Re: mdraid and hpa upgrade issues
At 3:58 PM -0400 5/24/07, Jarod Wilson wrote:
Tony Nelson wrote:
> At 2:55 PM -0400 5/24/07, Jarod Wilson wrote:
>> Jarod Wilson wrote:
>>> Okay, fc6 mdraid to f7 upgrading via anaconda works for me now.
>>>
>>>> Once that's done, I'll see what I can do to see if the kernel
option
>>>> libata.ignore_hpa can be used to help those who don't really wanna
>>>> nuke their entire system to move from FC6 to F7.
>>> Starting in on this right now...
>> Got the problem reproducing, but...
>>
>> Unknown boot option 'libata.ignore_hpa=1': ignoring
>>
>> Talked to davej, module parameters can't be passed on the command line
>> just yet. So anyone with an FC6 system that uses part of the host
>> protected area is currently not able to upgrade to F7 using anaconda
>> (FC6 to F7 can be done with some modprobe.conf magic and upgrading via
>> yum though).
>>
>> davej is going to poke some folks who were working on a patch to allow
>> module parameters to be passed on the kernel command line.
>
> Well, this keeps me from upgrading to F7!
Not entirely. You can put the following into /etc/modprobe.conf:
options libata libata.ignore_hpa=1
Then upgrade via yum. Sub-optimal for those who prefer to upgrade via
anaconda, but its an option.
I might do that.
> How serious a problem results from doing an installer upgrade
from FCx to
> F7, no repartitioning? Is it going to cause massive data loss for
> unsuspecting users, or does the Anaconda notice and stop the process?
Warning
The partition table on device sdX was unreadable. To create new
partitions it must be initialized, causing the loss of ALL DATA on this
drive.
This operation will override any previous installation choices about
which drives to ignore.
Would you like to initialize this drive, erasing ALL DATA
No(selected by default) Yes
This is good enough, though an unwelcome surprise for someone who would
have just downloaded 4 GiB of data. Since the kernel automatically
temporarily disables the HPA it might be very common.
> Would a respin be needed to get the installer to work for them
(me)
> (assuming they recovered from the first upgrade attempt)?
At this point in time, its way too late in the game to get a fix into
anaconda, so yes, either a respin or possibly an updates.img as Jesse
suggested would be the only way to get anaconda-based upgrades working
in this situation.
What I thought.
The initial thought is that we'll have to patch both anaconda and
modprobe to be able to recognize and apply kernel module options passed
on the kernel command line. I'll be filing bugs against both
module-init-tools and anaconda shortly. Never say never, but getting a
fix in for the F7 release is highly, highly, highly unlikely.
What I thought. I see by the later posts that a solution may have been found.
Ah, just noticed the email in this thread from Bruno... Could be some
way to deep-six the hpa area within FC6 before upgrading... (and
personal experience would suggest this can be done somehow -- I had a
drive that used to have the hpa issue and now doesn't -- but I know not
the magic incantation).
It's apparantly fairly simple; it's what the kernel normally does with a
flag set to say "permanent" rather than "temporary".
--
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' <http://www.georgeanelson.com/>