--- Begin Message ---
- To: submit@bugs.debian.org
- Subject: s390 installer doesn't support CMS minidisks; tries to mount partitions in wrong order
- From: Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@yahoo.com>
- Date: Tue, 23 Oct 2007 08:28:38 -0700 (PDT)
- Message-id: <704707.25719.qm@web38201.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
Package: installation-reports
Boot method: VM reader
Image version:
/dists/etch/main/installer-s390/20070308etch1/images/generic/*
Date: 2007-10-19
Machine: ESA/390-mode virtual machine under z/VM 5.2.0
Processor: 2086 (z/890) IFL (real processor)
Memory: 512M (virtual machine memory)
Partitions:
ADDR DEVT CYLS MOUNT COMMENTS
---- ---- ---- ----- --------
0200 3390 2000 / CMS FORMAT/RESERVE
0201 3390 75 /boot Linux cdl
0202 3390 500 /home CMS FORMAT/RESERVE
0203 3390 543 swap CMS FORMAT/RESERVE
Output of lspci -nn and lspci -vnn: N/A
Base System Installation Checklist:
[O] = OK, [E] = Error (please elaborate below), [ ] =
didn't try it
Initial boot: [O]
Detect network card: [O]
Configure network: [O]
Detect CD: [N/A]
Load installer modules: [O]
Detect hard drives: [O]
Partition hard drives: [E]
Install base system: [ ]
Clock/timezone setup: [ ]
User/password setup: [ ]
Install tasks: [ ]
Install boot loader: [ ]
Overall install: [ ]
Comments/Problems:
The s390 Debian installer, running in a virtual
machine under z/VM, cannot handle minidisks which have
been pre-formatted by the CMS FORMAT command, whether
they have been processed by the CMS RESERVE command or
not. The installer detects the minidisks and will
bring them online if they are selected. The installer
also allows the low-level formatting of these disks
(dasdfmt) to be skipped. However, the installer does
not recognize the implicit single partition which is
already present on these minidisks. Therefore, there
is no way to tell the installer to high-level format
(mke2fs) these partitions, nor to assign a mount point
to these partitions.
I eventually got the system configured the way I
wanted it, but I had to do the installation to Linux
cdl minidisks and then manually copy everything
(except the /boot partition) to CMS-formatted
minidisks. The requirement to do this turns Debian
into a hacker's distro again and defeats the purpose
of the nice installer. Support for CMS-formatted
minidisks is important because they are the only
format of minidisk which works with the dasd_diag
driver, which I wanted to use. (Incidentally, the
default kernel image does not include the
dasd_diag_mod module, which it should. I had to
download the kernel source code and configure and
build my own kernel to get the dasd_diag_mod module
that I needed.)
Another problem with the installer is that it tries to
mount the partitions in the order listed on the screen
instead of in the order required by the file system.
For example, if one wants device 200, partition 1, to
be the "/boot" partition and device 201, partition 1,
to be the "/" partition, this will fail. It should
try to mount "/" first, then "/boot". Instead, it
tries to mount "/boot" first, which fails because "/"
is not yet mounted. Follow the tree structure, not
increasing device numbers!
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