If anyone is willing to try out OpenSolaris and has Vista and Ubuntu pre-installed, you might face some issues with the grub(i.e., the bootloader). I just successfully completed the triple boot setup and I would be taking you through my installation process.
Partitioning:
First, you need a primary partition to install opensolaris. Use the ‘Disk Management’ utility of vista to create/resize/format your partitions as per your needs. OpenSolaris recommends atleast 9GB of space for your partition. Don’t forget to backup essential data in the partition you want to format or you will end up losing them.
Installing OpenSolaris:
Once you have got a primary partition, insert the opensolaris cd and reboot your computer. If you don’t have a cd, you can download its image from http://www.opensolaris.com/get/index.jsp and write it or you can order a free cd from https://oscd.sun.com/ , though the latter option requires you wait for a month or so.
Booting into the live cd, you will be asked for keyboard layout and default language. Once you enter them, gnome loads. You have an ‘Install OpenSolaris’ icon. This will guide you through the installation process. In step 2 of installation, you would be asked for the partition to which opensolaris has to be installed. Set the partition that you had prepared as ‘Solaris’. The other steps need no explanation.
Editing the grub:
After installing, when you reboot the system, the opensolaris grub loads and provides you with options for Windows and OpenSolaris, but not for Ubuntu.
Now, we’ll be editing the ubuntu grub to add a chainloader to the solaris grub.
Part I: Recover ubuntu grub
i. Boot into ubuntu live cd.
ii. Open the terminal.
iii. Enter
sudo fdisk -l
This will list the details of all the partitions in your hard disks. This is what the command displays in my laptop.
Disk /dev/sda: 500.1 GB, 500107862016 bytes 255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 60801 cylinders Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes Disk identifier: 0x60000000 Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/sda1 21 6522 52224000 7 HPFS/NTFS /dev/sda2 6522 11749 41984000 83 Linux /dev/sda3 * 11749 14299 20480000 bf Solaris /dev/sda4 14299 60802 373536768 f W95 Ext'd (LBA) /dev/sda5 14299 60802 373535744 7 HPFS/NTFS
Note down the partitions in which linux and solaris are installed. The ‘a’ after /dev/sd represents the hard disk in which the partition is present. ‘a’ refers to first hard disk, ‘b’ to second, etc. The number represents the partition in that hard disk. In the terminal, I would be typing (hd0,1) to represent linux partition and (hd0,2) to represent solaris partition. Here, the partition numbering starts for 0. Write down the partitions in which linux and solaris have been installed in your computer.
iv. In the terminal type sudo grub
v. In the grub prompt, type
root (hd0,1)
*Replace (hd0,1) with the partition in which ubuntu is installed in your computer.
vi. Type
setup (hd0)
Once it says done, you have got back your ubuntu grub, but you can’t boot opensolaris from it. So, we now have to add a chainloader to the solaris grub in the ubuntu grub.
Part II: Chainloading to solaris grub from ubuntu grub
Reboot your system and remove the live cd. Boot into ubuntu (from the ubuntu grub which loads now). Open the terminal and type
sudo gedit /boot/grub/menu.lst
This opens the grub menu. At the end of the file, append the following lines and save the file.
title OpenSolaris
rootnoverify (hd0,2)
makeactive
chainloader +1
boot
*Replace (hd0,2) with the partition where you have solaris installed.
Reboot the system and you have ubuntu grub loading first with an option to OpenSolaris grub other than vista and ubuntu.
Edit: Not Applicable for Ubuntu 9.10 (Karmic Koala). Karmic uses grub2, whose architecture differs from the previous grub.
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