Hi Andrew, This patch set frees the restriction that makedumpfile users should install a vmlinux file (including the debugging information) into each system.
makedumpfile command is the dump filtering feature for kdump. It creates a small dumpfile by filtering unnecessary pages for the analysis. To distinguish unnecessary pages, it needs a vmlinux file including the debugging information. These days, the debugging package becomes a huge file, and it is hard to install it into each system. To solve the problem, kdump developers discussed it at lkml and kexec-ml. As the result, we reached the conclusion that necessary information for dump filtering (called "vmcoreinfo") should be embedded into the first kernel file and it should be accessed through /proc/vmcore during the second kernel. (http://www.uwsg.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0707.0/1806.html) Dan Aloni created the patch set for the above implementation. (http://www.uwsg.iu.edu/hypermail/linux/kernel/0707.1/1053.html) And I updated it for multi architectures and memory models. (http://lists.infradead.org/pipermail/kexec/2007-August/000479.html) PATCH SET: [1/3] [linux] Add vmcoreinfo The patch is for linux-2.6.22. The patch adds the vmcoreinfo data. Its address and size are output to /sys/kernel/vmcoreinfo. [2/3] [kexec-tools] Pass vmcoreinfo's address and size The patch is for kexec-tools-testing-20070330. (http://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/kernel/people/horms/kexec-tools/) kexec command gets the address and size of the vmcoreinfo data from /sys/kernel/vmcoreinfo, and passes them to the second kernel through ELF header of /proc/vmcore. When the second kernel is booting, the kernel gets them from the ELF header and creates vmcoreinfo's PT_NOTE segment into /proc/vmcore. [3/3] [makedumpfile] Extract vmcoreinfo from /proc/vmcore The patch is for makedumpfile v1.1.6. (https://sourceforge.net/projects/makedumpfile/) makedumpfile command extracts the vmcoreinfo data from /proc/vmcore and uses it for dump filtering. Usage: - Run the first kernel applied with [PATCH 1/3]. - Preload the second kernel by the kexec-tools applied with [PATCH 2/3]. - Cause panic and switch to the second kernel. - Get a dumpfile by the makedumpfile applied with [PATCH 3/3]: (Ex.) # makedumpfile -cd31 /proc/vmcore dumpfile Thanks Ken'ichi Ohmichi - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in the body of a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html Please read the FAQ at http://www.tux.org/lkml/
