struggling with install

gavin · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 27

I was hoping it would be easy ( can see why I like OS's which install themselves

).

Spent all weekend trying to do this, Almost ready to give up :\

Basically I am up to the stage of chroot'ing, and i'm getting this error:

Raoul_Duke · Posted: Mon Jun 07, 2004 11:37 am Post subject:

If you're at the chrooting stage, the command should be:

Helena · Posted: Mon Jun 07, 2004 11:39 am Post subject: Re: struggling with install

gavin · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 27

Hi - thanks for the speedy reply!

Yes, I've been following the manual exactly so far, the only error I had so far was transfering some of the portage files (I figure I can emerge them later if needed?).

And yes, I'm typing in that command exactly.

Helena · Posted: Mon Jun 07, 2004 12:06 pm Post subject:

gavin · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 27

Okay, I might burn another CD and start again

I got some I/O errors on a few files while they were being un-tar'd

Helena · Posted: Mon Jun 07, 2004 1:14 pm Post subject:

gavin · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 27

Okay, just burnt another CD (did it at 4x speed just to make sure everything was written properly).

I started untaring the stage3-x86... tar, and it works okay for the first part, then it starts giving me errors.

gavin · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 27

heh - I think it was lack of disk space

How large is the complete install for gentoo? I have had mandrake installed before on this machine with no issues.

Basically it's a P200 with quite an old bios which doesn't support large drives, I have to install the base onto a 1.7GB hard drive, and then sitting next to it is a huge 160gb one which will need to be detected by GRUB. Obviously I can't do that until I get this thing installed on the old 1.7

baldeante · Posted: Mon Jun 07, 2004 7:32 pm Post subject:

baldeante · Posted: Mon Jun 07, 2004 7:41 pm Post subject:

gavin · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 27

ok - thanks, but I'm not even up to the boot strapping yet, still trying to unpack the tarballs!

Should I use a stage 1 install then? Any other tips on getting a small install (this is going to be an internet and file server, so I definatly don't need any GUI's, openoffice, mozilla, etc pre-packaged).

zoom · n00b Joined: 26 Jan 2004 Posts: 46

Gavin,
Since this is your first time and to ease the frustration try using the Stage3 tarball for the install. That way you can avoid alot of the more custom aspects of Gentoo. I'm using a Stage3 install on one of my servers and it works just great and was easy to setup as well. Stage3 really isn't that big either.

gavin · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 27

yes, I am using the stage3 at the moment

hda3 should have around a gig of space free, surely that is enough? Just seem to be stuck on this step which should be very straight forward!

toddrblade · n00b Joined: 08 Jun 2004 Posts: 2 Location: phoenix

I don't think the problem is disk space or bad install disks.

I've had the same problem. I used a purchased copy of the i386 dual CD from Gentoo (this is about 2 months ago). I tried doing a Stage 3 install on a 20G drive. I followed instructions exactly, at least to my ability. No errors were encountered. At the step

chroot /mnt/gentoo /bin/bash

I got the same error: /bin/bash no such file or directory exists. But it does exist.

Repeated about 2 weeks later an 80G drive (so I wouldn't have to set up my 20G drive on RH9 again). I was even more careful, if possible, in following the instructions for surely I had done something wrong. Again I got no errors till the chroot step and got /bin/bash no such file or directory exists again.

The only thing I know of which I might be doing wrong is that I'm installing on a i686 machine (AMD Duron) using i386 Gentoo disks. I have an older i386 also on which I want to install Gentoo.

Any help or suggestions would be appreciated.

-Todd

baldeante · Posted: Tue Jun 08, 2004 12:21 pm Post subject:

servant · n00b Joined: 03 Jun 2004 Posts: 17

i've had some unpacking problems as well. i think it was with the stage3 tarball.

the problem was that i was unpacking them into the wrong directory. make sure you are in the proper /mnt/gentoo directory, before unpacking nething.

to be sure use cd to /mnt/gentoo and ls.

u should have 3 folders. boot; lost&found; proc.

gavin · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 27

servant · n00b Joined: 03 Jun 2004 Posts: 17

have u mounted all your partitions? i'm assuming so but just in case. also, everytime you reboot, if say ur machine hangs, or aliens invade your house, u must remount the partitions.

toddrblade · n00b Joined: 08 Jun 2004 Posts: 2 Location: phoenix

Shouldn't the chroot command be:
chroot /mnt/gentoo/bin/bash
rather than
chroot /mnt/gentoo /bin/bash ?

As I read the man page chroot has the form
chroot NewDirectory Command
This changes "/" to be NewDirectory and optionally executes Command.
It does not have the form
chroot directory1 directory2

If this is correct then the problem may be
1) the real command is chroot /mnt/gentoo/bin/bash and
2) /mnt/gentoo/bin/bash has to exist.

The statement
chroot /mnt/gentoo /bin/bash
would chroot to /mnt/gentoo and then try to execute /bin/bash which is a command (file or directory) that does not exist.

Am I out to lunch on this?

-Todd

az_zel · n00b Joined: 12 May 2004 Posts: 69

There is supposed to be a space betweehn gentoo and /, so the correct code is:

Red_Weasel · n00b Joined: 11 Jun 2003 Posts: 35 Location: Portland, OR

I seem to recall having this error. Be sure that you are in a directory that is r/w by root. I seem to remember that this will not really work if you are in /proc, /dev, and the like. Try this set of commands and replace with your known partitions:

gavin · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 27

thanks for the help!

I realised I could mount my 160gb hard drive using /dev/hdb :oops:

So I've done that, created a 5gb partition for the main files, and they copied accross fine. The chroot appeared to work as well.

Now for the next step heh

gavin · n00b Joined: 05 Jun 2004 Posts: 27

okay next question (Sorry!).

I copied all the files correctly (no errors) from the stage3-x86 package, and the portage tarball.

Following the manual exactly, the portage files all seemed to be located in /usr/snapshots/

rather than /usr/portage as the manual uses later on.

And the /usr/src/ directory is empty?

baldeante · Posted: Tue Jun 08, 2004 7:42 pm Post subject: