Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[Clemens Eisserer]

Hello!

I hope this questions hasn't been asked too often (since it seems to
be a perfect example for this), but I'm not too long on this list and
for what I've seen it hasn't ... so please don't kill me ;-)

Does anybody know a number of distrbibutions which support reiser4 out
of the box (installer, grub, reiserfs4-utils, ...)?
Is opensuse planned to include reiser4?

For now I am using Fedora but since a long time I feel uncomfortable
with their use-what-we-tell-you policy, they tell me to use ext3 or
gnome for example and if I want to make a different choice a get
anything but not a perfect installation.

Thank you in advance, lg Clemens

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[michael chang]

On 8/10/05, Clemens Eisserer <linuxhippy@gmail.com> wrote:
> I hope this questions hasn't been asked too often (since it seems to
> be a perfect example for this), but I'm not too long on this list and
> for what I've seen it hasn't ... so please don't kill me ;-)

Nonsense... I haven't seen it yet... but I think it's _supposed_ to be
on the site somewhere.

> Does anybody know a number of distrbibutions which support reiser4 out
> of the box (installer, grub, reiserfs4-utils, ...)?
> Is opensuse planned to include reiser4?

Not sure; although IIRC, many distros plan to support it in the
_future_.  Apparently, that's why Hans is trying to hard to get it
into the vanilla kernel -- so distros can support it.  There should be
a Gentoo Live CD that supports it...

I believe at the moment Reiser4 root partitions are unsupported, so
you are advised to use another filesystem for storing other files,
especially /boot.  [Some versions of GRUB support Reiser4, but there
have been issues; others don't; there's supposed to be a patch for
GRUB in order to support Reiser4, etc. etc.]

Does Lindows support Reiser4 roots?

> For now I am using Fedora but since a long time I feel uncomfortable
> with their use-what-we-tell-you policy, they tell me to use ext3 or
> gnome for example and if I want to make a different choice a get
> anything but not a perfect installation.

Consider using ReiserFS 3.6 in the meantime; and use either Debian or
Ubantu [or stick with FC, if you need to].  Former gives you more
control; I haven't used the latter but I hear it's rather popular.
Gentoo has also been suggested -- but I don't know how it works or
anything.  I believe the consensus for most users is "while it's
there, root/boot support isn't in yet, and there could be unsolved
bugs, so use it to debug, or wait" or something.  Iunno.  *shrugs*

Hans, or anyone from Namesys, might know better.

--
~Mike
 - Just my two cents
 - No man is an island, and no man is unable.

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[David Masover]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

michael chang wrote:
> On 8/10/05, Clemens Eisserer <linuxhippy@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>>I hope this questions hasn't been asked too often (since it seems to
>>be a perfect example for this), but I'm not too long on this list and
>>for what I've seen it hasn't ... so please don't kill me ;-)
> 
> 
> Nonsense... I haven't seen it yet... but I think it's _supposed_ to be
> on the site somewhere.
> 
> 
>>Does anybody know a number of distrbibutions which support reiser4 out
>>of the box (installer, grub, reiserfs4-utils, ...)?
>>Is opensuse planned to include reiser4?
> 
> 
> Not sure; although IIRC, many distros plan to support it in the
> _future_.  Apparently, that's why Hans is trying to hard to get it
> into the vanilla kernel -- so distros can support it.  There should be
> a Gentoo Live CD that supports it...

There is.  Not an official one, but it supports all kinds of
"experimental" stuff.  The ones I noticed are reiser4 and dmraid,
because that's what I needed.  But then, I roll my own network bootable
Gentoo installs.

I don't like how bloated Knoppix has gotten, or how spartan RIP and the
various official and unofficial Gentoo LiveCD are.  I'd like a livecd in
the 100-150 meg range, with support for any kind of weird install I want
to do (top of the list is a new kernel with Reiser4 and dmraid, and
support for booting the "CD" off the network), amd64 support, and decent
web browsing -- links with no jpeg support doesn't count.

If enough people want this, I can have an image in the next couple
weeks.  Otherwise, I'll keep it to myself, and give you scripts/howtos
on how to bootstrap your way there with an existing livecd.

> I believe at the moment Reiser4 root partitions are unsupported, so
> you are advised to use another filesystem for storing other files,
> especially /boot.  [Some versions of GRUB support Reiser4, but there
> have been issues; others don't; there's supposed to be a patch for
> GRUB in order to support Reiser4, etc. etc.]

I think it would be more productive to take some lessons from LinuxBIOS
and replace Grub with a Linux-based solution.  I'm thinking lilo (which
does support reiser4, right?), an initrd or early-userspace, a little
curses app, and kexec support.  That way, our "bootloader" would
instantly support anything Linux does.

Does anyone know of a project to do this already?

> Does Lindows support Reiser4 roots?

Don't count on it.

>>For now I am using Fedora but since a long time I feel uncomfortable
>>with their use-what-we-tell-you policy, they tell me to use ext3 or
>>gnome for example and if I want to make a different choice a get
>>anything but not a perfect installation.
> 
> 
> Consider using ReiserFS 3.6 in the meantime; and use either Debian or
> Ubantu [or stick with FC, if you need to].  Former gives you more
> control; I haven't used the latter but I hear it's rather popular.
> Gentoo has also been suggested -- but I don't know how it works or
> anything.  I believe the consensus for most users is "while it's
> there, root/boot support isn't in yet, and there could be unsolved
> bugs, so use it to debug, or wait" or something.  Iunno.  *shrugs*

Debian is rock-solid, and stuff often moves from Ubuntu into Debian's
unstable fork.  Both Debian and Ubuntu use Apt, which I've found to be
almost as flexible as Portage, but it uses binary packages, meaning you
can type "apt-get install mozilla" and come back in five minutes and
it's there.

