How to have a custom Grub2 menu that is maintenance free

[oldfred]

I find path to be one of the issues.
As system is not yet mounted with grub, it is defaults as seen if using live installer, but not if you have booted and mounted using your own mount.

I have a partition (hd0,7) and in that partition I have my data partition. While data partition once booted is /mnt/data, before mount it just has a bunch of folders, one of which is ISO. So grub will see it as (hd0,7)/ISO. If you do a ls of that from grub's c for command line then you should see your ISO & if you create a textfile for grub stanza, you see that file. The file has to have correctly formatted grub boot stanza, just like you have in 40_custom.

So is your data partition the hd0,7?
and is path to ISO this? /Iso/-amd64/ubuntu-mate-18.04.4-desktop-amd64.iso"

[Michael Dooley]

Yes oldfred, my data partition is sda7 (hd0,7). And the path is also correct.

[Michael Dooley]

I'm going to abandon this project at this point as it is taking up way too much of my time. A newer grub was installed in 20.04.2 this morning and I'll work with that rather than 18.04's grub. Thanks to all of you for your assistance and if I ever get a live CD or ISO to mount, I'll report back.

[Cavsfan]

I'm going to abandon this project at this point as it is taking up way too much of my time. A newer grub was installed in 20.04.2 this morning and I'll work with that rather than 18.04's grub. Thanks to all of you for your assistance and if I ever get a live CD or ISO to mount, I'll report back.

I know you will get it going, you definitely know what you are doing. If you need additional support, please open up a thread in the Help section.
I mean no ill will whatsoever, it's just that booting anything live was never included as a part of this Wiki; only booting operating systems.

Thank you kindly.

If you ever need help booting operating systems in a custom grub, virtually any Linux OS system, that I can help with, Ubuntu, Arch Linux, Fedora, openSUSE, etc.

[brkpoint]

I'm trying to follow the instructions of https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Ma...tioned_systems, but it says

DO NOT CLICK SAVE! Click file, save as and save it as 06_custom and not 40_custom.
This way the custom entries will be display at the top which is the goal.

Find where it is saved. If it is saved in /etc/grub.d/ you are good to go.

It's unclear where save as is coming from, is it a grub edit tool? Elsewhere in the wiki only nano is mentioned to edit files and there you don't need to find where the files are saved.

[Cavsfan]

I'm trying to follow the instructions of https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Ma...tioned_systems, but it says

DO NOT CLICK SAVE! Click file, save as and save it as 06_custom and not 40_custom.
This way the custom entries will be display at the top which is the goal.

Find where it is saved. If it is saved in /etc/grub.d/ you are good to go.

It's unclear where save as is coming from, is it a grub edit tool? Elsewhere in the wiki only nano is mentioned to edit files and there you don't need to find where the files are saved.

The intention is to edit /etc/grub.d/40_custom and then save it as /etc/grub.d/06_custom so it will show first above all other menu entries.
At one point I made a copy of 40_custom and changed the name to 06_custom.
I always keep an updated 06_custom file in my home directory. I edit it there and move a copy to /etc/grub.d/

This section explains about changing the +3 to +4. It is so the 4th line gets executed instead of the 3rd.

This is 40_custom:

#!/usr/bin/sh
exec tail -n +3 $0
# This file provides an easy way to add custom menu entries.  Simply type the
# menu entries you want to add after this comment.  Be careful not to change
# the 'exec tail' line above.

This is my current 06_custom file on Fedora 34 (distro really doesn't matter) booting Arch Linux, Fedora 34, 3 Xubuntu versions and Windows 10:

