Bug#273087: kernel-source-2.6.8: CONFIG_DEVFS_MOUNT=y makes disk partitions inaccessible
On Thu, 23 Sep 2004 12:55:04 -0700, David Liontooth wrote:
> Package: kernel-source-2.6.8
> Version: 2.6.8-6
> Severity: normal
>
> When I use CONFIG_DEVFS_MOUNT=y on a dual xeon, the main /dev/hda drive still boots
> fine to /dev/hda1, but swap on /dev/hda2 won't mount on boot or with "swapon -a", fdisk
> sees nothing, and cfdisk says "FATAL ERROR: Cannot open disk drive". Booting with
> "devfs=nomount" solves the problem.
I'm failing to see the bug, here. Your system didn't mount swap because
you told the kernel to mount devfs on /dev; devfs uses a different naming
scheme for devices. So, you must modify /etc/fstab to use the devfs
names, or you can install the devfsd package for backwards compatibility.
CONFIG_DEVFS_FS's help screen says, "This is work in progress. If you want to use this,
you *must* read the material in <file:Documentation/filesystems/devfs/>,
especially the file README there."
The README says things like, "IF YOU CONFIGURE TO MOUNT DEVFS AT BOOT, MAKE SURE YOU
INSTALL DEVFSD BEFORE YOU BOOT A DEVFS-ENABLED KERNEL!" I don't know how
to make it more clear than that.
>
> This is pretty alarming and it took me a while to pinpoint the problem,
> so I hope at least a warning can be inserted in the help screen.
>
There's far too much devfs documentation to fit into the help screen,
that's why it says to read the README.
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