Dual booting openSUSE (Gecko) with Pop!_OS

[Jayaguru-Shishya]

The following 3 Posts I have carved off from here https://www.linux.org/threads/dual-...-to-handle-them-both.33868/page-2#post-118832
to become its own Thread for the OP. Members referred to provided input at that other Thread, The new material begins at #4 - Wizard

Greetings! It has been almost a year and a half since the last post in this thread, so hopefully I am doing the right thing by re-opening it — so to speak.

Kari in the meantime, this page is worth a look at, as it broadly divides the Linuxes out there into Families, and if you mix those, you will be on a learning curve, but I believe that is fun in the same way as I enjoy rollercoasters. Thrilling challenges. —wizardfromoz

So yeah, I am having a problem trying to install two parallel Linux distributions: openSUSE Leap and Pop!_OS. As @wizardfromoz already pointed out earlier about the different families, I hope this isn't an impossible task since the former originates from Slackware (at least according to the 22:14, 9 October 2020 version of the family tree), whereas the latter is an Ubuntu (and therefore a Debian) -derivate. Two different braches anyway. As far as I know, however, both run the GRUB2 bootloader, but this doesn't let my problem resolve any easier...

Brevity is the soul of wit. I've successfully partitioned my hard drive into two equally sized portions; besides, I've got a fair chunk of swap section as well. The first one, though, where the openSUSE was installed, is a mounted portion under the Btrfs -filesystem (as recommended by the installer). The second one — yet to be installed by Pop!_OS — was formatted into ext4 -filesystem, and left unmounted (for later installation).

Well, first openSUSE was installed succesfully: the OS launched flawlessly from the hard drive, and the updates were running like a charm. So was the case with Pop!_OS, which I installed on the remaining partion (ext4). No problems so far — not untill reboot...

Note: when 'dual-booting' with Debian based distro's and Arch based distro's you will likely run into trouble with the GrUB boot loader. —Vrai

remember that last distro you install will control the boot manager grub2
if you delete that partition the hard drive wont know how to boot —galen

I think I've run into the problems described by @Vrai and @galen . After installing openSUSE first — later followed by Pop!_OS — the system boots straight away to the latter, just like @galen suggested. Any list to choose from just simply isn't there.

If I boot from the openSUSE installation media (USB), I've got options like Boot from hard disk (which takes me back to Pop!_OS), Installation (I don't wanna do that, I guess...), Rescue system, and Boot Linux. Whereas I have no idea what the last one does, it is the only one that recognizes openSUSE on my system ... well, at least I saw the name on the drop-down menu.

My apologies, I'm not that that tech-savvy, but I hope I could give you some idea about my concern. @wizardfromoz do you happen to have any deeper insight ? Is there a path that can lead me out of my misery...?

A thousand thanks in advance to all of you!

Cheers!

 

[wizardfromoz]

G'day @Jayaguru-Shishya - you are likely best-served by having your own Thread, in another subforum, and I can do that with the above Post and we can refer or link to this Thread. That way helpers will get less confused without the interference of the 35 Posts preceding yours, and better focus on your issues.

I am thinking of our openSUSE subforum, which is sparsely populated, and your Thread will stay closer to the top.

But first, on that link of yours to the family tree - while I am not qualified enough to say that there is no distant connection with Slackware, SUSE-based distros are more closely related to Redhat, and can use its Redhat Package Manager (RPM), as shown here

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SUSE_Linux

I will make the move with this material once I see you have read it (allow for my being in Australia), but let's get a little more information on what you can put to use best.

Q.1 - Can you tell us if your computer is UEFI-GPT or BIOS-MBR?

Q.2 - Under a new regime, with a Grub Menu would you want the SUSE-based on on top or the Pop!_OS?

Gecko Linux is based on openSUSE but more user-friendly, and its Developer is one of our Members.

I would be inclined to blowing away the openSUSE from within Pop, replace it with Gecko and go from there.

Have a think about it and we can start getting you sorted on my tomorrow.

