Re: [SD4L-user] mkfs hangs when creating large container from HD partition

[Hans-Ulrich J. <han...@t-...>]

Hi Jonathan,

Jonathan Coles wrote:
> Hi Ulrich,
> 
>> $ ls -l /dev/sda*
>> brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 0 2008-08-04 12:44 /dev/sda
>> brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 1 2008-08-04 12:44 /dev/sda1
>> brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 3 2008-08-04 13:43 /dev/sda3
>> brw-rw---- 1 root disk 8, 5 2008-08-04 12:44 /dev/sda5
> sda3 is the partition I used. It is a primary partition.
> I belong to the disk group, but I cannot create the volume unless I run 
> Scramdisk using sudo.
> 

you have no rights to access /dev/sda3 unless you change your
active group to "disk" with the command

newgrp disk

a scramdisk started after that command from the same shell
will create the volume.

> Nothing is reported to /var/log/messages about the volume creation.
> 
> When I kill the stalled mkfs.ext2 process, I briefly see a Scramdisk 
> Create dialog showing volume creation 20-30% complete. Then it is 
> covered by an error dialog "Couldn't mount device: Invalid argument". If 
> I move that aside, I can see the value in the Scramdisk Create dialog 
> change to 80% complete. Clicking OK in the error dialog also closes the 
> create dialog.
> 
> A straight mkfs of an ext2 filesystem on the partition works normally.
> 

Today I've managed to reproduce the problem. It's a deadlock produced
in some circumstances by scramdisk waiting for the mkfs command to
finish while the mkfs command is waiting for scramdisk to read it's
output. The "Couldn't mount device: Invalid argument" is simply an
aftereffect of the failed mkfs command.

On the other hand, I haven't seen scramdisk reporting the size of
the whole drive instead of the size of the selected partition, are
you sure about this? If yes, where exactly have you seen the wrong
size?

Finally, I'd like to ask whether you have an urgent need for a bug fix
package. I'm hesitating to publish a complete new bug fix release for
all the supported distributions since I'm preparing for a major new
version which, however, will take some months to be finished.
I could send you a patch for the sources or a package just for your
distribution. What do you think about that?

Best regards
Ulrich