grub> install /grub/stage1 d (hd0) /grub/stage2 p /grub/menu.lst

How to uninstall GRUB from my hard disk drive?

     There is no concept uninstall in boot loaders, because if you uninstall a boot loader, an unbootable machine would simply remain. So all you need to do is overwrite another boot loader you like to your disk, that is, install the boot loader without uninstalling GRUB.

     For example, if you want to install the boot loader for Windows, just run FDISK /MBR on Windows. If you want to install LILO (I can't imagine why you want to do such a thing, though), run /sbin/lilo on GNU/Linux.

GRUB hangs when accessing my large IDE disk.

     If your disk is bigger than 32GB, probably updating your mainboard BIOS will solve your problem. This bug is well-known and most vendors should provide fixed versions. For example, if you have ASUS-P3BF, upgrading the BIOS to V1007beta1 or later can fix it. Please ask your vendor, for more information.

Why don't Linux, FreeBSD, NetBSD, etc. become Multiboot-compliant?

     Please ask the relevant maintainers. If all free kernels were Multiboot-compliant (see Motivation (The Multiboot Specification)), the world would be an utopia...

How to obtain and build GRUB
****************************

     Caution: GRUB requires binutils-2.9.1.0.23 or later because the GNU assembler has been changed so that it can produce real 16bits machine code between 2.9.1 and 2.9.1.0.x. See http://sourceware.cygnus.com/binutils/, to obtain information on how to get the latest version.

GRUB is available from the GNU alpha archive site ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/grub or any of its mirrors. The file will be named grub-version.tar.gz. The current version is VERSION, so the file you should grab is:

ftp://alpha.gnu.org/gnu/grub/grub-VERSION.tar.gz

To unbundle GRUB use the instruction:

     zcat grub-VERSION.tar.gz | tar xvf -

which will create a directory called grub-VERSION with all the sources. You can look at the file INSTALL for detailed instructions on how to build and install GRUB, but you should be able to just do:

     cd grub-VERSION
     ./configure
     make install

This will install the grub shell grub (see Invoking the grub shell), the Multiboot checker mbchk (see Invoking mbchk), and the GRUB images. This will also install the GRUB manual.

Also, the latest version is available from the CVS. The repository is:

:pserver:anoncvs@subversions.gnu.org:/cvsroot/grub

and the module is:

grub

The password for anoncvs is empty. So the instruction is:

     cvs -d :pserver:anoncvs@subversions.gnu.org:/cvsroot/grub login
     Password: ENTER
     cvs -d :pserver:anoncvs@subversions.gnu.org:/cvsroot/grub co grub

Reporting bugs
**************

This is the guideline of how to report bugs. Take a look at this list below before you send e-mail to bug-grub@gnu.org:

 1. Before unsettled, read this manual through and through, in particular see FAQ.

 2. Always mention the information on your GRUB. The version number and the configuration are quite important. If you build it yourself, write the options specified to the configure script and your operating system, including the versions of gcc and binutils.

 3. If you get troubled with the installation, inform us of how you installed GRUB. Don't omit error messages, if any. Just GRUB hangs up when it boots is not enough.

     The information on your hardware is also essential. These are especially important: the geometries and the partition tables of your hard disk drives and your BIOS.

 4. If GRUB cannot boot your operating system, write down all on the screen. Don't paraphrase them, like The foo OS crashes with GRUB, even though it can boot with the bar boot loader fine. Mention the commands you executed, the messages printed by them, and information on your operating system including the version number.

 5. Explain what you wanted to do. It is very useful to know your purpose and your wish, and how GRUB didn't satisfy you.

 6. If you can investigate the problem yourself, please do. That will give you and us much more information on the problem. Attaching a patch is even better.

     When you attach a patch, make the patch in unified diff format, and write ChangeLog entries. But, even when you make a patch, don't forget to explain the problem, so that we can understand what your patch is for.

 7. Write down anything that you think might be related. Please understand that we often need to reproduce the same problem you encounterred in our environment. So your information should be sufficient for us to do the same thing---Don't forget that we cannot see your computer directly. If you are not sure whether to state a fact or leave it out, state it! Reporting too many things is quite better than omitting an important thing.

If you realize the guideline above, send e-mail to bug-grub@gnu.org, and we will try to fix the bugs.

Where GRUB will go
******************

Here are some ideas that might happen in the future:

  * Support dynamic loading.

  * Add real memory management.

  * Add a real scripting language.

  * Support internationalization.

  * Support other architectures than i386-pc.

See the file TODO in the source distribution, for more information.

     [file internals.texi not included]