mkinitrd stoped making bootable images for me

[Shaul Karl <shaulka@bezeqint.net>]

Package: initrd-tools
Version: 0.1.43

  I was able to boot the machine with older versions of initrd-tools. I
believe the last version that worked for me was 0.1.42 although I am not
sure. In any case, all my attempts to get 0.1.43 to create bootable
images fail. In particular, the ROOT=PROBE from 
/etc/mkinitrd/mkinitrd.conf doesn't seem to do much now. It seems to me
that the problem is that it insists on either ext3 or devfs. I have 
neither. Follows the last messages of the boot screen:

    [ Detection of scsi devices and partition tables is correct. ]
    umount: devfs: not mounted.
    modprobe: modprobe: Can't locate module dedvfs
    mount: devfs has wrong device number or fs type devfs not supported
    mknod: `devfs/root': Operation not permitted
    mount: special device /devfs/root does not exists
    warning: can't open /etc/mtab: No such file or directory
    umount: devfs: not mounted
    pivot_root: No such file or directory
    /sbin/init: 135: cannot open /dev/console: No such file
    Kernel panic: Attempted to kill init!

The configuration files by which that initrd image was created is as
follows:

    ::::::::::::::
    /etc/mkinitrd/files
    ::::::::::::::
/etc/isapnpModule.conf

    ::::::::::::::
    /etc/mkinitrd/mkinitrd.conf
    ::::::::::::::
# /etc/mkinitrd/mkinitrd.conf:
#  Configuration file for mkinitrd(8).  See mkinitrd.conf(5).
#
# This file is meant to be parsed as a shell script.

# What modules to install.
MODULES=most

# The length (in seconds) of the startup delay during which linuxrc may be
# interrupted.
DELAY=10

# If this is set to probe mkinitrd will try to figure out what's needed to
# mount the root file system.  This is equivalent to the old PROBE=on setting.
ROOT="/dev/sda2 ext2"

# This controls the permission of the resulting initrd image.
UMASK=022

# Command to generate the initrd image.
MKIMAGE='mkcramfs %s %s > /dev/null'

# Set this to yes if you wan to use busybox(1).
BUSYBOX=no

    ::::::::::::::
    /etc/mkinitrd/modules
    ::::::::::::::
# /etc/mkinitrd/modules: Kernel modules to load for initrd.
#
# This file should contain the names of kernel modules and their arguments
# (if any) that are needed to mount the root file system, one per line.
# Comments begin with a `#', and everything on the line after them are ignored.
#
# You must run mkinitrd(8) to effect this change.
#
# Examples:
#
#  ext2
#  wd io=0x300

ext2
    
    ::::::::::::::
    /etc/mkinitrd/scripts/e2fsprogs
    ::::::::::::::
#!/bin/sh
ext3root=`grep -v '^ *#' /etc/fstab | awk '{ if (($2 == "/") && ($3 == "ext3")) {print $1;}}'`
if test -n "$ext3root" ; then
    /sbin/tune2fs -O has_journal $ext3root > /dev/null
fi


-- System Information
Debian Release: testing/unstable
Architecture: i386
Kernel: Linux calanit 2.4.20-6.custom486.2 #1 Sat Mar 29 15:14:10 IDT 2003 i486
Locale: LANG=C, LC_CTYPE=C

Versions of packages initrd-tools depends on:
ii  coreutils                     5.0-1      The GNU core utilities
ii  coreutils [fileutils]         5.0-1      The GNU core utilities
ii  cpio                          2.5-1      GNU cpio -- a program to manage ar
ii  cramfsprogs                   1.1-4      Tools for CramFs (Compressed ROM F
ii  dash                          0.4.16     The Debian Almquist Shell
ii  modutils                      2.4.21-2   Linux module utilities.
ii  util-linux                    2.11z-1    Miscellaneous system utilities.
-- 

    Shaul Karl, shaulka@bezeqint.n e t