Stage1, Stage2 or Stage3....

fidel · Guru Joined: 16 Jul 2004 Posts: 407 Location: CH

Hi there!
I read a couple of times that stage1 installs aren't supported anymore, they're just used by the Devs. Users are encouraged to use stage3 installs, whereas you still should be able to bootstrap and rebuild the system.
Therefore, because of several errors appearing on a stage1 install (you need perl-5 etc...) I started a stage3 install for the first time for about the last three years. I always picked a stage1 install before, since I liked very much to really know, which packages are already there, to choose the packages all myself and to get a solid, rock-stable system. Besides a couple of errors during emerging the system it always worked at last, somehow! I always ended up having a very nicely built, a very stable, just very well working system!
Since I just recently noticed that it is not recommended to choose a stage1 install because of those very well known problems, I assumed, choosing a stage3 install would be better, I wouldn't need to recompile so many times and could enjoy a less complicated procedure of installing the system.
It now turned out for me that this assumption was wrong! I took a stage3, made the bootstrap and built the system... and I still am (trying to)!
There is some strange dependency on help2man now, it requires Locale::gettext.
Oh well, if that's all, let's just emerge Locale-gettext...
Same error, trying to emerge help2man gives me the error, I would need Locale-gettext. -->??
Ok, I rebuilt libperl, perl and Locale-gettext. Trying to emerge help2man gives me the error, I would need Locale::gettext... I emerged gettext, libperl, perl and Locale-gettext... Same thing!
Any begin with a stage1 install ended up nicely, I may have needed to emerge perl in between, but at the end those procedures worked!
What's up? Are you guys installing Gentoo from stage1, stage2 or stage3? Why? What are your experiences? What would you recommend?...
...anxously looking forward to your opinions!
greets
fidel

alienjon · Veteran Joined: 09 Feb 2005 Posts: 1709

Well, admittedly I haven't had to re-install Gentoo for a while now, but when I did I think it was from a stage 1. Since then I have heard that you (not only should not) but cannot start from a stage 1 unless you are a developer. From what I remember of stage 1's, this shouldn't be a problem since there really wasn't anything on the system at the time that you're installing the stage and, whats more, the stage 3 actually saves you time from having to compile a bunch of stuff that is standard for pretty much every system within your arch anyway (from what I hear, at least)

Have you had a chance to check the forums for your problem (I'm afraid I'm in a rush right now, so I can't do a thorough search at this point)

fidel · Guru Joined: 16 Jul 2004 Posts: 407 Location: CH

I did search indeed, found an issue about last year ago about help2man, but not the same problem. I did the same things again, emerge libperl perl Locale-gettext help2man. It worked now! Still I'm curious!...

alienjon · Veteran Joined: 09 Feb 2005 Posts: 1709

hmmm, so it's working now? That does seem a little weird. Did you do anything different? (Keep us posted

)

fidel · Guru Joined: 16 Jul 2004 Posts: 407 Location: CH

I downloaded stage3-x86 and portage, unpacked it, change-rooted into it, wrote make.conf etc. according to athlon-xp, changed to /usr/portage/scripts and ran ./bootstrap.sh. Afterwards I ran emerge system && emerge -e system... I don't remember where it failed.. then all the above began. I can't tell to have anything done differently, I assume somehow my "world" didn't get updated after I emerged Locale-gettext. Or perhaps there was a messed dependency...
Still, anxious to hear some more opinions, experiences... ;-)

Steve.long · n00b Joined: 25 Apr 2006 Posts: 8

I am new to Gentoo. I have tried the stage3 x86 install twice. Each time I get a message stating that an unexpected type of error has occurred and to file a bug report. I believe the problem has to do with which packages I selected to be installed. Is there a minimal set of packages I should choose just to get everything to compile for the initial install and then add/change packages later. I downloaded and burned the cd and then later downloaded the I686 stage3. I selected packages to produce a system with GNOME as the GUI. The second time I chose not to copy the livecd's kernal. Both times I used the GUI installer. I had previously tied the command line installer once but it error exited when I tried to save the install configuration I was building. Help.
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Rukie · Posted: Wed Apr 26, 2006 1:33 am Post subject:

Hmm, stage1 not recommended anymore? Thats all I ever do.... but then again all my cd's are 2004 cd's :-D

with full package cd's n such lol
I even have a full printout of the NTPL developers install method thingy sitting around here somewhere..
But my system has been so stable I haven't reinstalled anything since I decided to go Linux only (I always had to reinstall b/c windows would screw things up)

What about stage 2's, they still get used?
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alienjon · Veteran Joined: 09 Feb 2005 Posts: 1709

Steve.long: What is the error you are getting? If you are still installing the stage then I don't think you should have to worry about packages yet (in which case your system should be up and running, but getting the packages installed on the system is your problem)

Rukie: From what I understand, Stage 2 was pretty pointless end-user anyway (even back when people were doing stage 1's) just because it was an already-run stage 1 with something else that needed to be run (I'm not sure what that something is specifically, but it would be equal to a stage 3 minus a stage 1, if that makes any sense) For anyone who wanted that level of detail they would just use a stage 1 anyway, basically.

Steve.long · n00b Joined: 25 Apr 2006 Posts: 8

Alienjon:
I tried the stage3 install again last night using the GUI installer on the livecd and chose both the "current" x86 stage3 and the "current" snapshot from the mirrow at OSU. I had debug logging on during the install. It built the kernal ok and I now have a system that is bootable from its hard disk and has a working network. The livecd installer exited when it was first trying to "install_packages();". The system is without "X" and other packages. Below are the last messages from both the installer's output and its log file.

output:
install_packages(); processing package virtual/xft
Exception received during 'Installing additional packages': EmergePackageError: FATAL: emerge: Could not emerge virtual/xft

log file:
... succeeded
grub> quit
Scanning Configuration Files.
Exiting: Nothing left to do: exiting.

