Ubuntu Wiki

Introduction

What is Wubi?

Wubi is a Ubuntu installer for Windows users that will bring you into the Linux world with just a few clicks. Wubi allows you to install and uninstall Ubuntu as any other application. If you heard about Linux and Ubuntu, if you wanted to try them but you were afraid, Wubi is for you.

How to use this guide

The standard installation has default settings that will work for most people. For general information on Wubi see the [http://wubi-installer.org Wubi official website]. You might also be interested in the [http://www.ubuntuforums.org/forumdisplay.php?f=234 Wubi Forum].

Please note that this guide is only for issues directly related to the Wubi installer; for general Ubuntu questions please use appropriate resources like [http://help.ubuntu.com/ the official Ubuntu documentation] or [http://www.ubuntuforums.org/forumdisplay.php?f=131 ubuntuforums] or [http://www.ubuntuguide.org ubuntuguide].

Quick Trobleshooting

• If you want to use a pre-downloaded ISO place it in the same folder as the wubi executable. The ISO will be ignored if it's the wrong version or if it is corrupted.
• If you do not see "Ubuntu" in the boot menu, make sure you have the appropriate rights. The entry should be in C:\boot.ini for Windows XP (the file might be hidden) or you can use EasyBCD for accessing the Vista bootloader
• If you see the boot menu, but cannot boot into Windows or Ubuntu try to run "chkdsk /r" from Windows (you can use the recovery console available in the Windows CD)
• If you still have boot problems after running chkdsk /r, press ESC when you see a countdown, you should see a menu with a few boot options, try them out.
• Wubi does not support software raid 0 (fakeraid), you have to install into a partition outside of the raid array.

• If none of the above helps, feel free to ask for help on http://www.ubuntuforums.org/forumdisplay.php?f=234

Wubi 8.04

Wubi 8.04 is getting there... You can find experimental versions in http://wubi-installer.org/devel/minefield/ The more stable 8.04 version (beta) is available via the main dowload button on http://wubi-installer.org. It is recommended to uninstall previous Wubi versions before trying out Wubi 8.04.

Upgrading from 7.04 to 7.10

Upgrading from 7.04 to 7.10 is NOT supported, due to the fundamental differences between 7.04 and 7.10. The best route is to uninstall and install Wubi-8.04 (you can save the old installation files and access them from 8.04) or [http://lubi.sourceforge.net/lvpm.html move your 7.04 installation to a dedicated partition via LVPM], then [http://www.ubuntu.com/getubuntu/upgrading upgrade using the standard upgrade-manager tool].

Upgrading from 7.10 to 8.04 might work, but it has not been tested yet.

Upgrading from 8.04 to 8.10 will be fully supported.

Inclusion into official Ubuntu

Wubi was born as an independent project and hence the 7.04 and 7.10 versions were unofficial. But Wubi 8.04 is fully supported and has now been shipping within the Ubuntu Live CD since the 8.04 Alpha-5 release.

Installation

How do I make Ubuntu the default boot option?

Ubuntu is not installed as the default boot option, you have to select it in the windows boot menu. To change that, in windows XP go to control_panel > system > advanced > startup_and_recovery and edit the "Default Operating System", if you want you can change the timeout as well.

How do I install on a machine with no internet connection?

Wubi works with a physical Ubuntu Desktop 8.04 Live CD. Wubi.exe is available on the CD itself.

If you do not have a CD, try to find a computer with internet access, and download both Wubi and the required ISO:

• http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=198355

• http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/daily-live/current (daily ISO build)

Then copy both files within the same folder on the machine with no internet acces. Then run the Wubi executable. If you have internet access on the machine where you plan to install Ubuntu, you only need Wubi (the first link), Wubi will automatically download the other file as required.

Where do I find older versions of Wubi?

Here: http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=198355

How can I use a manually downloaded ISO?

You need to download the appropriate ISO of the appropriate version. Place the ISO in the same folder where you have Wubi-X.XX-XXX.exe. Then run Wubi.

• Wubi 8.04 requires the 8.04 DESKTOP ISO
• Wubi 7.10 requires the 7.10 DESKTOP ISO
• Wubi 7.04 requires the 7.04 ALTERNATE ISO

Why is the AMD64 version of Ubuntu getting downloaded and installed?

You probably have a 64 bit machine, the 64AMD installation is appropriate for all 64 bit architectures whether AMD or Intel

Can I force Wubi to download and install a 32 bit version of Ubuntu?

Yes either pre-download the appropriate 32 bit ISO manually and place it in the same folder as Wubi.exe or start Wubi with the "--32bit" argument.

How do I install multiple distros?

You can install your favorite distro from within Wubi (see the advanced settings) and then once you are in Ubuntu, you can install the other desktop environments as normal packages. Each desktop environment is available as a single package (e.g. kubuntu-desktop). You will not have to reboot to change the desktop, simply log-off and choose the desktop environment in the options at login.