Also, both Debian and Ubuntu are probably relatively easy to install,
though probably not with Reiser4.

Gentoo compiles everything from scratch, which is both good and bad.
It's good because theoretically, you can apply global optimizations like
"-mach=athlon-xp" that would speed up your system dramatically -- but,
it's not really that much faster, and the "bad" is, it takes forever to
install something.  "apt-get install mozilla" could take five minutes or
less, depending on the speed of your machine and network connection, but
"emerge mozilla" is probably going to take at least half an hour.

It's also bad because packages tend to be more centrallized -- because
that's how compiles are.  You don't have separate packages for the X
libs, for instance, meaning that you have to build a whole X server,
even if it's a headless machine that you only want support for ssh X
forwarding on.

It's also nice to compile everything from scratch, because you can set
system-wide defaults for compile-time features (USE flags), such as
GNOME/KDE support.  You can get a fully loaded desktop, or you can trim
much of the fat off.  A simple 'USE="-gnome -kde"' helps a lot.

Gentoo has, I feel, a much more evolved rc/init system than Debian.  It
still uses /etc/init.d, but instead of /etc/rc.d, startup scripts are
linked into folders in /etc/runlevels.  The system is entirely based on
dependencies, meaning it can launch many services in parallel (not by
default) -- a real plus if some of them are network-bound or generally
sluggish -- and it's easier to add/remove startup apps, and create new
ones.  On Debian, there's a tool to manage links in /etc/rc.d, but you
still have to specify the order manually, which is why most services are
turned on by default.  On Gentoo, you have to enable sshd manually, but
it's just a matter of "rc-update add sshd default".

Gentoo is also the hardest to install.  There's no installer, just a
text-mode web browser on the CD so you can read an installation guide as
you enter commands.  In other words, the install process is entirely
manual.  Both good and bad -- good, because you'll learn lots of things
about Linux, the commandline, and things like fstab and fdisk/cfdisk,
all of which is helpful later if you need to do some rescue work.  Bad,
because the learning curve is practically vertical.

This also means that if you can find a boot CD -- just about any boot
CD, doesn't have to be Gentoo-specific -- that supports Reiser4, then
Gentoo supports Reiser4, because you generally have to compile your own
kernel.  It can do some of that for you, but there's ample opportunity
to patch support in, or even to just choose an MM kernel.  But then,
this is sort of true of other distros, just that on, say, Debian, you
usually want the official CDs, so you get their installers.  On Gentoo,
tar+chroot is the installer.

I haven't actually used Ubuntu, but I hear it's more up-to-date and
generally slicker to use than Debian, although it does favor simplicity
over choice -- meaning that they have an officially supported web
browser, and they don't give you any others.  But, I don't actually know
that, it's all just what I've heard.  Generally, it's easier to get
new/cool stuff like xorg+nvidia working on Ubuntu.

I use Gentoo, but I recommend Debian/Ubuntu to anyone who doesn't have a
good reason for using Gentoo.
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Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[michael chang]

On 8/10/05, David Masover <ninja@slaphack.com> wrote:
> michael chang wrote:
> > On 8/10/05, Clemens Eisserer <linuxhippy@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Not sure; although IIRC, many distros plan to support it in the
> > _future_.  Apparently, that's why Hans is trying to hard to get it
> > into the vanilla kernel -- so distros can support it.  There should be
> > a Gentoo Live CD that supports it...
> 
> There is.  Not an official one, but it supports all kinds of
> "experimental" stuff.  The ones I noticed are reiser4 and dmraid,
> because that's what I needed.  But then, I roll my own network bootable
> Gentoo installs.
> 
> I don't like how bloated Knoppix has gotten, or how spartan RIP and the
> various official and unofficial Gentoo LiveCD are.  I'd like a livecd in
> the 100-150 meg range, with support for any kind of weird install I want
> to do (top of the list is a new kernel with Reiser4 and dmraid, and
> support for booting the "CD" off the network), amd64 support, and decent
> web browsing -- links with no jpeg support doesn't count.
> 
> If enough people want this, I can have an image in the next couple
> weeks.  Otherwise, I'll keep it to myself, and give you scripts/howtos
> on how to bootstrap your way there with an existing livecd.

This would be nice -- if you get it done, either way, please send me a
copy.  Although it'd be interesting what kind of an install you do
(LFS, Gentoo, Debian, Ubantu, etc.).  I know the way Knoppix does it's
CD installs is weird -- Parted apparently didn't like the way it's
"ext2" partitions were [-- were they even ext2 at all?].

> > I believe at the moment Reiser4 root partitions are unsupported, so
> > you are advised to use another filesystem for storing other files,
> > especially /boot.  [Some versions of GRUB support Reiser4, but there
> > have been issues; others don't; there's supposed to be a patch for
> > GRUB in order to support Reiser4, etc. etc.]
> 
> I think it would be more productive to take some lessons from LinuxBIOS
> and replace Grub with a Linux-based solution.  I'm thinking lilo (which
> does support reiser4, right?), an initrd or early-userspace, a little
> curses app, and kexec support.  That way, our "bootloader" would
> instantly support anything Linux does.
> 
> Does anyone know of a project to do this already?

If memory serves me right, GRUB is the newer one -- and supports
dynamic boot configuration; at the expense of it having to know about
all filesystems it boots from.  LILO has to be reinstalled every
single time you add or remove a kernel, move a partition, resize a
partition, etc. etc.; because it hard links to the kernel images.  In
this case, I'd rather stick with GRUB, and be forced to put /boot on a
10-15 MB ext2 partition.

