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Re: "Waiting for root file system..." hang solved

From: <cls(at)truffula.sj.ca.us>
Date: Fri Nov 02 2007 - 18:33:06 EDT

[This message has also been posted to linux.debian.user.] In article <9l0Hy-3FQ-5@gated-at.bofh.it>, Johannes Wiedersich wrote:
>
> Cameron L. Spitzer wrote:
> [snip upgrade instructions]
>
> Thanks for posting your experience! I am sure it will be useful to others.
>
>> You could have a debate about whether this is an installer
>> bug, a kernel package bug, a udev bug, or operator error.
>
> If I understand correctly, you upgraded the kernel and the new kernel
> would not boot. Then it would be a kernel bug.

That was my initial conclusion. But then I spent some time googling for the error messages. A lot of people have had this same hang, and most of them got there by some other path than I did. So I think it may be a more general problem than that.

My friend in Los Angeles tried to install Ubuntu for a friend, and got stuck "waiting for root file system" in the middle of a fresh install from CD. When he booted his trusty Knoppix CD it revealed the root file system was just fine. I suspect udev device names are less persistent than we have assumed they are.

> - From the installation/upgrade instructions from sarge to etch I
> remember, that one was supposed to upgrade the kernel and just the
> kernel, then reboot and upgrade other packages. Is this still the case?
> Did you follow the upgrade instructions?

That's what I did. When I installed an Etch kernel on Sarge, it pulled in a new libc, locales, and a few other things. It replaced module-utils. I think it replaced devfs with udev. When I installed a Lenny kernel on a fresh Etch, it just put the new kernel in along side the old one. Nothing else new.

I agree udev is an improvement over devfs or just having all possible static device nodes. But would it be unreasonable to create static device nodes for the devices in the boot path? Or in /etc/fstab?
Can I do that, or will udev just take them away?

I've read the udev manpages and I just get more and more confused. It's that old unix documentation canard that "examples will just limit your creativity." Udev needs a top-down explanation and an introductory tutorial with complete examples. There's a "view from ten thousand feet" overview (the conference paper), and lots of details (the manpages), but no bridge between them.

Cameron

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Received on Fri Nov 2 18:48:48 2007

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