How to have a custom Grub2 menu that is maintenance free

[deadflowr]

Yep, this thread is about customizing the grub2 boot menu.
If you want to trick out your theme, look here:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...ht=grub+themes

[Cavsfan]

Yep, this thread is about customizing the grub2 boot menu.
If you want to trick out your theme, look here:

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...ht=grub+themes

That is good. Drs305 is a friend of mine. Not sure who will maintain that thread though as he is now retired.

This method customizes the Grub2 selections, changes the font, font size, font colors and adds a background pitcture.
Here is my most recent Grub picture for Precise Pangolin 12.04 LTS. I had the same one on all my installs but, that was confusing so I did this.



The beauty is that no matter what kernels get installed on any of the 4 Ubuntus, the default line will never ever change.
This method may appear to be daunting but, it comes down to what is in one file /etc/grub.d/06_custom and a couple of other minor changes that need to be made.

[deadflowr]

That is good. Drs305 is a friend of mine. Not sure who will maintain that thread though as he is now retired.

This method customizes the Grub2 selections, changes the font, font size, font colors and adds a background pitcture.
Here is my most recent Grub picture for Precise Pangolin 12.04 LTS. I had the same one on all my installs but, that was confusing so I did this.



The beauty is that no matter what kernels get installed on any of the 4 Ubuntus, the default line will never ever change.
This method may appear to be daunting but, it comes down to what is in one file /etc/grub.d/06_custom and a couple of other minor changes that need to be made.

I think grubthemeartist has done a good job of keeping up with newer themes on that thread.
I agree the custom menu setup is a great thing.
I have a precise, and kubuntu precise, a quantal, and a raring (plus a windows xp) on my system, and without utilizing the custom file, finding the right distro took some special attention to kernel versions.
Now all distros are well defined, and I click far less to boot.
And simplfied booting is what it's supposed to be about.
Themes and fonts and backgrounds, though nice, aren't nearly as important to me as getting into the OS want I quickly.

[Cavsfan]

I agree the custom menu setup is a great thing.
I have a precise, and kubuntu precise, a quantal, and a raring (plus a windows xp) on my system, and without utilizing the custom file, finding the right distro took some special attention to kernel versions.
Now all distros are well defined, and I click far less to boot.
And simplfied booting is what it's supposed to be about.
Themes and fonts and backgrounds, though nice, aren't nearly as important to me as getting into the OS want I quickly.

This method does exactly that: allows you to get to the OS of your choice quickly.

How much easier is hitting enter or moving the cursor up or down with the arrow keys to get to the OS of your choice?
This thread is about How to have a custom Grub2 menu that is maintenance free.

If your not going to post questions, etc. pertaining to this thread I suggest you create your own thread.

[deadflowr]

This thread is about How to have a custom Grub2 menu that is maintenance free.

Got it.
Here's a question.
Last night, I decided to see about adding a menuentry for the .old file in the root directory, as oldfred mentioned.
It works fine, but I get the same message when hitting enter as I do booting into windows.

You know, that whole something something, press enter to continue thing.

menuentry "Good Kernel" {    set root=(hd0,1)
        linux /vmlinuz.old root=/dev/sda1 ro quiet splash
        initrd /boot/initrd.img.old
}

Do you think I'd have to do anything to the entry to avoid that?

[oldfred]

I get that error also on several of my newer installs. It slows boot but other than that I have not determined what the issue is. I thought for a while is was search for UUID line, but you so not have search in your entry, just a device setting.

[Cavsfan]

Got it.
Here's a question.
Last night, I decided to see about adding a menuentry for the .old file in the root directory, as oldfred mentioned.
It works fine, but I get the same message when hitting enter as I do booting into windows.

You know, that whole something something, press enter to continue thing.

menuentry "Good Kernel" {    set root=(hd0,1)
        linux /vmlinuz.old root=/dev/sda1 ro quiet splash
        initrd /boot/initrd.img.old
}

Do you think I'd have to do anything to the entry to avoid that?

I get that error also on several of my newer installs. It slows boot but other than that I have not determined what the issue is. I thought for a while is was search for UUID line, but you so not have search in your entry, just a device setting.

That erroneous error is mentioned in the wiki in Section 4.6 when selecting Windows:
https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Ma...from_Grub_1.99

Is that the error you are talking about?

You can either wait or just press enter again and it goes ahead and does it.

I haven't seen it when selecting anything but Windows myself.
That is the only thing I don't like about Grub version 1.99. Grub 1.98 and 2.00 do not get that error.

[oldfred]

That is the error I get on some of my boots, but it is not Windows.

I think it is my desktop boot from 12.04 to 12.10 both on my SSD. But I have to check and cannot do that until next week. (in Fla on laptop).

[deadflowr]

Yep, grub 1.99.

grub 2.00 runs it as normal as the rest of the entries.

At this point it's more of an academic curiosity then a necessity.

Normally, I'd pull a Joe Dirt and say, "Why does it do that? well cuz it just does."

But my interest in it was little above normal.

It's doubtful that I'll ever boot into it (knock on wood for the stable kernels), but maybe someone who needs/wants an older kernel can glean something from it.

[Cavsfan]

That is the error I get on some of my boots, but it is not Windows.

I think it is my desktop boot from 12.04 to 12.10 both on my SSD. But I have to check and cannot do that until next week. (in Fla on laptop).

Only selecting Windows 7 gives me that error. Selecting the other Ubuntu versions never has.

Yep, grub 1.99.

grub 2.00 runs it as normal as the rest of the entries.

At this point it's more of an academic curiosity then a necessity.

Normally, I'd pull a Joe Dirt and say, "Why does it do that? well cuz it just does."

But my interest in it was little above normal.

It's doubtful that I'll ever boot into it (knock on wood for the stable kernels), but maybe someone who needs/wants an older kernel can glean something from it.

I guess it would be logical for initrd.img.old and vmlinuz.old to provide the ability to boot into the previously installed kernel and that is fine if anyone wants to incorporate that into their menu.
But, I will leave that out of my wiki. I have never had the need to boot into an older kernel and if I did I would boot into recovery and make the appropriate files 10_linux or 30_os-prober executable.