> Debian is rock-solid, and stuff often moves from Ubuntu into Debian's
> unstable fork.  Both Debian and Ubuntu use Apt, which I've found to be
> almost as flexible as Portage, but it uses binary packages, meaning you
> can type "apt-get install mozilla" and come back in five minutes and
> it's there.
> 
> Also, both Debian and Ubuntu are probably relatively easy to install,
> though probably not with Reiser4.

Well, debian's latest installer, debian-installer, [sarge] can bring
you into a partition manager if you wish to install on a ReiserFS
[3.6], XFS, ext2, ext3, or various other partitions; or you can let it
autopartition (-- I haven't tried this, and have no intent on doing
so, because I handle my partitions somewhat oddly).  If you want
Reiser4, it seems like you have to get the mkfs tools onto a ISO or
boot image or something, as well as put in a Reiser4 kernel, and then
mkfs and mount the root partitions normally.  If you've installed it
once before with a different filesystem, it shouldn't be too hard to
figure out where debian-installer wants you to mount your Reiser4
partition however...

That said, root Reiser4s aren't support atm, afaik.

> Gentoo compiles everything from scratch, which is both good and bad.

> It's also nice to compile everything from scratch, because you can set
> system-wide defaults for compile-time features (USE flags), such as
> GNOME/KDE support.  You can get a fully loaded desktop, or you can trim
> much of the fat off.  A simple 'USE="-gnome -kde"' helps a lot.

If you want to go through the trouble, there is a mechanism you can
use to compile your own packages in debian -- I believe you can use
"apt-get source <packagename>" as a regular user to build "optimized"
copies of most of the packages on Debian -- or you can do an install
from source, and it will install in /usr/local or whatever, and
because of the way paths are setup, it will "override" your package. 
[That can be confusing for dependencies though... although FC's RPM
madness is worse IIRC.]

> I haven't actually used Ubuntu, but I hear it's more up-to-date and
> generally slicker to use than Debian, although it does favor simplicity
> over choice -- meaning that they have an officially supported web
> browser, and they don't give you any others.  But, I don't actually know
> that, it's all just what I've heard.  Generally, it's easier to get
> new/cool stuff like xorg+nvidia working on Ubuntu.

I haven't tried Ubantu myself, but apparently people've been raving
about it -- they say that Ubantu listens to it's users (as opposed to
Debian? I'm not sure...) and that there is a risk for package
interoperability concerns (similar to the .rpm issue, but that's
another issue entirely).  I myself may take a look at it -- I've
ordered one of their free CDs myself.  *shrugs*

-- 
~Mike
 - Just my two cents
 - No man is an island, and no man is unable.

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[David Masover]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

michael chang wrote:
> On 8/10/05, David Masover <ninja@slaphack.com> wrote:
> 
>>michael chang wrote:
>>
>>>On 8/10/05, Clemens Eisserer <linuxhippy@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>Not sure; although IIRC, many distros plan to support it in the
>>>_future_.  Apparently, that's why Hans is trying to hard to get it
>>>into the vanilla kernel -- so distros can support it.  There should be
>>>a Gentoo Live CD that supports it...
>>
>>There is.  Not an official one, but it supports all kinds of
>>"experimental" stuff.  The ones I noticed are reiser4 and dmraid,
>>because that's what I needed.  But then, I roll my own network bootable
>>Gentoo installs.
>>
>>I don't like how bloated Knoppix has gotten, or how spartan RIP and the
>>various official and unofficial Gentoo LiveCD are.  I'd like a livecd in
>>the 100-150 meg range, with support for any kind of weird install I want
>>to do (top of the list is a new kernel with Reiser4 and dmraid, and
>>support for booting the "CD" off the network), amd64 support, and decent
>>web browsing -- links with no jpeg support doesn't count.
>>
>>If enough people want this, I can have an image in the next couple
>>weeks.  Otherwise, I'll keep it to myself, and give you scripts/howtos
>>on how to bootstrap your way there with an existing livecd.
> 
> 
> This would be nice -- if you get it done, either way, please send me a
> copy.  Although it'd be interesting what kind of an install you do
> (LFS, Gentoo, Debian, Ubantu, etc.).  I know the way Knoppix does it's
> CD installs is weird -- Parted apparently didn't like the way it's
> "ext2" partitions were [-- were they even ext2 at all?].
> 
> 
>>>I believe at the moment Reiser4 root partitions are unsupported, so
>>>you are advised to use another filesystem for storing other files,
>>>especially /boot.  [Some versions of GRUB support Reiser4, but there
>>>have been issues; others don't; there's supposed to be a patch for
>>>GRUB in order to support Reiser4, etc. etc.]
>>
>>I think it would be more productive to take some lessons from LinuxBIOS
>>and replace Grub with a Linux-based solution.  I'm thinking lilo (which
>>does support reiser4, right?), an initrd or early-userspace, a little
>>curses app, and kexec support.  That way, our "bootloader" would
>>instantly support anything Linux does.
>>
>>Does anyone know of a project to do this already?
> 
> 
> If memory serves me right, GRUB is the newer one -- and supports
> dynamic boot configuration; at the expense of it having to know about
> all filesystems it boots from.

Yes, I know.  I love being able to hit "c" at the boot menu to drop to a
commandline and manually pick a kernel.  But, see below.

> LILO has to be reinstalled every
> single time you add or remove a kernel, move a partition, resize a
> partition, etc. etc.; because it hard links to the kernel images.  In

Not a big deal at all.  Just add "lilo" to your install script.  You do
have one, don't you?

With a stock kernel, for me, it's always been "make bzImage modules
modules_install && mount /boot && cp arch/x86_64/boot/bzImage /boot &&
(initrd stuff here, on some machines) && umount /boot && reboot".  I
don't think adding a "lilo" in there really changes much, it just makes
it a little bit harder to boot an old kernel -- but not at all impossible.

