[SOLVED] Installing Slackware on RAID 1. Misunderstandings with Initrd.

BombJack · 04-12-2021, 08:46 AM

I install Slackware 14.2 64-bit on RAID 1 following README_RAID.TXT (Slackware RAID HOWTO v1.02 2013/03/09 by Amritpal Bath) instruction from ISO distribution.

After creation a customized /etc/mdadm.conf for my system (at the end of "Setup" section):
- mdadm -Es > /etc/mdadm.conf

following recommendation of the official Slackware to switch to the "generic" kernel, I moved on to the "Using the generic kernel" section and ended up creating /etc/mkinitrd.conf and add:
MODULE_LIST="ext4"
RAID="1"

There's a note further down the instructions:

Quote:

Note: If the module for your hard drive controller is not compiled into the
generic kernel, you will want to add that module to the MODULE_LIST variable
in mkinitrd.conf. For example, my controller requires the mptspi module, so
my /etc/mkinitrd.conf looks like:

Code:

  MODULE_LIST="ext4:mptspi"
  RAID="1"

On what I'm stuck on having the following questions:

1) How do I find out if I have a module for the hard drive controller compiled into the generic kernel?
2) And if it is not compiled, then what should be written into the MODULE_LIST variable?

My config:
Motherboard ASUS PRIME B450M-A
Two 1Tb SATA 6Gb/s Western Digital Gold <WD1005FBYZ> 3.5" 7200rpm 128Mb HDDs

allend · 04-15-2021, 01:45 AM

According to this your disk controller uses the ahci kernel driver.
Running 'grep -i ahci /usr/src/linux/.config' on a Slackware 14.2 64-bit install with the generic kernel shows that as builtin.

BombJack · 04-16-2021, 02:47 AM

So, I left /etc/mkinitrd.conf like this:

Code:

  MODULE_LIST="ext4"
  RAID="1"

and continued - finished the instruction and rebooted.

And got this:
https://ibb.co/rFXWy52

Startx and root commands don't work, outputs: /bin/sh: … not found

I must say right away that I carefully checked the command line when executing the instruction, so it is unlikely that I made a mistake in typing.

Does anyone understand what kind of errors he gave out?
And what to do?

colorpurple21859 · 04-16-2021, 05:44 AM

Maybe missing some modules in initrd.conf, did you try this:

Code:

/usr/share/mkinitrd/mkinitrd_command_generator.sh > /etc/mkinitrd.conf

Is you lilo.conf correct? Did you rerun lilo?

BombJack · 05-18-2021, 08:51 AM

Exactly, the script you specified helped, the system booted.

Did the following:

(1)
From the installation flash drive from \slackware64\a\ executed:
installpkg kernel-modules-4.4.14-x86_64-1.txz

I don't know should I have done this, or just run the script (next point)?

(2)
Executed the script:
/usr/share/mkinitrd/mkinitrd_command_generator.sh > /etc/mkinitrd.conf

I got /etc/mkinitrd.conf not the same as in the instructions, but with a long command mkinitrd… something there. I did not execute this command manually.

(3)
Executed again: mkinitrd –F

(4)
Rerun: lilo

(5)
Exited the installer and rebooted:
exit
reboot

and the system booted:

https://ibb.co/6BmqMqC

But when loading, as you can see on the screenshot, when mounting md2, md3 and md4, the system outputs:
No such file or directory while trying to open
Possibly non-existent device
And further:
special device … does not exist

Earlier, when I set up RAID before installing the system, I gave the following commands:

mdadm --create /dev/md0 --name=swap --level 1 --raid-devices 2 \
/dev/sda1 /dev/sdb1

mdadm --create /dev/md1 --name=system --level 1 --raid-devices 2 \
/dev/sda2 /dev/sdb2 --metadata=0.90

mdadm --create /dev/md2 --name=programs --level 1 --raid-devices 2 \
/dev/sda3 /dev/sdb3

mdadm --create /dev/md3 --name=archive --level 1 --raid-devices 2 \
/dev/sda5 /dev/sdb5

mdadm --create /dev/md4 --name=exchange --level 1 --raid-devices 2 \
/dev/sda6 /dev/sdb6

Partitions sizes:
2Gb - Swap
20Gb - system
128Gb - programs
600Gb - archive
181.4Gb - exchange

Then, when installing the system, I assigned the same names to the mount points (disk names).