Calculating dependences
!!! '=virtual/xft' is not a valid package atom.
!!! Please check ebuild(5) for full details.
!!! (Did you specify a version but forget to prefix with "="?
Exception received:

That is the end of the last message.

I must be doing this all wrong. Should I not choose any packages to be installed? and also not specify any services to be started at boot? Or is there a minimal safe set of packages I must install and later change them after I have a working system? Also, I don't recall selecting the package named "virtual/xft" which errored out. I did select "proftp". I am not sure of the status of the system on my hard disk. I may not be able to properly "emerge" packages using it. Therefore, I would like to redo the install selecting a minimal set of packages that will work. Do you know of a minimal list of packages that will work?

Thanks for your help!!
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stobbsm · Guru Joined: 23 May 2004 Posts: 452

stage 1 proccess is pretty easy to get to a stage 3.

Follow the old install guide until the installing the sources part (don't install the sources).
make sure your make.conf is setup the way you want it, as well as /etc/locales.build (for glibc).
for bootstrap, I always use

alienjon · Veteran Joined: 09 Feb 2005 Posts: 1709

If you have the system installed, then just go for the installation of packages from there on. My only concern is if your system is stable or not. I'd recommend trying to emerge some stuff you want (KDE/Gnome, for example, X will be labeled as a dependency so you don't have to worry about installing that separately)

Steve.long · n00b Joined: 25 Apr 2006 Posts: 8

Alienjon,
To see if my system was stable after the partially successful install, I tried "emerge --sync" to pull in the lastest portage tree. I had to kill the process after it timed-out three times. Each time after it timed-out it kept re-trying to a different mirrow site. Each time it tried to "--sync", it would quickly and successfully get the list of files to sync then quickly get all of the files up to "xfce-extra" file, where it would just freeze until it timed out. At this point I thought my system was unstable, so I tried a new install. This time just pulling in one additional package, "gnome". It failed at the same place as before, "emerge virtual/xft", which was being pulled in as a package "gnome" is dependent upon. Therefore, I tried another clean install without pulling in any additional packages. This last install worked without any problems. I then rebooted my new system and tried to to sync the portage tree again with "emerge --sync". This failed again just like before. I now think the installation of the virtual package "virtual/xft" fails because a problem with the "xfce-extra" file in the portage tree prevents me from successfully finishing the sync'ing of the protage tree (and this causes other problems).
Do you use "gnome"? Do you get the file "xfce-extra" when you sync the portage tree with "emerge --sync" or do you time out like I do? Should I file a bug report. I have the specifics of the "virtual/xft" failure, but I think this is just caused because I can't sync the portage tree because of a problem with file "xfce-extra".
Thanks again.
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alienjon · Veteran Joined: 09 Feb 2005 Posts: 1709

Please someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't have an 'xfce-extra' package, now that I checked for it. If one doesn't exist, and you're computer is trying to update the emerge, I think I can see why you're having the problem (cause it doesn't exist in the first place) I'd check to see if the install cd you are using is the most up-to-date one available.

This is starting to seem real weird to me. Check bugzilla and see if they have something, if not please feel free to post it. In the meantime, would you please post what you can of the error for the xfce-extra emerge?

As a side note I use KDE, not Gnome, but I do have xft installed.

Steve.long · n00b Joined: 25 Apr 2006 Posts: 8

Alienjon,
Bugzilla has 5 bugs about xfce-extra, all are of status NEW, and one from late last year complaints about not being able to get the "ebuilds" file for xfce-extra due to an incorrect length. If this is the same problem, then I don't understand how it could have been around so long without everyone complaining.
I am able to install from the livecd if I use a snapshot download of the portage tree, which is a zipped tar file of the entire portage tree. This only works if I do not choose to add any additional packages. If I try to add even one package I believe the installer must do an "emerge --sync" that messes up my local copy of the portage tree and later causes the "emerge virtual/xft" to fail. After doing a successful install with no extra packages, I can boot my system but when I try "emerge --sync" it repeatedly hangs on trying to get the "ebuilds" file for xfce-extra. Each time my system retries it accesses a different mirrow.
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chrisruwe · Apprentice Joined: 17 Apr 2006 Posts: 160

I did not do an any reinstalls for some time, however, regarding my stability problems, I might soon be forced to.

When I started Gentoo (at that time I used to have current windows experience and some five year old SUSE-Experience ), I was discouraged, because everybody told me Gentoo was complicated, though admittedly rock-stable and really fast, but hands-off for non-geeks. I am a stubborn, thick-headed Westfalian (Germans of you know what I mean), thats why I tried anyway.
I never ever experienced any stability problems or installation probelms, it worked out of the box as long as you stuck to the manual. I found out that gentoo was easy ... you just had to do (and understand) what you were told. "man" used to resolve problems.
I wondered whether it was time to migrate to FreeBSD some time ago, this post has added to my indecisiveness. Gentoo-issues used to be about "how do I configure this-and-that" and related issues, not about "how do I get stability". This is not good. I myself experience stability issues since about two months, this is enitirely new for me. Is gentoo loosing its stability?

SirYes · Posted: Fri Apr 28, 2006 4:59 am Post subject:

Maybe you could investigate my post concerning the Fiordland Install?

Also don't forget to look at the test that compares times needed to do stage1 vs. stage3 install.
Hint: Looks like Time(stage3) is almost 2x LONGER than Time(stage1)...
(but this data might be as well outdated, so YMMV)
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