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

[David Masover <ninja@slaphack.com>]

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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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