Re: [OmniOS-discuss] Boot from mirrored USB?
On 2013-10-31 18:28, Günther Alka wrote: Only problem: currently you can only boot from usb when you plugin the sticks in those ports that were used during setup. It would be perfect it you may boot from any usb port maybe on similar mainboards. But this seems a Grub restriction where the physical bootdevice is hardcoded during setup. This is also a problem in other cases, such as attempts to switch from LegacyIDE to SATA on the motherboard. In my case on a laptop, booting from USB causes the SATA devices to be enumerated differently than if I boot from a SATA disk, so legacy-ide is the only practically working option :( My research into the problem led me to believe that it is possible to code a different solution into the bootloader and rpool-importer, but my attempts to complete this have stalled :( I may be wrong (some time has passed) but somewhere here: http://src.illumos.org/source/xref/illumos-gate/usr/src/lib/libgrubmgmt/common/libgrub_fs.c ...grub locates the physpath strings from the rpool-component labels and passes these strings to the kernel (as well as the rootfs dataset by number, not name). Then in zfs_mountroot() at http://src.illumos.org/source/xref/illumos-gate/usr/src/uts/common/fs/zfs/zfs_vfsops.c the booted kernel tries to mount the provided device path - which fails due to renamed devices. I tried to make GRUB also detect and pass the GUID of the pool for the process to fall back in case of absent devices, and this required to implement appropriate ascii_to_uint64() and/or ascii_to_uint64_hex(), and the opposite functions in both GRUB and ZFS, as well as to figure out the proper use of nvlists and spa_import_rootpool() and stuff like that. In short, this seemed like an easy quest for someone who knows their way around the ZFS code, but I was blind there and did fail. I believe the GUID value passing from GRUB to kernel worked (but not completely certain of that though), and mounting of an rpool by GUID apparently did not succeed, and then I had other pressing quests :( If anyone is interested to pick up, I can share the diffs of what I did though :) HTH, //Jim Klimov ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss
Re: [OmniOS-discuss] Boot from mirrored USB?
On 2013-11-01 19:03, alka wrote:
Sadly I cannot help to overcome this behaviour.
If one could plugin any bootable device in any slot
(sata, ide or usb) and it would bootup just like
plain old stupid DOS with the bios bootup order-
that would be a huge improvement in handling -
allowing preconfigured deploy and emergency disks
I really hope someone with more Grub knowledge
is willing to look at this item as well and help to fix it.
See if Alex Eremin's revival of Failsafe Boot helps for such cases?
http://alexeremin.blogspot.ru/2013/05/firefly-failsafe-image-for-illumos.html
AFAIK, this should use GRUB to load a failsafe miniroot into RAM
from the provided filesystem (including from ZFS), and does not
rely on the kernel rpool import at all.
The project is distributed as ISO and USB images, but according
to comments, the former can be unpacked and files from it can be
used from grub:
# Download ISO, unpack ISO and copy files to boot-url
# The ramdisk is compressed with gzip, which must be unpacked
# to work with iPXE
# mv firefly firefly.gz
# gunzip firefly.gz
kernel ${base-url}/platform/i86pc/kernel/amd64/unix
module ${base-url}/firefly
Hmm... I don't think I've after all tried this with my laptop...
And I don't think that the image building recipe was described
or opensourced either, as this was a PoC release...
//Jim
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Re: [OmniOS-discuss] Boot from mirrored USB?
On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 11:54:50 +, Ben Summers wrote: Hello, I'm speccing out some new hardware. It seems challenging to get vendor supported configurations which give you lots of discs on a Solarish OS, rather than using horrid RAID cards. The best config I've found so far seems to be a Fujitsu RX200 with 4 internal 15k SAS discs (the internal supported card can only do 8 drives if you use RAID), plus a Fujitsu branded LSI controller connected to an Intel 3.5 JBOD array for bulk storage and maybe an SSD for ZIL. Because I'd like to use all the internal discs for a database as a pair of mirrors in a single JBOD, I was wondering if anyone boots from USB discs? SmartOS is designed to run from USB drives. I don't know if their configuration supports mirroring, though. -- Chris Nehren ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss
Re: [OmniOS-discuss] Boot from mirrored USB?