What Operating Systems are supported?

Windows Vista, XP, and 2000 are known to be working fine with Wubi. Windows 98 should also work, but it has not been thoroughly tested. Windows ME is not supported. Linux is supported through Lubi http://lubi.sourceforge.net/.

How do I reinstall Wubi?

Run Wubi.exe again. Wubi will detect that there is an existing installation and you will be shown an option to uninstall. You probably want to backup the installation files (the ISO) in order to avoid to have to download them again. Note that when you reinstall, the system virtual drive (root.disk) is reset.

Can I back up the installation files?

Yes just copy C:\ubuntu\disks\root.disk somewhere else (in 7.04 the relevant files are called C:\wubi\disks\*.virtual.disk). Old installation files can be mounted within Ubuntu and any relevant data can be copied over the new installation.

How big should the the virtual disks be?

The default size is calculated automatically based on your free space, you can change that in the settings. The space is not actually fully used, a barebone installation take less than 3GB including all the preinstalled software (office suite, games, graphics applications, etc...), but if the virtual disks were of 2-3GB you would soon run out of space once you start installing extra software. 8GB should be enough in most cases. Remember that on FAT filesystems the virtual disks cannot be larger than 4GB (Wubi will split larger allocations over several virtual disks). Remember also that Wubi requires a larger free space than the one required by the virtual disk themselves, that is because it has to grab an ISO (700MB) plus some headroom. So Wubi will not install if you have less than 5GB free.

Uninstallation

How do I uninstall Wubi?

Run the uninstaller in add-remove programs. Or use C:\ubuntu\uninstall.exe.

How do I manually uninstall Wubi?

Remove C:\ubuntu (C:\wubi in 7.04) and C:\wubildr*. Then edit C:\boot.ini and delete the Ubuntu/Wubi line. C:\boot.ini is normally protected. To edit it, go to control_panel > system > advanced > startup_and_recovery and press Edit. For Vista use EasyBCD to edit the boot menu.

To remove Wubi from the add/remove list, delete the registry key: HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\Wubi

Misc

How do I create a virtual disk in Ubuntu?

Open a terminal (Applications -> Accessories -> Teminal), and enter these commands (this will create a 10 GB extra.virtual.disk, adjust line 2 to change these):

{{{cd /host/wubi/disks sudo dd if=/dev/zero of=extra.disk bs=1MB count=1 seek=1000 sudo mkfs.ext3 -F extra.disk}}}

How do I create a virtual disk in Windows?

You can use qemu-img for that. Another dirty trick (but working) is to copy any other file of the desired size to c:\wubi\disks and rename it "root.disk", "home.disk", "swap.disk" or "extra.disk". That's the wubi equivalent of buying (and installing) a new hard disk

If you are running Windows XP (may work in Windows 2000 and Vista as well) you can create a file by using the fsutil that is included with Windows. The command format is fsutil file createnew filename filesize where filename is the file you wish to create and filesize is the size of the file to be created in bytes.

How do I resize the virtual disks?

Use LVPM, at http://lubi.sourceforge.net/lvpm.html

How do I access the Windows drives?

The Windows partition where you installed Wubi is available as /host within Ubuntu All the other partitions will be available under /media/

If you are using Wubi-7.04 (7.10 and 8.04 users can skip this), write support for ntfs is disabled by default, to enable it:

1. Make sure you have internet access (see the network icon on the top right)
2. Open the "Applications" menu and select "Add/Remove..."
3. In the listbox on the right select: "Show All Available Applications"
4. Search for "NTFS" and select "NTFS Configuration Tool". Click OK to install it

5. Run the configuration tool under Applications > System Tools > NTFS Configuration Tool

6. Select "Enable write support for internal device". Click OK to set it up.

How do I get rid of the virtual disks and switch to real partitions, and/or get rid of Windows entirely?

The existing Wubi/Lubi install can be upgraded to a full, real ubuntu install with dedicated partitions using LVPM. The main site for LVPM is at http://lubi.sourceforge.net/ and the guide and support forum is at http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=438591

How can I access my Wubi install and repair my install if it won't boot?

Boot the Ubuntu Desktop CD, or another LiveCD, then mount the windows partition:

sudo mkdir /win
sudo mount /dev/sda1 /win

Replace sda1 with the appropriate device (a = disk, 1 = partition number), then mount the virtual disk therein

sudo mkdir /vdisk
sudo mount -o loop /win/ubuntu/disks/root.disk /vdisk

Now the content of the virtual disk will be visible under /vdisk. 7.04 users will have to install ntfs-3g first and specify it as fstype to gain r/w access.

