using update-initramfs: how to get new mdadm.conf into the /boot? Or is it XFS?

using update-initramfs: how to get new mdadm.conf into the /boot? Or is it XFS?

[Moshe Yudkowsky]

I've managed to get myself into a little problem.

Since power hits were taking out the /boot partition, I decided to split 
/boot out of root. Working from my emergency partition,  I copied all 
files from /root, re-partitioned what had been /root into room for /boot 
and /root, and then created the drives. This left me with /dev/md/boot, 
/dev/md/root, and /dev/md/base (everything else).

I modified mdadm.conf on the emergency partition, used update-initramfs 
to make certain that the new md drives would be recognized, and 
rebooted. This worked as expected.

I then mounted all the entire new file system on a mount point, copied 
the mdadm.conf to that point, did a chroot to that point, and did an 
update-initramfs so that the non-emergency partition would have the 
updated mdadm.conf. This worked -- but with complaints about missing the 
file /proc/modules (which is not present under chroot). If I use the -v 
option I can see the raid456, raid1, etc. modules loading.

I modified menu.lst to make certain that boot=/dev/md/boot, ran grub 
(thanks, Robin!) successfully.

Problem: on reboot, the I get an error message:

root (hd0,1)  (Moshe comment: as expected)
Filesystem type is xfs, partition type 0xfd (Moshe comment: as expected)
kernel /boot/vmliuz-etc.-amd64 root=/dev/md/boot ro

Error 15: File not found

Did I miss something? I'm pretty certain this is the procedure I used 
before. The XFS module is being loaded by update-initramfs, so unless 
there's a reason that I can't boot md from  a boot partition with the 
XFS file system, then I don't understand what the problem is.

Comments welcome -- I'm wedged!


-- 
Moshe Yudkowsky * moshe@pobox.com * www.pobox.com/~moshe
"Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you 
give it to
them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the
wise cannot see all ends."
				-- Gandalf (J.R.R. Tolkien)

Re: using update-initramfs: how to get new mdadm.conf into the /boot? Or is it XFS?

[Robin Hill]

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On Mon Feb 04, 2008 at 02:59:44PM -0600, Moshe Yudkowsky wrote:

> I've managed to get myself into a little problem.
>
> Since power hits were taking out the /boot partition, I decided to split 
> /boot out of root. Working from my emergency partition,  I copied all files 
> from /root, re-partitioned what had been /root into room for /boot and 
> /root, and then created the drives. This left me with /dev/md/boot, 
> /dev/md/root, and /dev/md/base (everything else).
>
> I modified mdadm.conf on the emergency partition, used update-initramfs to 
> make certain that the new md drives would be recognized, and rebooted. This 
> worked as expected.
>
> I then mounted all the entire new file system on a mount point, copied the 
> mdadm.conf to that point, did a chroot to that point, and did an 
> update-initramfs so that the non-emergency partition would have the updated 
> mdadm.conf. This worked -- but with complaints about missing the file 
> /proc/modules (which is not present under chroot). If I use the -v option I 
> can see the raid456, raid1, etc. modules loading.
>
> I modified menu.lst to make certain that boot=/dev/md/boot, ran grub 
> (thanks, Robin!) successfully.
>
> Problem: on reboot, the I get an error message:
>
> root (hd0,1)  (Moshe comment: as expected)
> Filesystem type is xfs, partition type 0xfd (Moshe comment: as expected)
> kernel /boot/vmliuz-etc.-amd64 root=/dev/md/boot ro
---------------^^^^^^

Are you sure that's right?  Looks like a typo to me.

Cheers,
        Robin
-- 
     ___        
    ( ' }     |       Robin Hill        <robin@robinhill.me.uk> |
   / / )      | Little Jim says ....                            |
  // !!       |      "He fallen in de water !!"                 |

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Re: using update-initramfs: how to get new mdadm.conf into the /boot? Or is it XFS?

[maximilian attems]

On Mon, Feb 04, 2008 at 02:59:44PM -0600, Moshe Yudkowsky wrote:
> Problem: on reboot, the I get an error message:
> 
> root (hd0,1)  (Moshe comment: as expected)
> Filesystem type is xfs, partition type 0xfd (Moshe comment: as expected)
> kernel /boot/vmliuz-etc.-amd64 root=/dev/md/boot ro
> 
> Error 15: File not found
> 

error 15 is an *grub* error.

grub is known for it's dislike of xfs, so with this whole setup use ext3
rerun grub-install and you should be fine.

Re: using update-initramfs: how to get new mdadm.conf into the /boot? Or is it XFS?

