server locks up at boot

[David Warren <warren-qmPYOCrcNLLyFCzt5hm0YvZ8FUJU4vz8@public.gmane.org>]

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We have been having a problem for a while now with kernels ranging from 
2.6.26 through 30. When a boots and starts the nfs server, it reads the 
/var/lib/nfs/v4recovery directory. If this directory is empty everything 
is fine. If it is not, all nfs related processes go into D wait and 
never return. Any other attempt to read the directory results in that 
process getting stuck in D wait as well. This happens on a variety of 
systems, all running Debian Lenny (happened with etch also) with kernels 
ranging from 2.6.26 - 2.6.31-rc2 serving disks via nfs4. if you boot 
single user and clear out the directory, everything is fine. Also, there 
is never any problem logged anywhere.

So, my questions are:

What is this directory really used for? It doesn't seem to need it to 
reestablish connections
Anyone have any idea what is going on or suggestions for finding out?


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begin:vcard
fn:David Warren
n:Warren;David
org:Atmospheric Sciences
adr:Dept of Atmospheric Sciences, Box 351640;;University of Washington;Seattle;WA;98195-1640;USA
email;internet:warren-qmPYOCrcNLLyFCzt5hm0YvZ8FUJU4vz8@public.gmane.org
title:Software Engineer
tel;work:206 543-0945
url:http://www.atmos.washington.edu
version:2.1
end:vcard