Hello! I hope I’m not breaking any rules by making this post here as I’m totally new.
I recently experienced a failure that was a, let’s say, compound issue:
Nvidia doing it’s worst (as always) when waking up from suspension
and that, somehow freezing the system
plus, the filesystem corrupting itself on me (could enter the grub and that’s about it, after it’s only rescue mode)
got out of it thanks to a topic on this forum which saved me a LOT of stress and a whole reinstall, BUT it did have a caveat, needing a garuda ISO at hand.
Thankfully, that was the case for me, and probably most of us carry that around, but isn’t it possible to have one mini partition dedicated to having a rescue ISO, updated from the main partition regularly?
I don’t think it’s an appealing idea to everyone, but I know it’s an option I’d like to have around for catastrophes.
I’ve seen it discussed before in this topic although I don’t think that he was talking about the same to be honest.
for me, btrfs snapshots do cure most ailments, but some evils require greater assistance.
No, isn’t possible + special updated from “regular”
The system can’t boot itself from iso only from the content.
Easybcd have a boot option to do this (but auto update = )
If this function…who knows and M$ based.
so 2x garuda? I was thinking something more akin to the installer which doesn’t have that big of a space requirement. still it’s a good option for rescue, although I don’t think the regular install has btrfs fix? or garuda-chroot? at least I can’t find those commands on my own system
well, updating an iso is something I wasn’t expecting… what about a mini-garuda partition for rescue though? utilities + a minimal GUI and an internet browser so you can at least consult forums and post diagnostics correctly? I remember windows having something like that but waay worse, it’s an auto recovery that will try itself to recover the system and fail most of the time
Yes, that’s possible. Search for it online and you’ll find it.
However, you can’t update the ISO from the main system. You would have to replace an outdated ISO with a new one manually.
The question is whether that makes sense. For example, I have a Ventoy stick with the latest Garuda and various tools for analyzing and repairing different issues. This is much more flexible, easier, and useful than one ISO on a partition.
What’s not that good about depending on the USB is that it may not be always with me, and if i didn’t have any other computer at home, I’d be screwed (or another OS in which to burn the iso, but that’s maybe easier to come by). the thing is trying to have something easier at hand than a USB which can be with me or not, or even could be outdated, in which case that’s really bad for whatever you need rescuing
is it really an extra expense to have a “rescue partition” an expense in the sense of money or time?
If I were a linux developer (which frankly, is a cool thing to be) I’d really like to create a tool like this. I recently read that you added a nix submodule for example, that seems like a great way to dumb-proof a system, even if that includes getting a whole lot more headaches with the config files, but maybe in the future there’s going to be an easier way for that.
In any case, a recovery partiton, would be an amazing thing to have, even if it’s not aligned with the ISO idea, I’d like to help build something like that if there’s a way
Hmm… I don’t understand. You may not always have a flash drive with you, but you do have a computer or a drive with a partition?
New ISOs aren’t released every few days. As soon as a new one is released, I copy it to the flash drive. I always keep two versions on it: the new one and the previous one.
There is no recovery partition, but at least there are snapshots from Snapper.
Remember that almost every Linux distribution consists of a small team of people who maintain it. Every hour of unpaid work saved is valuable, no matter how much fun it is.
There are certainly some things that would be nice to have, even for the developers, but resources are limited.
Of course, I know full well development isn’t free. I asked only because the word “expensive” was used, and that gave me the impression that there was an inherent monetary cost associated.
I’m not entitled, I asked this out of curiosity for alternatives. There’s probably an obscure tool that solves this in some way already, but until now I haven’t found any.
Still, trying to discuss ideas only, I already appreciate the work being put on this distro enough, only recently I found out about garuda-rani which is an amazing frontend for what assistant did previously!
maybe just like a kde light or maybe better a plain xfce could be the basews then it shouldnt take more then 5-10 gigs my recommendation to anyone is get a cheap usb stick if its a desktop just have it plugged in the back an its always there when you need it make it a ventoy with 3 things garuda kde or xfce https://netboot.xyz/ and https://clonezilla.org/ at least thats how I do it.
Or the simple thing get a super cheap 60ishgig ssd internal drive or a sd card and just install kde lite none of the flashy stuff needed for a fix it drive.
@KillerX629
I will say if you do put on another garuda partition on the same disk there are a few things. Do these before you do the garuda 1 step update.
after installation you must go and disable OS proper on the recovery partition. prober on line 63: GRUB_DISABLE_OS_PROBER=false (set to true)
you will have to go into grub an give it a different name other then garuda so it can be picked up by you main install. Will be in etc/default/grub Will be on line 5: GRUB_DISTRIBUTOR='Garuda' change the garuda name part.
Then save.
Then you can run the default setup that happens on boot. I’d skip the nivida driver stuff since its a recovery partition.
Then all you have to do is reboot go into your main install. Run garuda-update an it will see your new recovery partition.
I may have that first step wrong (wrong order) so if anyone knows better feel free to correct me. Its been about 2 years since I did something like that.
A few weeks ago, I had a bad experience with Clonezilla in connection with BTRFS. Two attempts to clone a Garuda system with BTRFS to a network target failed so badly that I couldn’t start the original system afterward.
Therefore, I recommend Rescuezilla as a replacement for Clonezilla. It worked perfectly for me.
Over the years, I’ve never had any problems cloning ext4 partitions. The problem wasn’t cloning over the network. Rather Clonezilla damaged the source BTRFS system. I don’t know why it happened, but a quick online search revealed that others have had similar issues with BTRFS and Clonezilla.
It was a freshly set up system with all the necessary programs already installed and configured. Fortunately, it wasn’t a big deal because no data was lost.
It won’t happen again because I replaced it with Rescuezilla, as I already mentioned.
Indeed, I’m almost amazed at the diversity in countries with this forum.
@elite maybe that could work, the point from this post is, is it possible to make a separate partition that is (mostly) up to date without having to boot into it manually?
that’s why I took inspiration on bindow’s recovery partition. the thing is, Garuda is pretty bleeding edge, and not having an up to date tool may make things worse.
the thing is, having a whole 2nd garuda there, you need to mantain it, or else you get to arch update crises eventually.
another alternative is just a kernel with the garuda clis for rescue:
garuda-chroot
btrfs fix
(probably a lot more I haven’t used yet)
probably safer to use something like an LTS kernel for this sort of use case though, right?
as for clonezilla, I never used it, so I can’t say if it works for this use case, but i’m of the opinion that, if safety is within something smaller than my car keys, I’m prone to loosing it, even if it’s on top of my desk
It´s the World Wide Web. There are no countries and no borders. Only one thing.
Sure it is. You can create a seperate partition, copy an ISO on it and integrate it in grub.
However, it will not work like a Windows recovery partition. If you were to overwrite the /
partition during a restore, all programs that you installed and that are not included in the ISO, along with their settings, would be history.
It would simply remain a bootable ISO from which you can boot and possibly repair the system. It would be no different than a stick. The advantage of the Ventoy stick is that you can add additional diagnostic and repair tools.
You can also take it with you wherever you go, use it to boot other systems, and carry out any necessary repairs. It´s like a swiss army knife for computers.
Oh, there are many of them you can put on your key fob
Okay, I think I see your point, Right now I actually have a way around what I’ve been trying to do: since I recently updated my pc, I have an nvme with a new install of garuda, I installed garuda-tools there, and on my main install, that way I have a “backup”… though it’s not IDEAL, it does give me a hand when my system dies… Today was one such day sadly, but snapshots came to my rescue
)
