Trying to install Guix SD - grub-install fails

Trying to install Guix SD - grub-install fails

[David Lecompte]

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Hello all,

I never used Guix SD, only Guix on a foreign distro.

I want to install a system on an external SSD so that I can boot my PC in case my default boot disk would have problems (I have my data on other disks in this PC) and I decided to try with Guix SD.

With the guided installation in graphic mode, when I get to the point where I say to install Guix on a whole disk and I have selected it, the installer goes back to the first step, asking whether I want to install Guix SD with the graphic installer or shell commands, so the graphic install seems not to work.

Then I decided to try the installation with shell commands.

My desktop is a D8 with a blobless coreboot + seabios.

On my external SSD connected via USB and recognized as /dev/sdf (I have 6 internal disks, /dev/sda is the boot disk, then I have /dev/sdb to /dev/sde and /dev/sdg, not sure why the external SSD got put in the middle):

I created the following partitions and fs (DOS partition table):
/dev/sdf1: 1G formatted as ext4, for /boot, marked as bootable
/dev/sdf2: extended partition
/dev/sdf5: 922G formatted as btrfs, for /
/dev/sdf6: 8G, for swap

I have put labels on /dev/sdf1 and /dev/sdf5, I mounted /dev/sdf5 at /mnt, created /mnt/boot and mounted /dev/sdf1 at /mnt/boot, did swapon for /dev/sdf6. Then I launched herd, copied config.scm, edited it, and launched guix system init, using the commands advised in the manual.

After a while (lots of things were worked on), I have:
---quote start---
guix system: error: '/gnu/store/xxx-grub-2.04/sbin/grub-install --no-floppy target=i386-pc --bot-directory /mnt/boot /dev/sdf1' exited with status 1; output follows:

Installing of i386-pc platform.
/gnu/store/xxx-grub-2.04/sbin/grub-install: warning: File system 'ext2' doesn't support embedding.
/gnu/store/xxx-grub-2.04/sbin/grub-install: warning: Embedding is not possible. GRUB can only be installed in this setup by using blocklists. However, blocklists are UNRELIABLE and their use is discouraged...
/gnu/store/xxx-grub-2.04/sbin/grub-install: error: will not proceed with blocklists.
--- quote end ---


And then I get a shell prompt again.

My config.scm is:

(use-modules (gnu) (gnu system nss))
(use-service-modules desktop xorg)
(use-package-modules certs gnome)

(operating-system
  (host-name "albert")
  (timezone "Europe/Paris")
  (locale "fr_FR.utf8")

  (keyboard-layout (keyboard-layout "fr"))
  (bootloader (bootloader-configuration
                (bootloader grub-bootloader)
                (target "/dev/sdf1")
                (keyboard-layout keyboard-layout)))

  (file-systems (append
                  (list (file-system
                          (device (file-system-label "guix-root"))
                          (mount-point "/")
                          (type "btrfs"))
                        (file-system
                          (device (file-system-label "guix-boot"))
                          (mount-point "/boot")
                          (type "ext4")))
                  %base-file-systems))

  (users (cons (user-account
                 (name "david")
                 (comment "David")
                 (group "users")
                 (supplementary-groups '("wheel" "netdev"
                                         "audio" "video")))
               %base-user-accounts))

  (packages (append (list
                     nss-certs
                     gvfs)
                    %base-packages))

  (services (append (list (service mate-desktop-service-type)
                          (set-xorg-configuration
                            (xorg-configuration
                             (keyboard-layout keyboard-layout))))
                    %desktop-services))

  (name-service-switch %mdns-host-lookup-nss))
                           

I manually copied the file so there could be typos.

Did I do something wrong in the partition/filesystem choices, in the installation procedure or in the config.scm?

Thanks,
David.

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Trying to install Guix SD - grub-install fails

[angry rectangle]

try removing the partition number from the "target" entry in the bootloader configuration.
just `/dev/sdf'

Re: Trying to install Guix SD - grub-install fails

[pelzflorian (Florian Pelz)]

Hello David.

On Mon, Jun 06, 2022 at 12:48:01PM +0000, David Lecompte wrote:
> (operating-system
>   (host-name "albert")
>   (timezone "Europe/Paris")
>   (locale "fr_FR.utf8")
> 
>   (keyboard-layout (keyboard-layout "fr"))
>   (bootloader (bootloader-configuration
>                 (bootloader grub-bootloader)
>                 (target "/dev/sdf1")
>                 (keyboard-layout keyboard-layout)))

The target should be /dev/sdf, but why the GUI installer does not work
I do not know.  Perhaps download the latest image if you wanted the GUI.

Regards,
Florian

Re: Trying to install Guix SD - grub-install fails

[pelzflorian (Florian Pelz)]

On Tue, Jun 07, 2022 at 01:27:51PM +0200, pelzflorian (Florian Pelz) wrote:
> Hello David.
> 
> On Mon, Jun 06, 2022 at 12:48:01PM +0000, David Lecompte wrote:
> > (operating-system
> >   (host-name "albert")
> >   (timezone "Europe/Paris")
> >   (locale "fr_FR.utf8")
> > 
> >   (keyboard-layout (keyboard-layout "fr"))
> >   (bootloader (bootloader-configuration
> >                 (bootloader grub-bootloader)
> >                 (target "/dev/sdf1")
> >                 (keyboard-layout keyboard-layout)))
> 
> The target should be /dev/sdf, but why the GUI installer does not work
> I do not know.  Perhaps download the latest image if you wanted the GUI.

Ohh I forgot something important.  Because device names like /dev/sdf1
could refer to a different drive after reboot (depending on the order
the drives are detected), it is advisable that you instead use device
names from /dev/disk/ for the future

(targets '("/dev/disk/by-id/mmc-SC64G_0xb13f1704"))

to avoid bad surprises.

Regards,
Florian