I also like how Lilo can have a boot menu (entirely preconfigured, but
it's there) that only shows up if you hold a key during boot (think it's
alt).  Grub, you usually have to have the menu show up, then pick a
default within a timeout, and 99% of my boots, I want the default.  It
really annoys me that my BIOS, and everything else in my system with a
BIOS (bootable network cards, fake RAID controllers, and so on), plus
grub, all insist on waiting 5-10 seconds in case I'll press a certain
key to enter their setup menu.  It takes me longer to get through POST
and GRUB than it does for XP to un-Hibernate.  I wish everything did
what Lilo did -- just let me hold a key, so that if I don't hold that
key, it doesn't waste time waiting for me to press it.

> this case, I'd rather stick with GRUB, and be forced to put /boot on a
> 10-15 MB ext2 partition.

But, you might want more than that.  For instance, the RIP PXE rescue
system (for booting off a network) can easily be intsalled locally as a
GRUB menu option, but the ramdisk is 28 megs -- and that's without the
kernel.

Here's why I would want Lilo:

Linux now has something called "kexec", which is like an "exec" call for
the kernel.  It was designed for LinuxBIOS, a port of Linux to actually
replace the BIOS.  That's right -- you flash your BIOS to a kernel.  On
boards that support it, you boot faster and can boot off any device
Linux supports.  (On the ones that don't support it, if you try to flash
them, you'll be unbootable and you'll have to get an RMA on the board.)

I'm thinking, for those of us who don't want to actually try LinuxBIOS,
and for whom GRUB is too limiting, maybe lilo should be used to boot a
Linux, which can then use the main Reiser4 partition (and floppies, USB
drives, even loop-mounted files) to "boot" from.  You'd use the old
kernel to boot the new one, then if it works, you upgrade the
"bootloader" kernel.

There are kludges to get a lot of functionality out of GRUB, and even
graphical bootloaders like XOSL, but almost all of them force you to
have more than one bootloader, and to chainload them -- possibly in
quite a long chain.  Plus, there's no guarentee that you'll get one that
supports the media you want -- sure, SmartBootManager supports ATAPI
CD-ROM drives now, but does it support USB drives?

All the more reason, Hans, to have bitmaps not be preloaded on mount --
in a situation like this, you want a Reiser4 partition for maybe 5
seconds or less most of the time, but my partition takes 15-20 seconds
unless I use "dont_load_bitmap" from an initrd.

>>Debian is rock-solid, and stuff often moves from Ubuntu into Debian's
>>unstable fork.  Both Debian and Ubuntu use Apt, which I've found to be
>>almost as flexible as Portage, but it uses binary packages, meaning you
>>can type "apt-get install mozilla" and come back in five minutes and
>>it's there.
>>
>>Also, both Debian and Ubuntu are probably relatively easy to install,
>>though probably not with Reiser4.
> 
> 
> Well, debian's latest installer, debian-installer, [sarge] can bring
> you into a partition manager if you wish to install on a ReiserFS
> [3.6], XFS, ext2, ext3, or various other partitions; or you can let it
> autopartition (-- I haven't tried this, and have no intent on doing
> so, because I handle my partitions somewhat oddly).  If you want
> Reiser4, it seems like you have to get the mkfs tools onto a ISO or
> boot image or something, as well as put in a Reiser4 kernel, and then
> mkfs and mount the root partitions normally.

Still not fun, especially considering that if you're like me, you make
mistakes on your first install, and your second -- some days, it may be
my fifth install that's the one I keep.

> That said, root Reiser4s aren't support atm, afaik.

They are, if you can deal with manually creating/mounting them (not
using the debian-installer partitioner), and compiling a custom kernel
somehow during the install (before you reboot) -- Debian usually uses
precompiled kernels.

>>Gentoo compiles everything from scratch, which is both good and bad.
> 
> 
>>It's also nice to compile everything from scratch, because you can set
>>system-wide defaults for compile-time features (USE flags), such as
>>GNOME/KDE support.  You can get a fully loaded desktop, or you can trim
>>much of the fat off.  A simple 'USE="-gnome -kde"' helps a lot.
> 
> 
> If you want to go through the trouble, there is a mechanism you can
> use to compile your own packages in debian -- I believe you can use
> "apt-get source <packagename>" as a regular user to build "optimized"
> copies of most of the packages on Debian -- or you can do an install
> from source, and it will install in /usr/local or whatever, and
> because of the way paths are setup, it will "override" your package. 
> [That can be confusing for dependencies though... although FC's RPM
> madness is worse IIRC.]

It's nowhere near "emerge" on Gentoo.  For one thing, you can't easily
set system-wide CFLAGS, and there's really no equivalent of USE flags,
at least until we as a species figure out how to use a decent bytecode
for everything, and compile-time optimization/configuration becomes a
thing of the past.

>>I haven't actually used Ubuntu, but I hear it's more up-to-date and
>>generally slicker to use than Debian, although it does favor simplicity
>>over choice -- meaning that they have an officially supported web
>>browser, and they don't give you any others.  But, I don't actually know
>>that, it's all just what I've heard.  Generally, it's easier to get
>>new/cool stuff like xorg+nvidia working on Ubuntu.
> 
> 
> I haven't tried Ubantu myself, but apparently people've been raving
> about it -- they say that Ubantu listens to it's users (as opposed to
> Debian? I'm not sure...)

