Linux From Scratch - Version 12.3-rc2

Chapter 8. Installing Basic System Software

8.64. GRUB-2.12

The GRUB package contains the GRand Unified Bootloader.

Approximate build time: 0.3 SBU
Required disk space: 166 MB

8.64.1. Installation of GRUB

[Note]

Note

If your system has UEFI support and you wish to boot LFS with UEFI, you need to install GRUB with UEFI support (and its dependencies) by following the instructions on the BLFS page. You may skip this package, or install this package and the BLFS GRUB for UEFI package without conflict (the BLFS page provides instructions for both cases).

[Warning]

Warning

Unset any environment variables which may affect the build: 

unset {C,CPP,CXX,LD}FLAGS

Don't try “tuning” this package with custom compilation flags. This package is a bootloader. The low-level operations in the source code may be broken by aggressive optimization.

Add a file missing from the release tarball: 

echo depends bli part_gpt > grub-core/extra_deps.lst

Prepare GRUB for compilation: 

./configure --prefix=/usr          \
            --sysconfdir=/etc      \
            --disable-efiemu       \
            --disable-werror

The meaning of the new configure options:

--disable-werror

This allows the build to complete with warnings introduced by more recent versions of Flex.

--disable-efiemu

This option minimizes what is built by disabling a feature and eliminating some test programs not needed for LFS.

Compile the package: 

make

The test suite for this packages is not recommended. Most of the tests depend on packages that are not available in the limited LFS environment. To run the tests anyway, run make check.

Install the package, and move the Bash completion support file to the location recommended by the Bash completion maintainers: 

make install
mv -v /etc/bash_completion.d/grub /usr/share/bash-completion/completions

Making your LFS system bootable with GRUB will be discussed in Section 10.4, “Using GRUB to Set Up the Boot Process.”

8.64.2. Contents of GRUB

Installed programs: grub-bios-setup, grub-editenv, grub-file, grub-fstest, grub-glue-efi, grub-install, grub-kbdcomp, grub-macbless, grub-menulst2cfg, grub-mkconfig, grub-mkimage, grub-mklayout, grub-mknetdir, grub-mkpasswd-pbkdf2, grub-mkrelpath, grub-mkrescue, grub-mkstandalone, grub-ofpathname, grub-probe, grub-reboot, grub-render-label, grub-script-check, grub-set-default, grub-sparc64-setup, and grub-syslinux2cfg
Installed directories: /usr/lib/grub, /etc/grub.d, /usr/share/grub, and /boot/grub (when grub-install is first run)

Short Descriptions

grub-bios-setup

Is a helper program for grub-install

grub-editenv

Is a tool to edit the environment block

grub-file

Checks to see if the given file is of the specified type

grub-fstest

Is a tool to debug the file system driver

grub-glue-efi

Glues 32-bit and 64-bit binaries into a single file (for Apple machines)

grub-install

Installs GRUB on your drive

grub-kbdcomp

Is a script that converts an xkb layout into one recognized by GRUB

grub-macbless

Is the Mac-style bless for HFS or HFS+ file systems (bless is peculiar to Apple machines; it makes a device bootable)

grub-menulst2cfg

Converts a GRUB Legacy menu.lst into a grub.cfg for use with GRUB 2

grub-mkconfig

Generates a grub.cfg file

grub-mkimage

Makes a bootable image of GRUB

grub-mklayout

Generates a GRUB keyboard layout file

grub-mknetdir

Prepares a GRUB netboot directory

grub-mkpasswd-pbkdf2

Generates an encrypted PBKDF2 password for use in the boot menu

grub-mkrelpath

Makes a system pathname relative to its root

grub-mkrescue

Makes a bootable image of GRUB suitable for a floppy disk, CDROM/DVD, or a USB drive

grub-mkstandalone

Generates a standalone image

grub-ofpathname

Is a helper program that prints the path to a GRUB device

grub-probe

Probes device information for a given path or device

grub-reboot

Sets the default boot entry for GRUB for the next boot only

grub-render-label

Renders Apple .disk_label for Apple Macs

grub-script-check

Checks the GRUB configuration script for syntax errors

grub-set-default

Sets the default boot entry for GRUB

grub-sparc64-setup

Is a helper program for grub-setup

grub-syslinux2cfg

Transforms a syslinux config file into grub.cfg format