#!/bin/sh
echo 1>&2 "Adding Arch Linux, Fedora 34 (Thirty Four), Xubuntu 18.04 LTS Bionic Beaver, Xubuntu 20.04 LTS Focal Fossa, Xubuntu 21.04 Hirsute Hippo and Windows 10"
exec tail -n +4 $0
# This file provides an easy way to add custom menu entries.  Simply type the
# menu entries you want to add after this comment.  Be careful not to change
# the 'exec tail' line above.
menuentry 'Arch Linux' {
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root 688D-126B
        linux  /vmlinuz-linux root=UUID=bbca28b2-503e-4dc8-9850-c54bd0492da8 rw loglevel=3 quiet
        initrd /intel-ucode.img /initramfs-linux.img
}
menuentry 'Arch Linux (fallback kernel)' {
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root 688D-126B
        linux  /vmlinuz-linux root=UUID=bbca28b2-503e-4dc8-9850-c54bd0492da8 rw loglevel=3 quiet
        initrd /initramfs-linux-fallback.img
}
menuentry 'Fedora 34 (Thirty Four)' {
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root db5887a8-9c9f-4c06-9bd5-f4c123ff7839
        linux  /boot/vmlinuz root=UUID=db5887a8-9c9f-4c06-9bd5-f4c123ff7839 ro rd.driver.blacklist=nouveau modprobe.blacklist=nouveau nvidia-drm.modeset=1 resume=UUID=b564ed75-b9ee-410f-9f87-04afc30a0ff4 rhgb quiet LANG=en_US.UTF-8
        initrd /boot/initrd.img
}
menuentry 'Xubuntu 18.04 LTS Bionic Beaver' {
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root 338e6d3b-cbd4-496d-9cc2-b688a90c17c3
        linux  /vmlinuz root=UUID=338e6d3b-cbd4-496d-9cc2-b688a90c17c3 ro quiet resume=/dev/disk/by-uuid/b564ed75-b9ee-410f-9f87-04afc30a0ff4 splash
        initrd /initrd.img
}
menuentry 'Xubuntu 18.04 LTS Bionic Beaver (recovery mode)' {
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root 338e6d3b-cbd4-496d-9cc2-b688a90c17c3
        linux  /vmlinuz root=UUID=338e6d3b-cbd4-496d-9cc2-b688a90c17c3 ro recovery nomodeset
        initrd /initrd.img
}
menuentry 'Xubuntu 20.04 LTS Focal Fossa' {
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root b78c207b-9fc9-4230-b3bc-cee5e8e4e288
        linux  /boot/vmlinuz root=UUID=b78c207b-9fc9-4230-b3bc-cee5e8e4e288 ro quiet splash
        initrd /boot/initrd.img
}
menuentry 'Xubuntu 20.04 LTS Focal Fossa (recovery mode)' {
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root b78c207b-9fc9-4230-b3bc-cee5e8e4e288
        linux  /boot/vmlinuz root=UUID=b78c207b-9fc9-4230-b3bc-cee5e8e4e288 ro recovery nomodeset
        initrd /boot/initrd.img
}
menuentry 'Xubuntu 21.04 Hirsute Hippo' {
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root ea44cecd-5fe4-46ba-9914-bcddba6b34d1
        linux  /boot/vmlinuz root=UUID=ea44cecd-5fe4-46ba-9914-bcddba6b34d1 ro quiet splash
        initrd /boot/initrd.img
}
menuentry 'Xubuntu 21.04 Hirsute Hippo (recovery mode)' {
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root ea44cecd-5fe4-46ba-9914-bcddba6b34d1
        linux  /boot/vmlinuz root=UUID=ea44cecd-5fe4-46ba-9914-bcddba6b34d1 ro recovery nomodeset
        initrd /boot/initrd.img
}
menuentry 'Windows 10' {
        set root='hd2,gpt1'
        search --no-floppy --fs-uuid --set=root 688D-126B
        chainloader /EFI/Microsoft/Boot/bootmgfw.efi
}

I did find out that this must be in /etc/default/grub on any system or else your custom menu will not show:

GRUB_TIMEOUT_STYLE=menu

[von Stalhein]

I can't for the life of me remember how I got to my last (and preferred) setup - I've gone over the wiki etc & fiddled but no result.

I had to reload Win & Ubuntu (separate drives) as for the original build last year I installed them under the legacy BIOS and recently shenanigans ensued.

Anyway, all up and going again except for the GRUB screen.

It used to boot to my selected picture with the menu of OSs. When picking Ubuntu the screen then reloaded to the same background image with a login text box sited in the bottom right corner.

Now, when I select Ubuntu the next screen is (I think) the Plymouth? purple one with the box in the middle.

Would love some pointers on modifying this sequence to have the same image and also how to position the login text box.

[Cavsfan]

I can't for the life of me remember how I got to my last (and preferred) setup - I've gone over the wiki etc & fiddled but no result.

I had to reload Win & Ubuntu (separate drives) as for the original build last year I installed them under the legacy BIOS and recently shenanigans ensued.

Anyway, all up and going again except for the GRUB screen.

It used to boot to my selected picture with the menu of OSs. When picking Ubuntu the screen then reloaded to the same background image with a login text box sited in the bottom right corner.

Now, when I select Ubuntu the next screen is (I think) the Plymouth? purple one with the box in the middle.

Would love some pointers on modifying this sequence to have the same image and also how to position the login text box.

You say you have a Legacy/MBR system or UEFI/GPT system?

After the BIOS screen it should go to the custom grub screen, then to whichever OS is selected. Could be grub files left executable maybe?

Once customized and certain all custom menu selections work, you make these (files shown in white) unexecutable.

[von Stalhein]

It's now a UEFI/GPT system after much pain to the management.

Selecting an OS works fine.

If I select Win, the little wheel thingy rotates in a sort of cutout box in the middle of the GRUB screen for a few seconds before the Win login screen appears.

If I select Ubuntu, it drops to a purple screen headed "Ubuntu" with my account name and a password box underneath - there are also the usual options to select a desktop environment or restart etc.

The previous setup was similar except instead of the purple screen, the next screen contained my background image with a text box in the bottom right corner for the pword.

Hop e that makes sense!

[Cavsfan]

It's now a UEFI/GPT system after much pain to the management.

Selecting an OS works fine.

If I select Win, the little wheel thingy rotates in a sort of cutout box in the middle of the GRUB screen for a few seconds before the Win login screen appears.

If I select Ubuntu, it drops to a purple screen headed "Ubuntu" with my account name and a password box underneath - there are also the usual options to select a desktop environment or restart etc.

The previous setup was similar except instead of the purple screen, the next screen contained my background image with a text box in the bottom right corner for the pword.

Hope that makes sense!

My Windows logon looks pretty much the same, I have a wheel thing that rotates while Windows 10 is coming up.

Also, I believe your purple screen is your Plymouth logon screen on Ubuntu; I have the same except it's not purple. You've reached the system you selected at that point.

Here is a bit a bout Plymouth here

I hope this is what you meant.