Sounds about right.  Debian seems to hate their users, and Gentoo is
very helpful to users, if the users read documentation first.  You have
to sound educated on whatever you're askind for help about or you'll
likely be ignored.
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Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[michael chang]

On 8/10/05, David Masover <ninja@slaphack.com> wrote:
> michael chang wrote:
> > LILO has to be reinstalled every
> > single time you add or remove a kernel, move a partition, resize a
> > partition, etc. etc.; because it hard links to the kernel images.  In
> 
> Not a big deal at all.  Just add "lilo" to your install script.  You do
> have one, don't you?

Yes, but it's autogenerated by kernel-package/fakeroot, and then
tacked into the .deb file that generates.

For example:
config: make menuconfig/xconfig/gconfig/whatever
[optional, edit Makefile to edit revision append, kernel-package uses
a command argument in the next command to do a similar task]: nano
Makefile
make package: fakeroot make-kpkg kernel_image
install package: sudo dpkg -i ../kernel-package-<whatever>.deb
[GRUB is updated automatically, and LILO is too, usually, depending on
your system]
reboot.

Problem?  I repartition alot -- and reinstalling LILO is a pain.  Not
to mention I like booting floppy disk images -- which I use GRUB
for... so I figure I'll do thing my way -- you do things your way. 
Life's easier that way.  ^^

> I also like how Lilo can have a boot menu (entirely preconfigured, but
> it's there) that only shows up if you hold a key during boot (think it's

Except I don't know the command that automatically updates this
(update-grub in debian for GRUB).

> alt).  Grub, you usually have to have the menu show up, then pick a
> default within a timeout, and 99% of my boots, I want the default.  It

edit the /boot/grub/menu.lst file -- there should be a timeout line;
you can change this to 2 if you want [as soon as you press a key, the
timeout cancels]  if /boot is a seperate partition, this becomes
/boot/boot/grub/menu.lst [probably because it checks the /boot/grub
folder in the partition, regardless of where this gets mounted in the
filesystem]

> > this case, I'd rather stick with GRUB, and be forced to put /boot on a
> > 10-15 MB ext2 partition.
> 
> But, you might want more than that.  For instance, the RIP PXE rescue
> system (for booting off a network) can easily be intsalled locally as a
> GRUB menu option, but the ramdisk is 28 megs -- and that's without the
> kernel.

So I resize the partition.  Big deal.  I do that all the time.  I'll
shave off a meg off my FAT partition, or something.

> All the more reason, Hans, to have bitmaps not be preloaded on mount --
> in a situation like this, you want a Reiser4 partition for maybe 5
> seconds or less most of the time, but my partition takes 15-20 seconds
> unless I use "dont_load_bitmap" from an initrd.

So wouldn't the solution be not to mount it for five seconds and then
umount it?  That sounds very illogical... why do you want to do that?

> > Well, debian's latest installer, debian-installer, [sarge] can bring
> > you into a partition manager if you wish to install on a ReiserFS
> > [3.6], XFS, ext2, ext3, or various other partitions; or you can let it
> > autopartition (-- I haven't tried this, and have no intent on doing
> > so, because I handle my partitions somewhat oddly).  If you want
> > Reiser4, it seems like you have to get the mkfs tools onto a ISO or
> > boot image or something, as well as put in a Reiser4 kernel, and then
> > mkfs and mount the root partitions normally.
> 
> Still not fun, especially considering that if you're like me, you make
> mistakes on your first install, and your second -- some days, it may be
> my fifth install that's the one I keep.

*sigh* I think I went to sixth or eighth on my first machine --
although this machine is on it's second install of Windows XP and
Linux each -- both installs were used some time before being replaced.
 If you do it wrong ten times, but you can recover, you're okay,
generally, if you can do it right the first time on every machine
thereafter.  *shrugs*  Then again, Ubantu is supposed to be made to be
a really easy install so it won't go wrong, so if it ends up
supporting Reiser4 by default, then you can just pop in a CD, click a
few times or push a few buttons, and you're done.  *shrugs*

> > That said, root Reiser4s aren't support atm, afaik.
> 
> They are, if you can deal with manually creating/mounting them (not
> using the debian-installer partitioner), and compiling a custom kernel
> somehow during the install (before you reboot) -- Debian usually uses
> precompiled kernels.

I was referring to by Namesys... although that is true also.  I'd
think it'd make more sense, though, to have crucial bits on a
non-experimental filesystem [e.g. ReiserFS 3.6] in the meantime, and
then anything dynamic or replaceable on a Reiser4 partition; and since
I'll create that later, I have enough time to get a full system to
recomile a kernel on, etc. etc.

Personally, I've had to deal with compiling a kernel on a machine that
had a modem that worked in Windows but not in Linux [dial-up, at
that], so I had to download e.g. gcc, sources, and required packages
in Windows, and then move them to Linux, which was at a barebones
install.  Icky, but it worked, I suppose.  Although I don't want to
repeat that [thankfully, the machine's modem died, so I reinstalled
linux, and it now sports a Wireless USB dongle which I use NDISWrapper
(prebuilt modules) on] and I don't think anyone else does either.

> > If you want to go through the trouble, there is a mechanism you can
> > use to compile your own packages in debian -- I believe you can use
> > "apt-get source <packagename>" as a regular user to build "optimized"
> > copies of most of the packages on Debian -- or you can do an install
> > from source, and it will install in /usr/local or whatever, and
> > because of the way paths are setup, it will "override" your package.
> > [That can be confusing for dependencies though... although FC's RPM
> > madness is worse IIRC.]
> 
> It's nowhere near "emerge" on Gentoo.  For one thing, you can't easily
> set system-wide CFLAGS, and there's really no equivalent of USE flags,
> at least until we as a species figure out how to use a decent bytecode
> for everything, and compile-time optimization/configuration becomes a
> thing of the past.