[Moshe Yudkowsky]

maximilian attems wrote:

> error 15 is an *grub* error.
> 
> grub is known for it's dislike of xfs, so with this whole setup use ext3
> rerun grub-install and you should be fine.

I should mention that something *did* change. When attempting to use 
XFS, grub would give me a note about "18 partitions used" (I forget the 
exact language). This was different than I'd remembered; when I switched 
back to using reiserfs, grub reports using 19 partitions.

So there's something definitely interesting about XFS and booting.

As an additional note, if I use the grub boot-time commands to edit root 
to read, e.g., root=/dev/sda2 or root=/dev/sdb2, I get the same Error 15 
error message.

It may be that grub is complaining about grub and resiserfs, but I 
suspect that it has a true complain about the file system and what's on 
the partitions.

-- 
Moshe Yudkowsky * moshe@pobox.com * www.pobox.com/~moshe
  "If, after hearing my songs, just one human being is inspired to
   say something nasty to a friend, it will all have been worthwhile."
     			-- Tom Lehrer

Re: using update-initramfs: how to get new mdadm.conf into the /boot? Or is it XFS?

[Bill Davidsen]

Moshe Yudkowsky wrote:
> maximilian attems wrote:
>
>> error 15 is an *grub* error.
>>
>> grub is known for it's dislike of xfs, so with this whole setup use ext3
>> rerun grub-install and you should be fine.
>
> I should mention that something *did* change. When attempting to use 
> XFS, grub would give me a note about "18 partitions used" (I forget 
> the exact language). This was different than I'd remembered; when I 
> switched back to using reiserfs, grub reports using 19 partitions.
>
> So there's something definitely interesting about XFS and booting.
>
> As an additional note, if I use the grub boot-time commands to edit 
> root to read, e.g., root=/dev/sda2 or root=/dev/sdb2, I get the same 
> Error 15 error message.
>
> It may be that grub is complaining about grub and resiserfs, but I 
> suspect that it has a true complain about the file system and what's 
> on the partitions.
>
I think you have two choices, convert /boot to ext2 and be sure you are 
going down the best-tested code path, or fight and debug, read code, 
learn grub source, play with the init parts of the boot sequence, and 
then convert /boot to ext2 anyway. No matter how "better" something else 
might be, /boot has nothing I use except at boot, I don't need features 
or performance, I just want it to work.

Unless you are so frustrated you have entered "I am going to make this 
*work* if it takes forever" mode, I would try the easy solution first. 
Just my take on it.

-- 
Bill Davidsen <davidsen@tmr.com>
  "Woe unto the statesman who makes war without a reason that will still
  be valid when the war is over..." Otto von Bismark 

Re: using update-initramfs: how to get new mdadm.conf into the /boot? Or is it XFS?

[Bill Davidsen]

Bill Davidsen wrote:
> Moshe Yudkowsky wrote:
>> maximilian attems wrote:
>>
>>> error 15 is an *grub* error.
>>>
>>> grub is known for it's dislike of xfs, so with this whole setup use 
>>> ext3
>>> rerun grub-install and you should be fine.
>>
>> I should mention that something *did* change. When attempting to use 
>> XFS, grub would give me a note about "18 partitions used" (I forget 
>> the exact language). This was different than I'd remembered; when I 
>> switched back to using reiserfs, grub reports using 19 partitions.
>>
>> So there's something definitely interesting about XFS and booting.
>>
>> As an additional note, if I use the grub boot-time commands to edit 
>> root to read, e.g., root=/dev/sda2 or root=/dev/sdb2, I get the same 
>> Error 15 error message.
>>
>> It may be that grub is complaining about grub and resiserfs, but I 
>> suspect that it has a true complain about the file system and what's 
>> on the partitions.
>>
> I think you have two choices, convert /boot to ext2 and be sure you 
> are going down the best-tested code path, or fight and debug, read 
> code, learn grub source, play with the init parts of the boot 
> sequence, and then convert /boot to ext2 anyway. No matter how 
> "better" something else might be, /boot has nothing I use except at 
> boot, I don't need features or performance, I just want it to work.
>
> Unless you are so frustrated you have entered "I am going to make this 
> *work* if it takes forever" mode, I would try the easy solution first. 
> Just my take on it.
>
Or you can get lucky and someone will have seen this before and hand you 
a solution...  ;-)

-- 
Bill Davidsen <davidsen@tmr.com>
  "Woe unto the statesman who makes war without a reason that will still
  be valid when the war is over..." Otto von Bismark 

Re: using update-initramfs: how to get new mdadm.conf into the /boot? Or is it XFS?

