Grub2 hiddenmenu

[JebusWankel]

I have a dual boot, but I so seldom use the other OS (Debian actually) that I'd rather Grub just boot right away into Ubuntu and not show the menu. I couldn't figure out how to do this. I Googled around and found that what I wanted, the hiddenmenu option, has been taken out of Grub. Instead, you have to implement it yourself with an albeit short script.

I like the other things about Grub2: better looking, the update-grub function is probably a miracle if you've ever nuked grub by misconfiguring menu.lst. Adding backgrounds is nifty too, and, assuming you find a use for it, the scripting is probably cool. I just don't see how deprecating what I assume is a popular option is a good idea.

Btw, here's the script on the Grub wiki. Google yields some others.

[Rocket2DMn]

I think the equivalent in Grub2 is GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT in /etc/default/grub which needs to be uncommented and set to 0 for there to not be a menu prompt. There is more info here - https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Grub2

More user friendly documentation is in progress to go here (being written by our friend, drs305) - https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Grub2 (currently redirects to the wiki link above). He also has some nice Grub2 tutorials here -
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1287602
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=1195275

HTH

[JebusWankel]

Thanks for the tip, but it didn't work. The menu showed up for about 2 seconds, with the countdown starting at 4, even though there's no 4 in my config file.

[Rocket2DMn]

What about the GRUB_HIDDEN_MENU_QUIET property? Is that set to true?

[drs305]

It actually probably started at 5, but maybe the first number we see is 4. Check to see with:

cat /etc/default/grub | grep "GRUB_TIMEOUT"

If there is no number, it defaults. I've seen different default values in the past four months (I think), with different installs varying from 5-15 seconds. Chances are good it now defaults to 5 seconds if there is no value present.

If you don't want to see anything, you should be able to set the GRUB_TIMEOUT=0 and it should boot without delay. You should probably also remove any GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT value, and to cover all the bases, it should proably be GRUB_DEFAULT=saved for which option to boot.

gksu gedit /etc/default/grub

Don't forget to run "sudo update-grub" after you have made the changes.

There are a couple of Grub links in my signature line if you are interested.

[Rocket2DMn]

It actually probably started at 5, but maybe the first number we see is 4. Check to see with:

cat /etc/default/grub | grep "GRUB_TIMEOUT"

If you don't want to see anything, you should be able to set the GRUB_TIMEOUT=0 and it should boot without delay. You should probably also remove any GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT value, and to cover all the bases, it should proably be DEFAULT=saved for which option to boot.

gksu gedit /etc/default/grub

There are a couple of Grub links in my signature line if you are interested.

Just the man I was looking for! I've already linked the OP to your posts

[JebusWankel]

Thanks! I took the slightly unscientific method and followed all your suggestions at once.

I ended up with this:

GRUB_DEFAULT=saved
#GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT=0
#GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT_QUIET=true
GRUB_TIMEOUT="0"

And it did the job.