I was really glad to see systemd-boot became the default in Cassini.
Currently, I am on BTRFS, Grub, dracut, LTS. KDE Plasma, BTRFS.
I have BTRFS Assistant and snapper installed.
Trying to “follow” the development of EndeavourOS I am thinking of converting to systemd-boot.
I understand if I converted to systemd-boot I will have a menu with a few options to boot to.
What options exactly? Would I have the main two options:
Linux
linux-lts
(just in case something breaks I will have another kernel)
Snapshots will still be working? Is there a way to recover/restore from snapshots?
I will still be enjoying the main features of BTRFS?
What is the best way to convert given that I just changed to dracut.
Not to point out the obvious, but you already did this once and decided to go back to grub because you lost the ability to boot off snapshots and easily restore them.
Well @dalto I know I seem to be naughty and problematic.
The main point is that Cassidy defaults to systemd-boot. If I am doing a fresh install I would follow the defaults but will select BTRFS anyway.
As the developers (whom I trust give us the best) selected systemd-boot as the default, and it was being thought before to move away from Grub, and for me just to follow the “development” going on with EndeavourOS.
So, I feel comfortable now converting to systemd-boot, actually I feel I should.
To summarize:
to follow the best thing the developers I trust chose.
to be following the development going on.
I think boot time with dracut should be much faster than Grub.
Given the stability and no “serious” need to boot from snapshots it is OK, I can give it up, especially if I can have an option to boot from LTS, Linux, and thinking of trying the zen kernel as well. (would I have the three kernels as boot options in systemd-boot?)
ust read performance boost is negligible. So I would better stick to the defaults I have, Linux and LTS. I think those would be enough and safe.
P.S.
I noticed that @Whettingstone at Install dracut? is thinking the same as I am thinking and for the same reasons.
Mainly the developers defaulted to it.
Well, in hope it will be of any help for others, here I am recording exactly what I am doing to convert to sytemd-boot according to [Tutorial] Convert to systemd-boot and my post there (the steps I did then).
1- updating and rebooting! (Done)
2- sudo pacman -Rc grub
3- sudo mkdir /efi
4- efidevice=$(findmnt /boot/efi -no SOURCE) # save the efi partition location
5- sudo umount /boot/efi
6- sudo mount ${efidevice} /efi
7- To make the mount change permanent, edit /etc/fstab and change where it reads /boot/efi to /efi
8- sudo bootctl install
[limo@asus ~]$ sudo bootctl install
Created "/efi/EFI/systemd".
Created "/efi/loader".
Created "/efi/loader/entries".
Created "/efi/EFI/Linux".
Copied "/usr/lib/systemd/boot/efi/systemd-bootx64.efi" to "/efi/EFI/systemd/systemd-bootx64.efi".
Copied "/usr/lib/systemd/boot/efi/systemd-bootx64.efi" to "/efi/EFI/BOOT/BOOTX64.EFI".
Random seed file /efi/loader/random-seed successfully written (32 bytes).
Successfully initialized system token in EFI variable with 32 bytes.
Created EFI boot entry "Linux Boot Manager".
[limo@asus ~]$
9- sudo pacman -S kernel-install-for-dracut and typed “y” to uninstall kernel-install-for-dracut and eos-dracut are in conflict. Remove eos-dracut? [y/N] y
10- Created the scrypt I called dalto.sh
#!/usr/bin/env bash
# Find the configured esp
esp=$(bootctl -p)
# Prepare the efi partition for kernel-install
machineid=$(cat /etc/machine-id)
if [[ ${machineid} ]]; then
mkdir ${esp}/${machineid}
else
echo "Failed to get the machine ID"
fi
# Run kernel install for all the installed kernels
while read -r kernel; do
kernelversion=$(basename "${kernel%/vmlinuz}")
echo "Installing kernel ${kernelversion}"
kernel-install add ${kernelversion} ${kernel}
done < <(find /usr/lib/modules -maxdepth 2 -type f -name vmlinuz)
But, I guess I missed or messed something.
The system boots directly, not actually seeing the systemd-boot menu! (rebooted a few times)
What does this mean?
How can I get the systemd-boot menu?
When I mentioned loader/loader.conf, I sort of assumed that you were still inside the /efi/ directory. So, my bad.
You got an empty file because you tried to open a loader/loader.conf file from a working directory that doesn’t contain that file. So nano creates an empty buffer.
I am actually feeling great.
Now it is like I did a fresh Cassini install.
I believe now it is safe, no matter what happens to any kernel I have 2 boot options for each of ‘Linux’ and “LTS” the fall back.
On BTRFS, BTRFS Assistant, Snapper… etc… I can boot to any of the 4 options and restore a previous snapshot.
I hope I am getting it right.
A wonderful distro, a wonderful community, and wonderful developers.
Keep up the great work.
