tested on Devuan/ascii, Ubuntu/artful and Slackware/14.2
If using MBR, make sure the needed partition has the bootable flag, for the mbr.bin bootcode to work,
fdisk -l /dev/sda
Also assuming you do NOT have a separate partition for /boot. I have / only as ext4, which EXTLINUX is able to read. Very recent versions of EXTLINUX are also capable to read XFS partitions – see the Building latest EXTLINUX section.
If you have XFS instead of EXT4 on Slackware Linux, see the From Scratch section below, as XFS support is only available since v5.01. Ubuntu has v6.03 but slackware has v4.07.
Ubuntu artful,
apt install syslinux-utils extlinux
Avoiding Slackware 14.2’s obsolete v4.07,
#slackpkg install syslinux
Fetch the latest stable or testing or current SYSLINUX,
#wget https://cdn.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/boot/syslinux/syslinux-6.03.tar.gz
#tar xzf syslinux-6.03.tar.gz
#cd syslinux-6.03
#wget https://cdn.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/boot/syslinux/Testing/6.04/syslinux-6.04-pre1.tar.gz
#tar xzf syslinux-6.04-pre1.tar.gz
#cd syslinux-6.04-pre1
git clone --recursive git://repo.or.cz/syslinux.git
cd syslinux
which nasm
#sbopkg -i ucl
slackpkg install ucl
#sbopkg -i upx
slackpkg install upx
ls -lhF /usr/include/uuid/uuid.h
time make -j24 > make.log 2> make.err.log && echo done
removepkg syslinux
make -j16 install
which extlinux
date
ls -lhF `which extlinux`
extlinux -v
fdisk -l /dev/sda | grep ^Disklabel
In case you are using mbr.bin, you will have to MAKE THE PARTITION BOOTABLE,
cfdisk /dev/sda
Ubuntu GPT,
dd if=/usr/lib/SYSLINUX/gptmbr.bin of=/dev/sda
Ubuntu MBR,
dd if=/usr/lib/SYSLINUX/mbr.bin of=/dev/sda
Debian GPT,
dd if=/usr/lib/EXTLINUX/gptmbr.bin of=/dev/sda
Debian MBR,
dd if=/usr/lib/EXTLINUX/mbr.bin of=/dev/sda
From source GPT,
dd if=/usr/share/syslinux/gptmbr.bin of=/dev/sda
From source MBR,
date
ls -lF /usr/share/syslinux/mbr.bin
dd if=/usr/share/syslinux/mbr.bin of=/dev/sda
#cat /usr/share/syslinux/mbr.bin > /dev/sda
extlinux -i /
when the mount command does not show the tru device patch, force it e.g.,
#extlinux -i / --device /dev/sda1
ls -lhF /ldlinux.c32
ls -lhF /ldlinux.sys
#with multiboot/xen
cp -f /usr/share/syslinux/libcom32.c32 /
cp -f /usr/share/syslinux/mboot.c32 /
#debian
#cp /usr/lib/syslinux/modules/bios/libcom32.c32 /
#cp /usr/lib/syslinux/modules/bios/mboot.c32 /
#with menu
cp -f /usr/share/syslinux/libutil.c32 /
cp -f /usr/share/syslinux/menu.c32 /
#debian
#cp /usr/lib/syslinux/modules/bios/libutil.c32 /
#cp /usr/lib/syslinux/modules/bios/menu.c32 /
vi /extlinux.conf
default XEN
prompt 1
timeout 30
#default menu.c32
#prompt 0
#menu title EXTLINUX
label Linux
linux vmlinuz
append root=/dev/sda1 ro ipv6.disable=1
#initrd=initrd.img
label XEN
kernel mboot.c32
append xen.gz loglvl=info noreboot=true pv-linear-pt=true --- vmlinuz console=tty0 root=/dev/sda1 ro ipv6.disable=1
#--- initrd.img
#loglvl=all
#dom0_mem=4096M,max:4096M
#https://xenbits.xen.org/docs/4.11-testing/misc/xen-command-line.html
#8192M 10240M 12288M
#netcfg/do_not_use_netplan=true
#crashkernel=128M
#crashkernel=128M@16M
#crashkernel=auto
#crashkernel=X@Y
#crashkernel=0M-2G:128M,2G-6G:256M,6G-8G:512M,8G-:768M
ls -lhF /*.{conf,sys,c32}
ls -lhF /xen.gz /vmlinuz
sync
shutdown -r now
On Ubuntu artful,
apt purge lilo
dpkg -l | grep grub
apt purge ...grub...
On Slackware 14.2,
#no need to remove lilo, nothing is automated anyways
#and there is no grub
#ubuntu
cp /slackware/usr/share/syslinux/menu.c32 /
ui menu.c32
prompt 0
menu title SYS
timeout 100
default XEN