Bug#519254: Debian Lenny/s390 - unable to boot with a dedicated /boot partition

[Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@wowway.com>]

I just noticed this bug report today.  I am not the package maintainer,
I am another user.  I have noticed this bug too, but I never bothered
to file a bug report.  So since someone else did, I have subscribed
to this bug report.

I believe that this is a legitimate bug.  However, until such time
as it is fixed, I offer you a circumvention.  Apparently, the installer
attempts to mount the devices in increasing device number/partition order.
Thus, in your example, it attempts to mount the partitions in the order:
(3012,1), (3012,2), (3026,1), (3027,1).  In your example, it attempts
to mount /boot before /, which is not possible.  The algorithm needs to
be changed to mount the devices in the order that the file system requires.
To put it simply, mount / first, then mount all remaining mount points
containing a single slash (/boot, /home, etc.), then all remaining mount
points containing two slashes, etc., until all partitions are mounted.
Swap spaces are not part of the file system and can be mounted independently.

Given the algorithm used by the installer today, you can use a separate
/boot partition, but its device number/partition must be higher than
the device number/partition of the / device.  For example, if (3012,1)
was / and (3026,1) was /boot, it would have worked.

-- 
  .''`.     Stephen Powell    
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