[Bug 730225] Re: grub-install trashes the ntfs partition that starts at sector 63 if one or more sectors in the embedding area is occupied by Adobe FlexNet

[aimwin]

It is confirm after 6 times of grub-install with the error "Sector 50 is
already in use by FlexNet",

1. you can successfully reinstall grub only if you use - usb live cd ubuntu or other installed ubuntu partitions.
with exact the same messages as No.2
------------------------
/usr/sbin/grub-setup: warn: Sector 50 is already in use by FlexNet; avoiding it. This software may cause boot or other problems in future. Please ask its authors not to store data in the boot track.
Installation finished. No error reported.
====================


2. grub-install will destroy "grub boot menu" and you will get "grub command prompt",
 if you use the command grub-install in the following ways

you boot into "current partition", in my case sda4 contain ubuntu 11.04
(I also test with the same result in Lubuntu 11.10)

sudo mount /dev/sda(current partition) /mnt
in my case sudo mount /dev/sda4 /mnt

sudo grub-install --boot-directory=/mnt/boot /dev/sda
in my case I want to reinstall grub to sda4 so when the computer boot up it will auto boot into sda4,
which is the ubuntu partition I am using to execute the grub-install command. 

It will produce this message.
---------------------------------
/usr/sbin/grub-setup: warn: Sector 50 is already in use by FlexNet; avoiding it. This software may cause boot or other problems in future. Please ask its authors not to store data in the boot track.
Installation finished. No error reported.
====================
you will get grub> 
and not your grub menu any longer.

I don't know "if I should post this as new bug or not".
========================================

But certainly it is not correct when grub report "No error reported".
And you will get a "destroyed grub menu" after reboot.

note== the reasons 
 I start to do grub-install from Lubuntu 11.10 to force grub to start Lubuntu 11.10 as default os.
because the "startup-manager" fail to change grub menu as it did for previous version.
which I don't know why, bugs or just incompatible grub version in sda.
But the above "bugs" I have tested and found to be on both Ubuntu 10.04 and Lubuntu 11.10

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/730225

Title:
  grub-install trashes the ntfs partition that starts at sector 63 if
  one or more sectors in the embedding area is occupied by Adobe FlexNet

Status in “grub2” package in Ubuntu:
  Fix Released
Status in “grub2” package in Debian:
  Fix Released

Bug description:
  Binary package hint: grub

  The new grub-install of natty alpha3 now detects and avoids FlexNet-
  occupied sectors, but it seems it somehow mishandles something and
  writes code into after sector 63, thus make the ntfs partition that
  starts there unbootable and unreadable.

  I have tested with a memory stick /dev/sdc partitioned like this:

  ubuntu at ubuntu:~$ sudo fdisk -lu /dev/sdc

  Disk /dev/sdc: 16.2 GB, 16236085248 bytes

  255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 1973 cylinders, total 31711104 sectors

  Units = sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes

  Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

  I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes

  Disk identifier: 0x00063979

     Device Boot      Start         End      Blocks   Id  System

  /dev/sdc1              63    25671869    12835903+   7  HPFS/NTFS

  /dev/sdc2        25671870    31696244     3012187+  83  Linux

  
  /dev/sdc1 was not mounted.

  /dev/sdc2 was mounted on /mnt.

  Then I downloaded FlexNet signature at
  http://forum.ubuntu.com.cn/viewtopic.php?f=49&t=320155&start=30

  unzipped flexnet.sector32.zip, and wrote into sector32:

  sudo dd if=flexnet.sector32 of=/dev/sdc seek=32

  ran grub-install, it detected and avoided that sector:

  ubuntu at ubuntu:~$ sudo grub-install /dev/sdc --root-directory=/mnt

  /usr/sbin/grub-setup: warn: Sector 32 is already in use by FlexNet;
  avoiding it.  This software may cause boot or other problems in
  future.  Please ask its authors not to store data in the boot track.

  Installation finished. No error reported.

  NTFS partition /dev/sdc1 was now trashed. By design, the last sector
  of ntfs is a backup of its boot sector, so I copied the last sector of
  /dev/sdc1 to its first sector and successfully recovered the file
  system:

  ubuntu at ubuntu:~$ sudo dd if=/dev/sdc of=/dev/sdc count=1 seek=63
  skip=25671869

  I took a further look at the sectors and found that the first sector
  of the partition was not the only sector that was overwritten by grub,
  and was surprised that by recoverying only the first sector the whole
  file system seemed good.

  By removing the FlexNet signature, grub-install never overwrite the
  NTFS sectors again.

  ProblemType: Bug
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.04
  Package: grub (not installed)
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.38-5.32-generic 2.6.38-rc6
  Uname: Linux 2.6.38-5-generic i686
  NonfreeKernelModules: wl
  Architecture: i386
  Date: Sun Mar  6 17:43:14 2011
  LiveMediaBuild: Ubuntu 11.04 "Natty Narwhal" - Alpha i386 (20110302)
  ProcEnviron:
   LANGUAGE=en_US:en
   LANG=en_US.UTF-8
   SHELL=/bin/bash
  SourcePackage: grub
  UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

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