I believe napp-it based on OmniOS also boots from USB. The mirroring is hard because I don't think it is a native ZFS boot -- works more like a ram disk. On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 9:53 AM, Chris Nehren cnehren+omnios-disc...@omniti.com wrote: On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 11:54:50 +, Ben Summers wrote: Hello, I'm speccing out some new hardware. It seems challenging to get vendor supported configurations which give you lots of discs on a Solarish OS, rather than using horrid RAID cards. The best config I've found so far seems to be a Fujitsu RX200 with 4 internal 15k SAS discs (the internal supported card can only do 8 drives if you use RAID), plus a Fujitsu branded LSI controller connected to an Intel 3.5 JBOD array for bulk storage and maybe an SSD for ZIL. Because I'd like to use all the internal discs for a database as a pair of mirrors in a single JBOD, I was wondering if anyone boots from USB discs? SmartOS is designed to run from USB drives. I don't know if their configuration supports mirroring, though. -- Chris Nehren ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss -- Theo Schlossnagle http://omniti.com/is/theo-schlossnagle ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss
Re: [OmniOS-discuss] Boot from mirrored USB?
Thanks for all the feedback! It sounds like it's worth a bit of experimentation, but I should make sure things like /var are not on the USB stick. :-) Ben On 31 Oct 2013, at 14:19, Rob Logan r...@logan.com wrote: Some of my servers boot opendiana 151 from mirrored USB. I built a few root mirrored USB systems (three way), but stop because /var was wearing out the cheap USB sticks. http://rob.com/lancair/2013.01/usb.jpg Rob ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss -- http://bens.me.uk ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss
Re: [OmniOS-discuss] Boot from mirrored USB?
On 31/10/2013 13:53, Chris Nehren wrote: On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 11:54:50 +, Ben Summers wrote: Hello, I'm speccing out some new hardware. It seems challenging to get vendor supported configurations which give you lots of discs on a Solarish OS, rather than using horrid RAID cards. The best config I've found so far seems to be a Fujitsu RX200 with 4 internal 15k SAS discs (the internal supported card can only do 8 drives if you use RAID), plus a Fujitsu branded LSI controller connected to an Intel 3.5 JBOD array for bulk storage and maybe an SSD for ZIL. Because I'd like to use all the internal discs for a database as a pair of mirrors in a single JBOD, I was wondering if anyone boots from USB discs? SmartOS is designed to run from USB drives. I don't know if their configuration supports mirroring, though. I guess that depends on how we interpret mirroring. Mirrored boot disks make sense and are required in a traditional environment such as OmniOS. SmartOS just needs a method of getting the server up and running. SmartOS can be booted from a USB stick; CD ROM; or iPXE boot - effectively two fallback methods in addition to your primary boot method. ZFS has use of all the disks - internal or otherwise - for data storage. Depending on their size I'd recommend 3-way mirrors to ensure redundancy in the event of a disk failure and long resilver times. I'm not against OmniOS - we run it here and love it! The only negative I can see running SmartOS is the lack of IPS packaging - but it's a minor negative at that. -- Mark signature.asc Description: OpenPGP digital signature ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss
Re: [OmniOS-discuss] Boot from mirrored USB?
