Re: how to implement my unused /var partition in FC4?

From: andrew (seawolf_at_scssi.org)
Date: 07/14/05 

Date: 14 Jul 2005 08:07:28 -0700

Hello, Robert, Jan et al

thanks for the tips

I emerged my lost /dev/sda5 (intended /var) partition and
the system is working... well, sort of. It seems i need to
fix my Logical Volume Management (LVM) - (didn't know the
beast existed until today).

I attempted another rescue-mode fix (details below) and rebooted.
The boot stalled for a loooong time (i thought indefinitely)
but then proceeded, with errors, until system was up.
Here are the boot errors (i am retyping so, may not be exact,
character for character):

Setting up Logical Volume Management: /var/lock: mkdir failed:
Read-only filesystem
No Volume groups found [ OK ]

[

<skip>

Starting system logger # a 30-second wait, then switches to
                 # non-gui console and hangs for about 5 to 7 minutes

Then boots with more errors while starting various services, having
to do with write permissions (as far as i can remember - i couldn't
find anything in the logs about it, perhaps, because the log entries
were not made, due to the problem at hand, or because i don't
know where to look)

Any tips about fixing my LVM appreciated (i'm assuming that's
all that's left to fix)

When the system finally comes up, it seems to be fully operational,
and is writing to the (newly aligned) /var directory and partition

Below is what i did in rescue mode.

TIA
Andrew

my rescue mode procedure:

First, for the record, in my initiall post i mistakenly said
"/sysimage/blah", but the actual path of the moint point was
"/mnt/sysimage/blah". Same with "/mnt/sysimage/var", etc...

Second, here is what it did and didn't:

I did not chroot /mnt/sysimage, because that precludes me from creating
a volatile, temporary moint point - /mnt/sysimage/blah (just excess
caution to minimize creating permanent stuff during the fix)

Thus, in my linux rescue mode, i did:

 mkdir /mnt/sysimage/blah
 mount -t ext3 /dev/sda5 /mnt/sysimage/blah
 cp -apR /mnt/sysimage/var/* /mnt/sysimage/blah/
 # the "-p" is to preserve permissions and timestamps

 cd /mnt/sysimage
 mv ./var ./tvar # rename the existing var directory to get it
                  # out of the way, but restorable

 mkdir ./var # create the new designated mount point for /dev/sda5

 Then i added my fstab entry ( /dev/sda5 /var etc. etc. )

powered down. Rebooted, with errors (see above :-)

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