That said, if memory serves me right, the sources obtained by emerge
on Gentoo are heavily patched so they'll work with emerge.  But this
isn't the place to be arguing about which is better: Gentoo or Debian
-- It's a place to talk about ReiserFS/Reiser4.  So I guess we should
get back onto that, yes?

OT: Just thought I'd mention that before the last stable release that
came out (Sarge) -- I believe the predecessor, Woody, was about 3
years old... [not to mention current sarge packages are rather ancient
due to a rigerous and lengthy testing process for Stable--I remember
seeing a Wine package from like 99 or 2002 in either Woody or
Sarge...] and I believe the names of it's releases are the names of
characters from Toy Story (geez...) -- I mean come on, "Potato",
"Woody", and "Sarge"?!?  Oh well... it could be worse, I suppose.

So, to date, we have yet to see any recently released operating
systems with native out-of-the-box root Reiser4 support, it seems...
*sigh* Oh well... I guess we won't see it until we see it in vanilla
kernel and/or when the recompressor and/or resizer are ready... or
someone takes an initiative.

-- 
~Mike
 - Just my two cents
 - No man is an island, and no man is unable.

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[David Masover]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1

michael chang wrote:
> On 8/10/05, David Masover <ninja@slaphack.com> wrote:
> 
>>michael chang wrote:
>>
>>>LILO has to be reinstalled every
>>>single time you add or remove a kernel, move a partition, resize a
>>>partition, etc. etc.; because it hard links to the kernel images.  In
>>
>>Not a big deal at all.  Just add "lilo" to your install script.  You do
>>have one, don't you?
> 
> 
> Yes, but it's autogenerated by kernel-package/fakeroot, and then
> tacked into the .deb file that generates.
> 
> For example:
> config: make menuconfig/xconfig/gconfig/whatever
> [optional, edit Makefile to edit revision append, kernel-package uses
> a command argument in the next command to do a similar task]: nano
> Makefile
> make package: fakeroot make-kpkg kernel_image
> install package: sudo dpkg -i ../kernel-package-<whatever>.deb
> [GRUB is updated automatically, and LILO is too, usually, depending on
> your system]
> reboot.
> 
> Problem?  I repartition alot -- and reinstalling LILO is a pain.  Not
> to mention I like booting floppy disk images -- which I use GRUB
> for... so I figure I'll do thing my way -- you do things your way. 
> Life's easier that way.  ^^
> 
> 
>>I also like how Lilo can have a boot menu (entirely preconfigured, but
>>it's there) that only shows up if you hold a key during boot (think it's
> 
> 
> Except I don't know the command that automatically updates this
> (update-grub in debian for GRUB).
> 
> 
>>alt).  Grub, you usually have to have the menu show up, then pick a
>>default within a timeout, and 99% of my boots, I want the default.  It
> 
> 
> edit the /boot/grub/menu.lst file

Should be grub.conf.  I have menu.lst symlinked to it, just in case.

> -- there should be a timeout line;
> you can change this to 2 if you want [as soon as you press a key, the
> timeout cancels]  if /boot is a seperate partition, this becomes
> /boot/boot/grub/menu.lst [probably because it checks the /boot/grub
> folder in the partition, regardless of where this gets mounted in the
> filesystem]

Not a big deal, Gentoo defaults to having a symlink to do that for you,
so you don't have to create /boot/boot or anything stupid like that --
you can create your own symlink like this:

cd /boot
ln -s . boot

>>>this case, I'd rather stick with GRUB, and be forced to put /boot on a
>>>10-15 MB ext2 partition.
>>
>>But, you might want more than that.  For instance, the RIP PXE rescue
>>system (for booting off a network) can easily be intsalled locally as a
>>GRUB menu option, but the ramdisk is 28 megs -- and that's without the
>>kernel.
> 
> 
> So I resize the partition.  Big deal.  I do that all the time.  I'll
> shave off a meg off my FAT partition, or something.
> 
> 
>>All the more reason, Hans, to have bitmaps not be preloaded on mount --
>>in a situation like this, you want a Reiser4 partition for maybe 5
>>seconds or less most of the time, but my partition takes 15-20 seconds
>>unless I use "dont_load_bitmap" from an initrd.
> 
> 
> So wouldn't the solution be not to mount it for five seconds and then
> umount it?  That sounds very illogical... why do you want to do that?

Think about it.  That's essentially what Grub is doing, only I want to
replace Grub with a full-fledged Linux kernel and some utilities.  That
means it gets mounted read-only, I find the kernel image I want, and I
kexec it -- effectively a soft reboot.

>>>That said, root Reiser4s aren't support atm, afaik.
>>
>>They are, if you can deal with manually creating/mounting them (not
>>using the debian-installer partitioner), and compiling a custom kernel
>>somehow during the install (before you reboot) -- Debian usually uses
>>precompiled kernels.
> 
> 
> I was referring to by Namesys... although that is true also.

Namesys have supported root FS on Reiser4 for months now, so long as
you've got a separate /boot.

> I'd
> think it'd make more sense, though, to have crucial bits on a
> non-experimental filesystem [e.g. ReiserFS 3.6] in the meantime, and

I used to do that, back when Reiser4 was unstable.

> then anything dynamic or replaceable on a Reiser4 partition; and since

I don't like partitioning things much, especially because of the lack of
resizers -- but even with a perfect resizer, it'd still be a PITA.

> I'll create that later, I have enough time to get a full system to
> recomile a kernel on, etc. etc.

Yes, that makes sense, and is probably the easiest way to get a
Debian/Ubuntu system to use Reiser4 for anything.