So, now, when the system has finally booted, disks in Explorer are displayed without a name (bottom left).
But in the Root section there are 3 directories with these names (underlined in red), having the same size of 19 Gb, which does not correspond to the sizes of the disks to which I gave these names:

https://ibb.co/VSM31Nn

Now I have a questions arise:

1) Is this normal, is this how it should be?
2) How to mount these disks (md2, md3, md4) so that in the system (in the file manager) they are displayed under the specified names and can be configured in SAMBA with these names?

Poucket · 05-18-2021, 09:49 PM

what output do you see after the command.. ?

Code:

/sbin/mdadm -Ebsc partitions

BombJack · 05-19-2021, 01:46 AM

Poucket

this:

https://ibb.co/cLM8hPG

https://ibb.co/hBThyBq

Poucket · 05-19-2021, 04:51 AM

Click image for larger version

Name: mdadm.jpg
Views: 25
Size: 128.7 KB
ID: 36436

It looks ok.
All your arrays look healthy

The device names are different from the names in the boot message - /dev/md[234]

Poucket · 05-19-2021, 05:36 AM

Information about how to mount
here and
here.

BombJack · 06-01-2021, 02:50 AM

Here is the content of my Fstab, as it is after installing the system, I did not manually edit it:

Code:

/dev/md0         swap             swap        defaults         0   0
/dev/md1         /                ext4        defaults         1   1
/dev/md2         /programs        ext4        defaults         1   2
/dev/md3         /archive         ext4        defaults         1   2
/dev/md4         /exchange        ext4        defaults         1   2
#/dev/cdrom      /mnt/cdrom       auto        noauto,owner,ro,comment=x-gvfs-show 0   0
/dev/fd0         /mnt/floppy      auto        noauto,owner     0   0
devpts           /dev/pts         devpts      gid=5,mode=620   0   0
proc             /proc            proc        defaults         0   0
tmpfs            /dev/shm         tmpfs       defaults         0   0

Judging by it, I think everything should be mounted, and the corresponding directories: programs, archive, exchange, are present in root.

But why do they all have a size of 20 GB?

And can they be referenced in smb.conf like:

Code:

[archive]
path = /archive
writable = yes
create mask = 0775
directory mask = 0775
force group = users

Will users get the entire volume of 600 GB partition?

Poucket · 06-06-2021, 08:07 AM

Hello BombJack,

Your current fstab created by Slackware during installation would mount /dev/md2 /dev/md3 and /dev/md4 if they
existed on your system.
The output of the mdadm command you posted before shows instead devices /dev/md/programs, /dev/md/archive, and
/dev/md/exchange. These devices are not getting mounted .

To mount the devices just use, for example

Code:

sudo /bin/mount -t ext4 /dev/md/programs /programs

/programs, /archive, and /exchange are all empty directorys in / the 20 GB root partition.

/etc/fstab uses /programs, /archive, and /exchange as mount points but devices to mount there should correspond with
those on your system.

Edit /etc/fstab before next reboot as shown

Code:

/dev/md0         swap             swap        defaults         0   0
/dev/md1         /                ext4        defaults         1   1
/dev/md/programs         /programs        ext4        defaults         1   2
/dev/md/archive          /archive         ext4        defaults         1   2
/dev/md/exchange         /exchange        ext4        defaults         1   2
#/dev/cdrom      /mnt/cdrom       auto        noauto,owner,ro,comment=x-gvfs-show 0   0
/dev/fd0         /mnt/floppy      auto        noauto,owner     0   0
devpts           /dev/pts         devpts      gid=5,mode=620   0   0
proc             /proc            proc        defaults         0   0
tmpfs            /dev/shm         tmpfs       defaults         0   0`

if it helps the 600 GB volume will be available in /programs, /archive and /exchange .

BombJack · 06-15-2021, 08:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Poucket

Your current fstab created by Slackware during installation would mount /dev/md2 /dev/md3 and /dev/md4
The output of the mdadm command you posted before shows instead devices /dev/md/programs, /dev/md/archive, and
/dev/md/exchange.

Thank you Poucket!
Now everything works as it should.

Why did Slackware mark them as /dev/md/, if I specified /dev/md[2 3 4] when creating them?

Many thanks to everyone for your help!

Poucket · 06-19-2021, 05:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BombJack

Why did Slackware mark them as /dev/md/, if I specified /dev/md[2 3 4] when creating them?

Yes. Thought about that question but did not know enough to give a answer. Perhaps someone more familiar with
both mdadm and Slackware installer could tell us what happened.

BTW, BombJack if you have not yet run

Code:

/sbin/swapon -s

to be sure the system is using its virtual memory.
To mount a swap partition the first line of /etc/fstab may also have to be edited.

Code:

/dev/md/swap         swap             swap        defaults         0   0