I have been running OmniOS and Napp-It on my Dell T710 server, booting off of a USB stick running on the internal port for several months, with no issues or problems. I deliberately found and bought an SLC flash-based USB stick for this purpose, on Taobao (China's Ebay) last time I visited, which were dirt-cheap ($20 for 16 GB) and work like a charm. This is the main fileserver I use everyday, and USB booting works fine. I am also running OpenIndiana on my major workstation, with mirrored SLC Intel SSDs, and again no issues or problems; just followed the standard installation guide, and everything works fine. Peter On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 3:01 PM, Theo Schlossnagle je...@omniti.com wrote: I believe napp-it based on OmniOS also boots from USB. The mirroring is hard because I don't think it is a native ZFS boot -- works more like a ram disk. On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 9:53 AM, Chris Nehren cnehren+omnios-disc...@omniti.com wrote: On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 11:54:50 +, Ben Summers wrote: Hello, I'm speccing out some new hardware. It seems challenging to get vendor supported configurations which give you lots of discs on a Solarish OS, rather than using horrid RAID cards. The best config I've found so far seems to be a Fujitsu RX200 with 4 internal 15k SAS discs (the internal supported card can only do 8 drives if you use RAID), plus a Fujitsu branded LSI controller connected to an Intel 3.5 JBOD array for bulk storage and maybe an SSD for ZIL. Because I'd like to use all the internal discs for a database as a pair of mirrors in a single JBOD, I was wondering if anyone boots from USB discs? SmartOS is designed to run from USB drives. I don't know if their configuration supports mirroring, though. -- Chris Nehren ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss -- Theo Schlossnagle http://omniti.com/is/theo-schlossnagle ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss
Re: [OmniOS-discuss] Boot from mirrored USB?
napp-it has a web menu entry to create ZFS mirrored disks or mirrored usb sticks (both bootable) following the blog of Constantin Gonzales: http://constantin.glez.de/blog/2011/03/how-set-zfs-root-pool-mirror-oracle-solaris-11-express With high quality and fast usb sticks especially in a mirrored config and atime disabled, usb boot is a very attractive boot method where you can easily create clones of sticks for backups or OS deployment (I offer a free Windows clone tool and preconfigured OmniOS images for download at napp-it.org). Performance wise usb boot is quite ok. Only problem: currently you can only boot from usb when you plugin the sticks in those ports that were used during setup. It would be perfect it you may boot from any usb port maybe on similar mainboards. But this seems a Grub restriction where the physical bootdevice is hardcoded during setup. On 31.10.2013 15:01, Theo Schlossnagle wrote: I believe napp-it based on OmniOS also boots from USB. The mirroring is hard because I don't think it is a native ZFS boot -- works more like a ram disk. On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 9:53 AM, Chris Nehren cnehren+omnios-disc...@omniti.com mailto:cnehren+omnios-disc...@omniti.com wrote: On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 11:54:50 +, Ben Summers wrote: Hello, I'm speccing out some new hardware. It seems challenging to get vendor supported configurations which give you lots of discs on a Solarish OS, rather than using horrid RAID cards. The best config I've found so far seems to be a Fujitsu RX200 with 4 internal 15k SAS discs (the internal supported card can only do 8 drives if you use RAID), plus a Fujitsu branded LSI controller connected to an Intel 3.5 JBOD array for bulk storage and maybe an SSD for ZIL. Because I'd like to use all the internal discs for a database as a pair of mirrors in a single JBOD, I was wondering if anyone boots from USB discs? SmartOS is designed to run from USB drives. I don't know if their configuration supports mirroring, though. -- Chris Nehren ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com mailto:OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss -- Theo Schlossnagle http://omniti.com/is/theo-schlossnagle ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss -- H f G Hochschule für Gestaltung university of design Schwäbisch Gmünd Marie-Curie-Str. 19 73529 Schwäbisch Gmünd Guenther Alka, Dipl.-Ing. (FH) Leiter des Rechenzentrums head of computer center Tel 07171 602 624 Fax 07171 69259 guenther.a...@hfg-gmuend.de http://rz.hfg-gmuend.de ___ OmniOS-discuss mailing list OmniOS-discuss@lists.omniti.com http://lists.omniti.com/mailman/listinfo/omnios-discuss