>>>If you want to go through the trouble, there is a mechanism you can
>>>use to compile your own packages in debian -- I believe you can use
>>>"apt-get source <packagename>" as a regular user to build "optimized"
>>>copies of most of the packages on Debian -- or you can do an install
>>>from source, and it will install in /usr/local or whatever, and
>>>because of the way paths are setup, it will "override" your package.
>>>[That can be confusing for dependencies though... although FC's RPM
>>>madness is worse IIRC.]
>>
>>It's nowhere near "emerge" on Gentoo.  For one thing, you can't easily
>>set system-wide CFLAGS, and there's really no equivalent of USE flags,
>>at least until we as a species figure out how to use a decent bytecode
>>for everything, and compile-time optimization/configuration becomes a
>>thing of the past.
> 
> 
> That said, if memory serves me right, the sources obtained by emerge
> on Gentoo are heavily patched so they'll work with emerge.

Sometimes.  It usually doesn't take that much, though.  Just a matter of
setting BINDIR and such during the "make install" phase, but not during
"make" -- so the binaries are hardcoded to look for stuff in /etc, but
install themself to /var/tmp/portage/foo-1.2.3/install

> But this
> isn't the place to be arguing about which is better: Gentoo or Debian

I'm not.  Think of it more as a review.

> -- It's a place to talk about ReiserFS/Reiser4.  So I guess we should
> get back onto that, yes?

Yes.

> OT: Just thought I'd mention that before the last stable release that
> came out (Sarge) -- I believe the predecessor, Woody, was about 3
> years old... [not to mention current sarge packages are rather ancient
> due to a rigerous and lengthy testing process for Stable--I remember
> seeing a Wine package from like 99 or 2002 in either Woody or
> Sarge...] and I believe the names of it's releases are the names of
> characters from Toy Story (geez...) -- I mean come on, "Potato",
> "Woody", and "Sarge"?!?  Oh well... it could be worse, I suppose.

It is worse.  Now there's Sid.  Debian's getting evil...

> So, to date, we have yet to see any recently released operating
> systems with native out-of-the-box root Reiser4 support, it seems...

Wasn't there something about yoper?

> *sigh* Oh well... I guess we won't see it until we see it in vanilla
> kernel and/or when the recompressor and/or resizer are ready... or
> someone takes an initiative.

If I was running a distro, I'd put big fat warnings around a non-default
option for Reiser4, until the repacker was done.  Then I'd make it the
default FS, and mark ext3 as "legacy" ;)
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Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[michael chang]

On 8/10/05, David Masover <ninja@slaphack.com> wrote:
> > So, to date, we have yet to see any recently released operating
> > systems with native out-of-the-box root Reiser4 support, it seems...
> 
> Wasn't there something about yoper?

Yeah, there was, although someone discounted it for being a year old
release... [compared to Debian Sarge, that's pretty new...].

> > *sigh* Oh well... I guess we won't see it until we see it in vanilla
> > kernel and/or when the recompressor and/or resizer are ready... or
> > someone takes an initiative.
> 
> If I was running a distro, I'd put big fat warnings around a non-default
> option for Reiser4, until the repacker was done.  Then I'd make it the

This is what the Kernel Config does -- so no one will build with it
[they're scared it'll break something].

> default FS, and mark ext3 as "legacy" ;)

Then I'd have to modify the installer and the kernel now.  And again
every time Reiser4 makes a major leap.  [Not to mention I've yet to
see one person singlehandedly do a full distro -- a livecd /maybe/,
but probably not.]  Logically, the maintainers will wait until
something is reasonably stable, and put it in when they're nice and
ready.  *shrugs*  Besides, how many of them are on a release cycle
anyways?  But yeah, ext3 could be marked as legacy.  That said, I'm
not going to go as far as to remove it from my kernel. [What if I want
to put my kernel on a ext2/3 boot partition?]  ^^

-- 
~Mike
 - Just my two cents
 - No man is an island, and no man is unable.

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[michael chang]

On 8/10/05, michael chang <thenewme91@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > *sigh* Oh well... I guess we won't see it until we see it in vanilla
> > > kernel and/or when the recompressor and/or resizer are ready... or
> > > someone takes an initiative.

You know, I just mumbled this because I that's what I'd been
reading... now I looked about a bit, and I realize why this is true,
and why the Reiser team are trying *so* hard to get it into the
vanilla kernel.

See this Ubantu bug:
https://bugzilla.ubuntu.com/show_bug.cgi?id=10506
Summary?  Ubantu won't support Reiser4 until it gets into linus'
kernel tree.  *sigh*  And the bug request isn't even requesting for
root filesystem support...

-- 
~Mike
 - Just my two cents
 - No man is an island, and no man is unable.

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[Nikita Danilov]

David Masover writes:

[...]

 > 
 > Here's why I would want Lilo:

Add here "-R" option: immensely useful in situations when one has to
boot kernels that may hang on startup.

Nikita.

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[gimpel]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 926 bytes --]

On Wed, 10 Aug 2005 18:48:30 +0200
Clemens Eisserer <linuxhippy@gmail.com> wrote:

> Hello!
> 
> I hope this questions hasn't been asked too often (since it seems to
> be a perfect example for this), but I'm not too long on this list and
> for what I've seen it hasn't ... so please don't kill me ;-)
> 
> Does anybody know a number of distrbibutions which support reiser4 out
> of the box (installer, grub, reiserfs4-utils, ...)?
> Is opensuse planned to include reiser4?
> 
> For now I am using Fedora but since a long time I feel uncomfortable
> with their use-what-we-tell-you policy, they tell me to use ext3 or
> gnome for example and if I want to make a different choice a get
> anything but not a perfect installation.
> 
> Thank you in advance, lg Clemens
> 


SuSE 9.3 has reiser4 support! Also the online kernel-update for SuSE
9.2 contains reiser4. reiser4progs of course too :)

cheers!

