Re: showstopper for debian-7.1.0-powerpc-netinst.iso on POWER5 (p505) and iscsi disk

[Michael Felt <mamfelt@gmail.com>]

Hi Frank,

Thanks for the quick reply. I could follow your report a lot better than the archives from february. As I mentioned, I did an install using the 6.0.7 netinst iso image (is this squeeze?), using a vtopt DVD device. The problem I had is that the default grub did not assign the correct, nor could it boot from the device.

Note: my hardware is "only" Power5, so I do not know how applicable this is for Power7. My VIOS is fairly current though (v2.2.2.+).

In short, the only change I made was switching the netinst.iso from version 6.0.7 to 7.1.0. I have no clue how I would correct the problem of how the partition layout was made before:

         SCSI1 (0,1,0) (sda) - 10.7 GB AIX VDASD            a           x
  x          >     #1  primary    7.3 MB  B  K                  a           x
  x          >     #2  primary   10.2 GB     F  ext3    /       a           x
  x          >     #5  logical  504.4 MB     F  swap    swap    a           x

to what it made this evening (no screen capture, but I recall only two partitions: #2 ext4, and #5 swap.
In short, whatever program is supposed to be making these partitions, is not.

Also, I recall that it was calling it SCSI1 (0,3,0) - maybe because I modified disks and it know has LUN ID 0x83000000, rather 0x81000000 - would that have that effect (server is powered off, or I would look again). (atcually, not sure if it said SCSI1 - but I recall being surprised by the (0,3,0) identifier/string.

When I have more time I will do the install again, and make a screen shot.
regards,
Michael

On Tue, Aug 6, 2013 at 5:23 AM, Frank Fegert <fra.nospam.nk@gmx.de> wrote:

Hello Michael,

On Tue, Aug 06, 2013 at 03:44:01AM +0800, Michael Felt wrote:
> [...]
>
>   ??????????????? [!!] Install yaboot on a hard disk ?????????????????????????????
>   ??????                                                                       ???
>   ??????                     No bootstrap partition found                      ???
>   ?????? No hard disks were found which have an "Apple_Bootstrap" partition.   ???
>   ?????? You must create an 819200-byte partition with type "Apple_Bootstrap". ???
>   ??????                                                                       ???
>   ??????     <Go Back>                                          <Continue>     ???
>   ??????                                                                       ???
>   ????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

>
> I had chosen the option "whole disk" - all in one - recommended for new,
> and it created two partitions only (#2 ext4, and #5 swap).
>
> Is my assumption correct that I will need to use manual and create an
> additional partition named "Apple_Bootstrap" _(for now at least) - and if
> so, is there a preferred disk partition # to be used?
>
> Thanks for the feedback.
>
> p.s. a pointer to the bugs site is also welcome and I'll report and feed
> the bug report.

do you per chance have the d-i ISO image mounted via a VTOPT device
from e.g. a underlying VIO server? If so, please take a look at:
  http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=352914

starting at Message #194. Or the mailing list archive here:
  http://lists.debian.org/debian-powerpc/2013/02/msg00023.html

In my case it turned out the installer did everything fine WRT the
partition layout, but the "find-partitions" command used to detect
the "Apple_Bootstrap" partition stumbled upon the ISO image mounted
via a VTOPT from the VIO server. See here for a full writeup of the
whole ordeal:
  http://www.bityard.org/blog/2013/02/17/debian_wheezy_on_ibm_power

According to the latest update in the bug report this issue should
be fixed in more recent versions of the d-i. Didn't test this with
the new versions though ...

HTH & best regards,

    Frank Fegert