Newbie on the way to Gentoo... Hi!

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

Hi,

This post is to thank the team, say hello, and tell my newbie story...

I decided to switch to Gentoo as main system at home.

No boot attempt yet.
I started installation 2 days ago, that's maybe 6-7 hours of work so far, not enough to complain since it's a new process for me.

Also some of my requirements add a little bit of a challenge for a newbie:
- EFI boot
- mount by UUID
- aufs support
- systemd
- metalog
- KDE plasma
- fr locale
- NVidia proprietary drivers (along with Intel integrated graphics)
- dual seat (I'll see that point later)
(and I'll stick to portage for a while, I'm not sure to switch for paludis)

Installation is done from my current Linux Mint 17, on a new drive, but it seems I'll have to boot the System Rescue CD in EFI to install Grub2 with the right variables initialized, no big deal.

Since I started I keep a log of all my commands, problems and docs I read.
Maybe I'll turn that into something useful for next newbie with similar requirements.

The good news:

- emerge is quite exciting, chaining so much compilations is like magic
- I learned a few things that could help me fix the random Linux Mint freezes: I'll rebuild its kernel with the Gentoo advice regarding NVidia driver requirements.

The still on work issues:

- finalizing the EFI boot setup (got a clue for this one)
- NVidia drivers (emerge X server leads to strange ABI x86 messages, still searching)

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Mon Apr 11, 2016 6:35 pm Post subject:

blugendoo,

Welcome to Gentoo.

You are trying to eat a whole elephant at one sitting. Don't do that. The one plateful at a time approach works best.
Gentoo is the same. Take a handbook install, customise the filesystem layout if you wish then test it.
Once it works, add things to it. You can always back out your additions when it breaks.
This minimises the problem space you need to search when (not if) it fails.

Switch to systemd after the default openrc works. Then if it used to boot but doesn't after the switch, you know systemd is the issue.

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

Hi NeddySeagoon, thanks for such wise advice. I should have done that.

Well, maybe I'll carry on a little bit just to make it boot. Then, if there's too many problems eating that elephant, I'll start over with a very standard setup and on-board Intel graphics by default.

My hardware: integrated Intel graphic chip, that I do not use yet, and a separate NVidia GeForce 970GTX on PCI express slot as main graphic card. The Intel chip will be used later for another seat (with another keyboard and mouse).

I had one hour more to take care of my Gentoo system:

EFI boot on System Rescue CD is ok, chroot to install Grub with EFI variables is ok now, as expected.

Grub starts at pure EFI boot, it tells me "loading kernel xxxxxxxxxxxx" and "loading initial ramdisk xxxxxxxxxxx", and nothing else happen (blinking cursor).

I guess that using an USB adapter for my new system disk wasn't a good idea. A the moment it was simpler for me to try Gentoo, but this could add some problems. :oops:

So I plugged the drive on internal sata, motherboard setup sees it but I can't make it boot Grub anymore. :roll:

I'll try a Grub re-install from Rescue CD as soon as get back to this Gentoo install.

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2016 4:55 pm Post subject:

blugendoo,

Your quoted text comes from grub, that's a good sign.
Grub exits by jumping to the kernel start address. One of the first things the kernel does is display a message "Decompressing Kernel ...."

Did you see that?

I would have expected your boot to fail when the kernel tried to mount the root filesystem but that would be several screenfuls of kernel messages further on.

Root on usb needs as extra kernel parameter. Normally the kernel tries to mount root before it starts the USB subsystem, thun root on USB is doomed to fail.
However, if you add rootwait to the kernel command line, the kernel will wait (forever) for root to appear.
You are going to need that anyway but it sounds like you have other issues too.
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

I'm very grateful to your support here, as the intended purpose of my first post was a hello and feedback story.
It turns out that now I need more help, so having direct answers greatly accelerate the debugging of my setup: thanks!

No more USB drive: it's now internal SATA.
As expected, Grub reinstallation from Rescue CD now brings back Grub on EFI boot.

It is still stuck right after displaying "loading initial ramdisk" (in French if I remember well, that's the Gentoo effect of the locale setting

)
I have no screen flicker, only a blinking cursor. I have no message from kernel decompressing itself.

Of course I'm also doing my own research to solve this... :wink:

https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-p-7240690.html

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2016 6:48 pm Post subject:

blugendoo,

If grub loads you should see the grub menu and the grub splash screen.
Do you see that?

If not, it may not be grub that is loading your kernel. The kernel can be compiled to be an EFI compliant program, so that its loaded automatically on boot without the use of grub.
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

Yes, NeddySeagoon: I have Grub menu, etc.

I think it could be a framebuffer issue like here:
https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic-t-989210.html (last post)

I have removed many framebuffer options from the kernel config, following those advice for NVidia drivers, kernel KMS
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/NVidia/nvidia-drivers#Kernel_compatibility
https://wiki.gentoo.org/wiki/Xorg/Guide

I'll put some fb support back and test...