[-- Attachment #2: Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 189 bytes --]

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[Clemens Eisserer]

wow, that seems unbelieveable great!
seems I should give opensuse (thanks god!) a try!

Thanks a lot for this tip, it means I can use a distro I am familiar
with and do not need to play with stuff I do not want to learn *g*

Thanks again, lg Clemens

2005/8/11, gimpel <gimpel@sonnenkinder.org>:
> On Wed, 10 Aug 2005 18:48:30 +0200
> Clemens Eisserer <linuxhippy@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> > Hello!
> >
> > I hope this questions hasn't been asked too often (since it seems to
> > be a perfect example for this), but I'm not too long on this list and
> > for what I've seen it hasn't ... so please don't kill me ;-)
> >
> > Does anybody know a number of distrbibutions which support reiser4 out
> > of the box (installer, grub, reiserfs4-utils, ...)?
> > Is opensuse planned to include reiser4?
> >
> > For now I am using Fedora but since a long time I feel uncomfortable
> > with their use-what-we-tell-you policy, they tell me to use ext3 or
> > gnome for example and if I want to make a different choice a get
> > anything but not a perfect installation.
> >
> > Thank you in advance, lg Clemens
> >
> 
> 
> SuSE 9.3 has reiser4 support! Also the online kernel-update for SuSE
> 9.2 contains reiser4. reiser4progs of course too :)
> 
> cheers!
> 
> 
>

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[gimpel]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 885 bytes --]

On Thu, 11 Aug 2005 16:27:10 +0200
Clemens Eisserer <linuxhippy@gmail.com> wrote:

> wow, that seems unbelieveable great!
> seems I should give opensuse (thanks god!) a try!
> 
> Thanks a lot for this tip, it means I can use a distro I am familiar
> with and do not need to play with stuff I do not want to learn *g*
> 
> Thanks again, lg Clemens
> 

well i just know that from doing kernel patches for jacklab.net. using
gentoo for myself :)

AFAIK it's not possible to install SuSE on reiser4 on fresh
installation progress as parted can't handle reiser4 well enough (yet
- god bless the day when the kernel guys include it to vanilla, it's
the most stable and reliafilesystem i ever used). 
so you might have to create partitions manually and if
you want to copy your system to that partition, no big deal. but i also
might be wrong with that.

regards
tom

[-- Attachment #2: Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 189 bytes --]

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[Hans Reiser]

gimpel wrote:

>On Wed, 10 Aug 2005 18:48:30 +0200
>Clemens Eisserer <linuxhippy@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>  
>
>>Hello!
>>
>>I hope this questions hasn't been asked too often (since it seems to
>>be a perfect example for this), but I'm not too long on this list and
>>for what I've seen it hasn't ... so please don't kill me ;-)
>>
>>Does anybody know a number of distrbibutions which support reiser4 out
>>of the box (installer, grub, reiserfs4-utils, ...)?
>>Is opensuse planned to include reiser4?
>>
>>For now I am using Fedora but since a long time I feel uncomfortable
>>with their use-what-we-tell-you policy, they tell me to use ext3 or
>>gnome for example and if I want to make a different choice a get
>>anything but not a perfect installation.
>>
>>Thank you in advance, lg Clemens
>>
>>    
>>
>
>
>SuSE 9.3 has reiser4 support! Also the online kernel-update for SuSE
>9.2 contains reiser4. reiser4progs of course too :)
>
>cheers!
>  
>
Does installing it for root work?

Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[gimpel]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 1372 bytes --]

On Thu, 11 Aug 2005 19:51:00 -0700
Hans Reiser <reiser@namesys.com> wrote:

> gimpel wrote:
> 
> >On Wed, 10 Aug 2005 18:48:30 +0200
> >Clemens Eisserer <linuxhippy@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >  
> >
> >>Hello!
> >>
> >>I hope this questions hasn't been asked too often (since it seems to
> >>be a perfect example for this), but I'm not too long on this list
> >>and for what I've seen it hasn't ... so please don't kill me ;-)
> >>
> >>Does anybody know a number of distrbibutions which support reiser4
> >>out of the box (installer, grub, reiserfs4-utils, ...)?
> >>Is opensuse planned to include reiser4?
> >>
> >>For now I am using Fedora but since a long time I feel uncomfortable
> >>with their use-what-we-tell-you policy, they tell me to use ext3 or
> >>gnome for example and if I want to make a different choice a get
> >>anything but not a perfect installation.
> >>
> >>Thank you in advance, lg Clemens
> >>
> >>    
> >>
> >
> >
> >SuSE 9.3 has reiser4 support! Also the online kernel-update for SuSE
> >9.2 contains reiser4. reiser4progs of course too :)
> >
> >cheers!
> >  
> >
> Does installing it for root work?
> 
No it can't be selected in YaST, the installer/configurator. I think
that's because parted can't handle reiser4 yet, or not correctly. So
one has to use mkfs and copy to get reiser4 as root partition.

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Re: Distributions with out-of-the-box Reiser4 support?

[Clemens Eisserer]

Hi,

>  In some version I tried a couple of months ago, Yoper had Reiser4. I don't
> know if they still do though.

Thanks a lot for the tip - I already knew Yoper and was very pleased
by its princip to use the best out of all distributions (I still think
Yast is much better than all Fedora utilities available) but it seems
to be not activly developed any more :-(
Their last release is almost a year old :-(

So it seems I have either to wait or to build a kernel myself. I can't
believe that it is so complicated with reiser4 to get it in, after
statements like "we are happy with 2.6 - we did not break it more than
it has been".

lg Clemens