inittab file missing

[caitsdeo]

I did a new installation of Debian (sarge) and when the system tries to boot it says that the inittab file is not found and then asks for the run level I want. I'm setting this up on an 80 gigabyte disk and have manually partitioned the disk. Does anyone have any suggestions on how I can get this to run?

[oz]

Maybe your installation is corrupted. I'd try installing again if it were me. You can install again right over the same partitions.

[caitsdeo]

I'm installing from CD's and I've tried it 4 times already. Any other suggestions? I have done installations from these CD's that have worked before but I'm thinking it might be my partition assignment. Here's what I've set up:

IDE1 master (hda)
Partition size type mount point
----------------------------------------
#1 797.8 MB ext2 /
#6 5.0 GB ext3 /boot
#7 5.0 GB ext3 /var
#8 10.0 GB ext3 /usr
#12 5.0 GB ext3 /usr/local
#11 1.0 GB ext3 fat16
#10 2.5 GB ext3 /tmp
#9 2.0 GB ext3 /etc
#5 501.7 MB swap
#13 10.0 GB ext3 /opt
#14 10.0 GB ext3 /srv

IDE1 slave (hdb)
Partition size type mount point
---------------------------------------
#1 20.0 GB ext3 /home
#5 501.7 MB swap

All the rest of the disks are free space right now. Did I get to deep into partitions here?

[oz]

Did I get to deep into partitions here?

Yes, you did. Do you really need all those partitions?

I usually just make /, swap, and /home partitions, and I don't really need the swap or /home partitions. I'm just thinking it might simply things for you if you go with fewer partitions.

[anomie]

Never, ever make a separate filesystem for /etc. It needs to be part of /.

You'll notice at boot time that / is mounted first (read-only) and then the startup continues from there. Guess what happens when it can't find any of the /etc files on the / filesystem. I think you found out.

[caitsdeo]

Thank you. Having /etc back in the "/" file system did the trick. I now have a working system.

[TheBigPhish]

You will also find that you (rather unecessarily) tied up about 4.5 gigs of space in the /boot, and unless you do a lot of served resources, /srv and /opt might be a little big also. To start off? You can always do the "all in one" partition trick and you will get a off and running system from the get-go.

partitioning is always a disputed art.