Building new initrd with dracut-network packages for iscsi boot.

Building new initrd with dracut-network packages for iscsi boot.

[Vinay Venkataraghavan]

Hi all,

I have a few questions regarding building a new initrd which adds additional modules to the existing initrd.

The environment that I am working in is as follows:

1. that anaconda has completed the install and I prevent the system from rebooting. 

2. Anaconda has installed the OS to an iscsi disk. 


What I'd like to do now is to add the dracut-network and iscsi modules to the initrd so that when the system reboots it will be able to connect to the remote iscsi target and mount the root device.

I have been working through this for about three weeks now and am stuck at the phase where I can rebuild the initrd with the network modules and iscsi modules. 


The installed system contains all the dependency rpms such as: dracut, dracut-kernel, dracut-network, and iscsi-initiator-utils. 

While in the anaconda shell I tried the following command:

dracut -v -a iscsi -m network new_initrd.img `uname -r`

Executing this command has two problems:

1. The network option is invalid. I'm wondering if this should be -m dracut-network??

2. This does not add modules to the existing image. But it creates a very minimal initrd. 


What I would like is to add the network boot modules to boot from an iscsi root device to the existing initrd. 


I would appreciate any help in this matter. Please let me know if I can furnish any further information.

Thanks in advance.
- Vinay

Re: Building new initrd with dracut-network packages for iscsi boot.

[Harald Hoyer]

Am 01.08.2012 18:05, schrieb Vinay Venkataraghavan:
> Hi all,
> 
> I have a few questions regarding building a new initrd which adds additional modules to the existing initrd.
> 
> The environment that I am working in is as follows:
> 
> 1. that anaconda has completed the install and I prevent the system from rebooting. 
> 
> 2. Anaconda has installed the OS to an iscsi disk. 
> 
> 
> What I'd like to do now is to add the dracut-network and iscsi modules to the initrd so that when the system reboots it will be able to connect to the remote iscsi target and mount the root device.
> 
> I have been working through this for about three weeks now and am stuck at the phase where I can rebuild the initrd with the network modules and iscsi modules. 
> 
> 
> The installed system contains all the dependency rpms such as: dracut, dracut-kernel, dracut-network, and iscsi-initiator-utils. 
> 
> While in the anaconda shell I tried the following command:
> 
> dracut -v -a iscsi -m network new_initrd.img `uname -r`
> 
> Executing this command has two problems:
> 
> 1. The network option is invalid. I'm wondering if this should be -m dracut-network??
> 
> 2. This does not add modules to the existing image. But it creates a very minimal initrd. 
> 
> 
> What I would like is to add the network boot modules to boot from an iscsi root device to the existing initrd. 
> 
> 
> I would appreciate any help in this matter. Please let me know if I can furnish any further information.
> 
> Thanks in advance.
> - Vinay



"-m network" is wrong, because all the other modules are not used then. You will
end up only with "network" + "iscsi".

Why don't you just use:

# dracut new_initrd.img

or, if you find that too big, just omit the modules, you don't need.

# dracut --omit "nbd nfs multipath" new_initrd.img