/boot is 100% full (corrupted ?)

samengr · 01-22-2008, 04:03 AM

Hi Linux gurrus :-)

hope you all will be doing well.

Well I am facing a problem first time in my sys admin experience. I am using RHEL-4, I am unable to access /boot partition. when i try to access this partion or want to show its contents, It seems /boot is corrupted. see the following outputs

#ls /boot/
9?^?????tdÜ°??????4?çj?

#df -h
Filesystem Size Used Avail Use% Mounted on
/dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00
145G 98G 40G 72% /
/dev/sda1 1.4T 1.4T 0 100% /boot
none 501M 0 501M 0% /dev/shm

Note: its showing the wrong entries /dev/sda1 (1.4T) and its 100% full.

#fdisk -l

Disk /dev/sda: 80.0 GB, 80000000000 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9726 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sda1 * 1 13 104391 83 Linux
/dev/sda2 14 9726 78019672+ 8e Linux LVM

Disk /dev/sdb: 80.0 GB, 80000000000 bytes
255 heads, 63 sectors/track, 9726 cylinders
Units = cylinders of 16065 * 512 = 8225280 bytes

Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System
/dev/sdb1 * 1 9726 78124063+ 8e Linux LVM

Can any body help me whats wrong with /boot? Number of applications are being run (24x7) on this server. I cant reboot it and cant interrupt the running applications. Can any body tell me what should i do now?

Server's info:

#cat /etc/redhat-release
Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES release 4 (Nahant Update 5)

# uname -r
2.6.9-11.ELsmp

waiting for an early response.

Thanks
Sohail

Lenard · 01-22-2008, 05:43 AM

Remove old and unwanted kernel updates carefully, this will free up space on the /boot partition.

rpm -qa 'kernel*'
rpm -e kernel-<version number here>

FYI: kernel-2.6.9-11.ELsmp is quite a bit out of date(RHEL4 update 1), it may be a good idea to plan and execute a system restart. The latest is kernel-smp-2.6.9-67.0.1.EL Dec. 21, 2007

FYI: You might want to fully update this system before the restart also.

samengr · 01-22-2008, 06:13 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lenard

Remove old and unwanted kernel updates carefully, this will free up space on the /boot partition.

rpm -qa 'kernel*'
rpm -e kernel-<version number here>

FYI: kernel-2.6.9-11.ELsmp is quite a bit out of date(RHEL4 update 1), it may be a good idea to plan and execute a system restart. The latest is kernel-smp-2.6.9-67.0.1.EL Dec. 21, 2007

FYI: You might want to fully update this system before the restart also.

*********************
Thanks for your reply, I really appreciate your time.

See the output

#rpm -qa | grep kernel
kernel-2.6.9-11.EL
kernel-utils-2.4-13.1.66
kernel-smp-2.6.9-11.EL

I cant reboot the system as clients applications are running on this server. Can you suggest something else? I know it may create problem if i reboot the server, so can we save whats in the server and then once satisfied then take risk to reboot?

waiting for your help.

Sam

Lenard · 01-22-2008, 07:59 AM

I suggested that you plan (schedule a date/time) a update/maintenance/reboot of the system, this is a good idea please consider doing so ASAP. The kernel for one has been updated numerous times for one, so based on the information you posted;

Quote:

#rpm -qa | grep kernel
kernel-2.6.9-11.EL
kernel-utils-2.4-13.1.66
kernel-smp-2.6.9-11.EL

the system is runing an RHEL4 update1 kernel.

If the output from the typed command cat /etc/*release shows that the system is at the update 5 level then the running smp kernel should be upgraded to at least the 2.6.9-55.EL smp kernel.

As a suggestion try unmounting the /boot partition; unmount /dev/sda1
After verifying that /dev/sda1 is the boot partition, then remount the partition;
mount -t auto /dev/sda1 /boot

FYI: one does not need the /boot partition to be mounted unless a kernel or module update is being done.

Code:

$ parted /dev/sda
WARNING: You are not superuser.  Watch out for permissions.
Warning: Unable to open /dev/sda read-write (Permission denied).  /dev/sda has
been opened read-only.
Warning: Unable to open /dev/sda read-write (Permission denied).  /dev/sda has
been opened read-only.
GNU Parted 1.8.2
Using /dev/sda
Welcome to GNU Parted! Type 'help' to view a list of commands.
(parted) print
Model: ATA ST98823AS (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 80.0GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos

Number  Start   End     Size    Type      File system  Flags
 1      32.3kB  107MB   107MB   primary   ext3         boot
 2      107MB   52.7GB  52.6GB  primary   ext3
 3      52.7GB  78.9GB  26.2GB  primary   ext3
 4      78.9GB  80.0GB  1143MB  extended
 5      78.9GB  80.0GB  1143MB  logical   linux-swap

[lenard@Aspire5100 ~]$ ls -al /boot
total 16
drwxr-xr-x  2 root root 4096 Jan 16 05:47 .
drwxr-xr-x 26 root root 4096 Jan 18 22:15 ..

[lenard@Aspire5100 ~]$ sudo mount -t auto /dev/sda1 /boot

[lenard@Aspire5100 ~]$ ls -al /boot
total 19129
drwxr-xr-x  4 root root    3072 Jan 17 08:37 .
drwxr-xr-x 26 root root    4096 Jan 18 22:15 ..
-rw-r--r--  1 root root   61587 Nov 14 10:47 config-2.6.18-53.1.4.el5
-rw-r--r--  1 root root   47224 Dec 22 11:26 config-2.6.23.12
drwxr-xr-x  2 root root    1024 Jan 17 09:47 grub
-rw-------  1 root root 2437667 Dec  3 16:29 initrd-2.6.18-53.1.4.el5.img
-rw-------  1 root root 1488703 Jul 23  2007 initrd-2.6.21.6.img
-rw-------  1 root root 2388181 Dec 22 10:41 initrd-2.6.23.12.img
-rw-------  1 root root 2388177 Jan 17 08:37 initrd-2.6.23.14.img
drwx------  2 root root   12288 Mar 30  2007 lost+found
-rw-r--r--  1 root root   88649 Nov 14 10:47 symvers-2.6.18-53.1.4.el5.gz
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root      26 Jan 17 08:37 System.map -> /boot/System.map-2.6.23.14
-rw-r--r--  1 root root 1150850 Nov 14 10:47 System.map-2.6.18-53.1.4.el5
-rw-r--r--  1 root root  989961 Jul 23  2007 System.map-2.6.21.6
-rw-r--r--  1 root root 1033632 Dec 22 10:41 System.map-2.6.23.12
-rw-r--r--  1 root root 1033632 Jan 17 08:37 System.map-2.6.23.14
lrwxrwxrwx  1 root root      23 Jan 17 08:37 vmlinuz -> /boot/vmlinuz-2.6.23.14
-rw-r--r--  1 root root 1844220 Nov 14 10:47 vmlinuz-2.6.18-53.1.4.el5
-rw-r--r--  1 root root 1496780 Jul 23  2007 vmlinuz-2.6.21.6
-rw-r--r--  1 root root 1504536 Dec 22 10:41 vmlinuz-2.6.23.12
-rw-r--r--  1 root root 1504504 Jan 17 08:37 vmlinuz-2.6.23.14