[Robin Hill]

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On Mon Feb 04, 2008 at 02:59:44PM -0600, Moshe Yudkowsky wrote:

> I've managed to get myself into a little problem.
>
> Since power hits were taking out the /boot partition, I decided to split 
> /boot out of root. Working from my emergency partition,  I copied all files 
> from /root, re-partitioned what had been /root into room for /boot and 
> /root, and then created the drives. This left me with /dev/md/boot, 
> /dev/md/root, and /dev/md/base (everything else).
>
> I modified mdadm.conf on the emergency partition, used update-initramfs to 
> make certain that the new md drives would be recognized, and rebooted. This 
> worked as expected.
>
> I then mounted all the entire new file system on a mount point, copied the 
> mdadm.conf to that point, did a chroot to that point, and did an 
> update-initramfs so that the non-emergency partition would have the updated 
> mdadm.conf. This worked -- but with complaints about missing the file 
> /proc/modules (which is not present under chroot). If I use the -v option I 
> can see the raid456, raid1, etc. modules loading.
>
> I modified menu.lst to make certain that boot=/dev/md/boot, ran grub 
> (thanks, Robin!) successfully.
>
> Problem: on reboot, the I get an error message:
>
> root (hd0,1)  (Moshe comment: as expected)
> Filesystem type is xfs, partition type 0xfd (Moshe comment: as expected)
> kernel /boot/vmliuz-etc.-amd64 root=/dev/md/boot ro
>
> Error 15: File not found
>
"File not found" at that point would suggest it can't find the kernel
file.  The path here should be relative to the root of the partition
/boot is on, so if your /boot is its own partition then you should
either use "kernel /vmlinuz...." or (the more usual solution from what
I've seen) make sure there's a symlink:
        ln -s . /boot/boot

HTH,
        Robin
-- 
     ___        
    ( ' }     |       Robin Hill        <robin@robinhill.me.uk> |
   / / )      | Little Jim says ....                            |
  // !!       |      "He fallen in de water !!"                 |

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Re: using update-initramfs: how to get new mdadm.conf into the /boot? Or is it XFS?

[Moshe Yudkowsky]

Robin Hill wrote:

> "File not found" at that point would suggest it can't find the kernel
> file.  The path here should be relative to the root of the partition
> /boot is on, so if your /boot is its own partition then you should
> either use "kernel /vmlinuz...." or (the more usual solution from what
> I've seen) make sure there's a symlink:
>         ln -s . /boot/boot

Robin,

Thanks very much! ln -s . /boot/boot works to get past this problem.

Now it's failed in a different section and complains that it can't find 
/sbin/init. I'm at the (initramfs) prompt, which I don't ever recall 
seeing before. I can't  mount /dev/md/root on any mount points ("invalid 
arguments" even though I'm not supplying any). I've checked /dev/md/root 
and it does work as expected when I try mounting it while in my 
emergency partition, and it does contain /sbin/init and the other files 
and mount points for /var, /boot, /tmp, etc.

So this leads me to the question of why /sbin isn't being seen. /sbin is 
on the device /dev/md/root, and /etc/fstab specifically mounts it at /. 
  I would think /boot would look at an internal copy of /etc/fstab. Is 
this another side effect of using /boot on its own partition?

-- 
Moshe Yudkowsky * moshe@pobox.com * www.pobox.com/~moshe
  "Blessed are the peacemakers,
   for they shall be mowed down in the crossfire."
    				-- Michael Flynn

Re: using update-initramfs: how to get new mdadm.conf into the /boot? Or is it XFS?

[Moshe Yudkowsky]

I wrote:

> Now it's failed in a different section and complains that it can't find 
> /sbin/init. I'm at the (initramfs) prompt, which I don't ever recall 
> seeing before. I can't  mount /dev/md/root on any mount points ("invalid 
> arguments" even though I'm not supplying any). I've checked /dev/md/root 
> and it does work as expected when I try mounting it while in my 
> emergency partition, and it does contain /sbin/init and the other files 
> and mount points for /var, /boot, /tmp, etc.
> 
> So this leads me to the question of why /sbin isn't being seen. /sbin is 
> on the device /dev/md/root, and /etc/fstab specifically mounts it at /. 
>  I would think /boot would look at an internal copy of /etc/fstab. Is 
> this another side effect of using /boot on its own partition?

The answer: I managed to make a mistake in the configuration of grub, in 
  /boot/grub/menu.lst. I'd changed root= from /dev/md/root to 
/dev/md/boot -- but I really need to include the *root* location, which 
does not change, vs. the boot location, which is not relevant.

-- 
Moshe Yudkowsky * moshe@pobox.com * www.pobox.com/~moshe
"The central tenet of Buddhism is not 'Every man for himself.'"
                                         -- Wanda