EDIT:
I allready had:

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2016 7:28 pm Post subject:

blugendoo,

Ahhh nvidia-drivers. The nVidia drivers advertise that they do not work with a framebuffer console.
If you try, you will get dire warnings in dmesg.

What is important is that your framebuffer driver of choice does not attempt to control the graphics chip set.
Simple Framebuffer and/or EFI framebuffer may work. VESA framebuffer used to work for me but my video card is too old now, so I no longer use nVidia drivers.

The kernel uses the VGA text console to start with, then switches to a framebuffer console later, if it can.

Its quite possible to build the kernel with no console drivers at all. That gets you black text on a black background, which is hard to read :)

Hmm ... you have two graphics cards. Do you have the grub output on one and the kernel output on the other?
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

That was it: after adding EFI framebuffer support I'm now able to log in as root.

There's a few odd things I should be able to solve:
Despite the setup I prepared on chrooted environment, I don't have the proper hostname, the fr keyboard, the eth0 on dhcp, ...
I'll work on that. It could be a systemd issue, right ?

But I would apreciate some help for this:

Some messages keep trashing the console I am on (tty0, tty1, ...), it's like

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2016 8:32 pm Post subject:

blugendoo,

Are you actually using systemd?

The default on Gentoo is Openrc. What is the name of PID 1 on your system. I get init.
If you have managed to boot systemd from your first boot, well done!

I can't support systemd as I don't use it. I won't go into why in your topic.
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

Yes, I thought I would rather go from start to the target system I want (thus the elephant to eat).

So I emerged systemd on chroot, systemd is the init for boot config and in the kernel I only have the systemd support, not the Openrc.

I'm not sure if I should be glad to ear that having the very first boot on Gentoo with systemd is a kind of an achievement.

Anyway, I'll try to fix a few things before sleep...

EDIT:
- no more console jamming: I started metalog. I think that without any log eater the kernel send printk to console, right?
- keyboard ok

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

Network is up! (ping google.com)

It lacked drivers and was badly configured! My first time with systemd, udev rules, ...
So no eth0 but other names.
I've chosen rules so that I now have net0 and net1 as ethernet device names

I'm quite excited.

My next steps will be to get hostname set, at last! I think it's systemd again.
Then my unprivileged user, and graphic environment!

Hum... I just wonder why I wasn't able to simply "startx", since on chroot I emerged world with a KDE Plasma profile.

NeddySeagoon · Posted: Wed Apr 13, 2016 8:17 pm Post subject:

blugendoo,

For startx to just work you need xterm, xclock and twm. That's what startx runs by default.

To make startx start other things, you need to edit your ~/.xinitrc file.
Its missing until you create it.
_________________
Regards,

NeddySeagoon

Computer users fall into two groups:-
those that do backups
those that have never had a hard drive fail.

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

324874 · Apprentice Joined: 26 Jul 2014 Posts: 168

Hi everyone, welcome to Gentoo, blugendoo !

I take advantage of the title of your thread to share one comment.

1. For me, the most difficult thing is to find where search to understand what I have to do.

search : how to learn things in an effective manner ?

Indeed, a few years ago I hadn't knowledges about information technologies, operating systems, computers, etc.

Best regards,

neoptslap

steveL · Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2016 7:27 am Post subject:

Welcome to Gentoo, blugendoo :-)

You might like these tips collected over the years; I recommend reading "the basics" at least.

Don't forget IRC: chat.freenode.net or .org #gentoo for support and: #gentoo-chat for off-topic witter, with the same standard of moderation as the forums (not OTW.)

Bear in mind that there is a much wider world exposed to you on freenode; #bash is essential, ime, and will teach you an awful lot about the UNIX userland (as well as the implementation language for all ebuilds.)
Similarly ##workingset if you want to learn build-systems (make, toolchain, autotools, cmake, etc.)

#friendly-coders if you're finding IRC a bit overwhelming, or running into someone who is a pain (happens.)
#coding-n00bs if you are really new, and want to witter off-topic as well.

/topic #friendly-coders links to many other coding channels, and is how you find out a bit about a channel before entering with eg: /join #gentoo

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

@steveL thanks for the nice tips collection.
I see there's the EFI-nvidia thread on which I stumble upon recently: a good one.

This is my new issue now that I have X.org emerged.

There is a long pause after text login prompt display (with stale cursor), a slight flicker, and then the text cursor for login starts blinking.
Then if I startx, it leads to black screen and monitor goes in power save mode. :roll:

SysRq keys somewhat work to reboot.

I'll do my homework before asking help.
(EDITED)
It seems that many admins will keep having those warnings

steveL · Posted: Fri Apr 15, 2016 2:06 pm Post subject:

blugendoo · n00b Joined: 11 Apr 2016 Posts: 23

Working on those two problems:
1) X.org nvidia crash freeze
2) USB mouse repeatedly disconnect
I deal with the latter on another thread

Regarding nvidia I new it wouldn't be easy.
Here are some kernel log lines related to initial temporary freeze and the crash freeze on X startup:
(can't find a bbcode to fold this)