Cheers

Chris Turner
wizardfromoz

 

[Jayaguru-Shishya]

G'day @Jayaguru-Shishya - you are likely best-served by having your own Thread, in another subforum, and I can do that with the above Post and we can refer or link to this Thread. That way helpers will get less confused without the interference of the 35 Posts preceding yours, and better focus on your issues.

I am thinking of our openSUSE subforum, which is sparsely populated, and your Thread will stay closer to the top.

But first, on that link of yours to the family tree - while I am not qualified enough to say that there is no distant connection with Slackware, SUSE-based distros are more closely related to Redhat, and can use its Redhat Package Manager (RPM), as shown here

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SUSE_Linux

I will make the move with this material once I see you have read it (allow for my being in Australia), but let's get a little more information on what you can put to use best.

Q.1 - Can you tell us if your computer is UEFI-GPT or BIOS-MBR?

Q.2 - Under a new regime, with a Grub Menu would you want the SUSE-based on on top or the Pop!_OS?

Gecko Linux is based on openSUSE but more user-friendly, and its Developer is one of our Members.

I would be inclined to blowing away the openSUSE from within Pop, replace it with Gecko and go from there.

Have a think about it and we can start getting you sorted on my tomorrow.

Cheers

Chris Turner
wizardfromoz

Good evening @wizardfromoz ,

and my apologies for such a late reply. I took the time to educate myself about GeckoLinux, and I totally agree with your suggestion. Thanks for that! I never even could have imagined how many problems I might have encountered with the codecs and file extensions if I had gone with openSUSE. Well, maybe in the future when I've learnt more Linux already...

Anyway, to answer your questions in short:

A.1 My laptop is BIOS-MBR.
A.2 Doesn't really matter, but perhaps better Pop!_OS on top (more familiar)

My warmest greetings to @GeckoLinux !

 

[wizardfromoz]

@Jayaguru-Shishya I have given you this Thread, as indicated previously.

I just have to check a couple of points with Installers and I will come back to you on my tomorrow with a strategy for proceeding.

Cheers

Wizard

 

[Jayaguru-Shishya]

Thank you very much, @wizardfromoz ! I'm looking forward to that!

 

[wizardfromoz]

Just a heads up that this will take me a little longer than anticipated, regrets.

I had forgotten with Pop!_OS that under UEFI-GPT it use systemd-boot which I have little experience with, but under your Legacy (BIOS-MBR) setup it should be using Grub.

I will reinstall Pop under Legacy conditions and run my tests.

In the meantime, if you wish to install Gecko, just go ahead and install it over the top of your existing openSUSE install.

If you have any problems with the Gecko install, you are probably best served to ask questions of the Developer, who has a Github presence here

https://github.com/geckolinux/geckolinux-project/issues

Cheers

Wizard

 

[wizardfromoz]

I should have said, too, that if you are installing Gecko (as with openSUSE), the default may be to use the BTRFS format instead of EXT4. I would advocate using EXT4 (it can be chosen, may be listed as Standard), to keep the same file systems with the two Linux.

Wiz

 

[Jayaguru-Shishya]

I should have said, too, that if you are installing Gecko (as with openSUSE), the default may be to use the BTRFS format instead of EXT4. I would advocate using EXT4 (it can be chosen, may be listed as Standard), to keep the same file systems with the two Linux.

Wiz

Good point, I will do that once I get home. I am currently out of town, but I will establish myself to the homebase somewhere in the Monday evening (GMT+3)!

Edit: It seems that my homecoming will be delayed till the Tuesday evening...

 

[Jayaguru-Shishya]

Greetings @wizardfromoz ! I managed to install GeckoLinux KDE Static under EXT4 filesystem, just as you told me, and guess what happened? The system booted to a menu asking me whether I wanted to launch Gecko or Pop!_OS

Oh boy, do you think that the two different file systems (Btrfs & ext4) might have been the reason for not launching the selection menu properly? Now both distros are running under the same, and everything works like a charm.

Anyway, I'd still like to thank you for your kind help and the willingness to delve into my problem. And most of all, thank you for introducing me to GeckoLinux, for which I am ever so grateful!

Cheers!