To check the filesystem you can use:

sudo fsck /win/ubuntu/disks/root.disk

How to reboot cleanly

There are normally several ways to reboot cleanly using key combinations such as:

• CTRL + ALT + Backspace (Kills the graphic session)
• CTRL + ALT + DEL
• ALT+ SYSRQ + R then CTRL + ALT + DEL
• ALT+ SYSRQ + R + S + U + B

Known issues and debugging

Please see https://bugs.launchpad.net/wubi

I get a Grub Error

Try installing Wubi on a different disk/partition.

If you have multiple disks, sometimes the disk order at boot is wrong (it is a known bug). In such cases, edit c:\ubuntu\disks\boot\grub\menu.lst, and modify all the lines that contain "root (hd0,0)/ubuntu/disks" with the approriate disk (first number). Including the line that starts with "# groot (hd0,0)/ubuntu/disks". Once in Ubuntu run "sudo update-grub". See bug https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/grub/+bug/8497.

Busybox Errors

In some cases, Wubi fails to boot and you end up in a busybox console.

A common reason is that Wubi does not support software raid 0 (fakeraid), you have to install into a partition outside of the raid array. Pure hardware raid should be ok.

If that does not address the issues look for errors into /casper.log using the "cat" and "more" commands.

Poor disk performance

This is usually due to a fragmented drive or to low memory (frequent swapping).

You can use jkdefrag to defragment.

1. download http://www.kessels.com/JkDefrag/JkDefrag-3.8.zip

2. unzip
3. run: jkdefrag c:\ubuntu (or c:\wubi in 7.04)

Video Problems

Before installation, press "esc" at boot after selecting Ubuntu. Select "Safe graphics mode". After installation, press "Ctrl+Alt+F1" and run:

sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg

Select the Vesa driver and leave all other options at default. Then reboot. That will allow you to boot into a safe graphic mode (limited resolution) you should then be able to install the appropriate drivers or try other solutions as appropriate.

Corrupted NTFS filesystem

All reported cases of damaged filesystems so far were from people that hard rebooted (pulling the plug).

When you hard reboot, you can always damage your filesystem whether you use wubi or not. What happens is that new users sometimes get stacked with wubi/ubuntu and since they do not know what to do they tend to hard-reboot more often than necessary. Sometimes they get lucky, sometimes they do not. Since wubi sits on top of ntfs of course when they do not get lucky, ntfs gets corrupted. Sometimes people blame Wubi for that even though a quick googling will show you that there are tons of people experiencing ntfs corruption without having ever used wubi or ntfs-3g (and a full software industry lurking on that...), most of them after a hard reboot...

If ntfs filesystem gets corrupted you have to run chkdsk /r from the windows recovery console on the Windows CD (or other recovery CD available on the web) or in the msdos console (if you can boot into Windows). At the moment there is no fsck for ntfs on the Linux side, otherwise it would be possible to fix errors automatically within Linux itself, as it happens for other filesystems, without having to rely on Windows tools.

Best advise is to simply avoid hard rebooting. Whatever the OS.

Other Errors

• For errors within the Windows frontend, please see the wubi logs in the %temp% folder.
• For grub errors, immediately after reboot, press the insert key rapidly after selecting Wubi and/or press esc at the countdown after selecting "Ubuntu" and use "c" or "e" to enter the appropriate boot options manually
• If you end up in a busybox console or see some tty message after first reboot, see if there is a /casper.log file
• For installation problems (after reboot), press esc at the countdown and select "verbose mode". Then once the installer problem occurs, press ctrl+alt+f1 to access the logs. The relevant ones are /var/log/installer/* and /var/log/syslog.
• For post installation problems see the logs in /var/log

Feel free to ask in the Wubi forum for help: http://ubuntuforums.org/forumdisplay.php?f=234

Wubi Customization

Can you add Ubuntu-flavor-XYZ to Wubi?

Subject to approval, yes. A live CD ISO must be available to do that (ubiquity based installer).

Can I recompile my own version of Wubi to support my Ubuntu-based distro?

Yes, Wubi can be easily rebranded. Get the wubi source code and modify the files in the ./data directory as you see fit. In particular you may want to change isolist.ini and the artwork (image names have to match the headers in isolist.ini).

To compile on a Debian based system run:

{{{make prerequisites #only to be done once make make test #to test the installation within wine}}}

Where is the source code?

• [https://code.launchpad.net/wubi Wubi (Windows frontend)]

• [https://code.launchpad.net/lupin Lupin (Linux backend)]

• [https://code.launchpad.net/lubi Lubi (Linux frontend)]

• [https://code.launchpad.net/lvpm LVPM (Migrates virtual disks to real partitions)]

What license?

The code is distributed under [http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html#TOC1 GPL version 2 and above], however, the Linux kernel itself is licensed under the GPL version 2 only.

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