Error 15: File Not Found => Why? How to Prevent? How to recover?

[tim042849]

When I rebooted by system today, I was greeted by the following
error message at bootup:
"Error 15: File Not Found" and I couldn't even boot in recovery boot.
Suffice it to say, this is a serious problem and since I suspected it was
a corruption of grub, I found it easier to reinstall the OS.

I have the following questions:
1)Was this a corruption of grub?
2)How did it happen?
3)How can I prevent it?
4)Is there a way to recover from this problem without having
to re-install the Operating system?
thanks
tim

[Snowhog]

Re: Error 15: File Not Found => Why? How to Prevent? How to recover?

Grub Toolkit
An excellent How To on Grub by Qqmike. You will find the answer to your question there.

[tim042849]

Re: Error 15: File Not Found => Why? How to Prevent? How to recover?

Yup. That is certainly thorough.
Couple of thoughts in addition:
Might the cause be as simple as menu.lst being deleted?

It seems that a simple preventive method might be to make a backup
copy of menu.lst and as infrequently as I do reboots or shutdown,
I could check from time to time to see if menu.lst is present?

FYI: I'm new to ubuntu being more accustomed to lilo, where one
had to "recompile".
Am making a hard copy of the grub howto and will put it in
a fire-proof safe
Thanks
Tim

[Snowhog]

Re: Error 15: File Not Found => Why? How to Prevent? How to recover?

----- 15: GRUB Error 15: File not found
This error is returned if the specified file name cannot be found, but everything else (like the disk/partition info) is OK.

This is perhaps the most commonly encountered error. It occurs when you tell GRUB to access a file and GRUB can't find the file.
-- Examples. Error 15 will occur in each of the following examples:

>> Consider: kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.22-14-generic root=UUID=cbd79e1b-6095-49ca-9b42-4cfca49b899c ro quiet splash

If you edited this and made a typo by typing vmlinux instead of vmlinuz, you'd get error 15.
If you typed 2.6.22-14 as 2.6.22.14, you'd get error 15.
If you typed 2.6.22-14 as 2.60.22-14, you'd get error 15 (it's supposed to be .6, not .60).
If you omit the space between "generic" and "root" in "vmlinuz-2.6.22-14-generic root=UUID=," you will get error 15 (i.e., "vmlinuz-2.6.22-14-genericroot=UUID=" is improper).
If you type "boot" as "bot," as in kernel /bot/vmlinuz-2.6.22-14-generic, you will get error 15.
If you somehow introduce an extra / and space at the front, like in "/ /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.22-14-generic," you will get error 15.

In the statement "configfile /boot/grub/menu.lst," suppose you type this as "configfile /boot/grub/menulst," (i.e., you omit the dot), then you'd get error 15.

>> You must have the correct root (hdx,y). Consider our example again:
title Boot by kernel--Kubuntu 7.10 sdb5
root (hd1,4)
kernel /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.22-14-generic root=UUID=cbd79e1b-6095-49ca-9b42-4cfca49b899c ro quiet splash
initrd /boot/initrd.img-2.6.22-14-generic

If somehow, say by making a typo, it reads
root (hd1,5)
and suppose the partition (hd1,5) exists. But suppose that (hd1,5) does not contain any such kernel & initrd files (or it contains kernel & initrd files, but not the ones referenced in this boot entry). Then you will get error 15: File Not Found (because GRUB cannot find the kernel & initrd files listed here).

[Qqmike]

Re: Error 15: File Not Found => Why? How to Prevent? How to recover?

Snowhog pointed you at the answer.
Good news, it's not serious. It is common. It is entirely fixable. And, no, I would never go to the bother of re-installing my entire OS to fix it, but I can understand why you did ...
Glad you got it fixed.

[tim042849]

Re: Error 15: File Not Found => Why? How to Prevent? How to recover?

Should this happen again, with the info provided, I'm sure I
could correct it without a re-install. But with the setup I have,
re-installing isn't that big a deal, even with a full-blown developer's
platform here.

That's why /home is on it's own partition.
I know for certain that I hadn't made any edits to menu.lst,
to make a long story short, I suspect the updater, or some
other automated process, and I know
that from now on, after every update, I will be checking
for file changes...

Thanks to all for the info.
TJ

[Qqmike]

Re: Error 15: File Not Found => Why? How to Prevent? How to recover?

"But with the setup I have, re-installing isn't that big a deal . . . That's why /home is on it's own partition."

Yep, that's how I see it, too. A nice way to travel, huh? Besides, re-installing & set-up is good practice!

[tim042849]

Re: Error 15: File Not Found => Why? How to Prevent? How to recover?

Quotes Qgmike
"Besides, re-installing & set-up is good practice!"

Hear, hear!
Especially since I'd like to get my wife off of windows.
soon to do an install on her box...
tj

[Qqmike]

Re: Error 15: File Not Found => Why? How to Prevent? How to recover?

tj, another thought -

It's a good time, if you haven't already done so, to download/burn Super Grub Disk Live CD. That way, you can always get booted into your OS(s). If you have a printer, it doesn't hurt to print some of the How-To information, also.

-Mike

Super Grub Disk, new site: http://supergrub.forjamari.linex.org/

[tim042849]

Re: Error 15: File Not Found => Why? How to Prevent? How to recover?

thanks Mike. I'm doing so as I write.
Cheers
Tim