Re: installing a 4.1 DOMU

[Brook Milligan <brook%nmsu.edu@localhost>]

On Mon, 16 Jul 2012 23:43:36 +0200
Jean-Yves Migeon <jeanyves.migeon%free.fr@localhost> wrote:

> On 16.07.2012 21:14, Brook Milligan wrote:
> > - The INSTALL_XEN3PAE_DOMU kernel seems to think that the root
> > filesystem is readonly.  Consequently, disklabel fails and the
> > installation cannot be completed.  However, within the same system a
> > manual installation can be completed just fine.  Is this a
> > deficiency with setup in some way?
> 
> What do you mean by "within the same system"? Mounting vnd0a and
> installing the system inside?

I simply meant that if I drop into the shell while in sysinst, I can
manually mount /dev/xbd0a and install a complete system to
it. Thus, the DOM0 is presenting the underlying device to the DOMU
correctly.  However, even manually I cannot successfully run
disklabel on xbd0 as it seems to be readonly.  I am confused about why
I can mount it read/write but disklabel thinks it is readonly. 

Of course I can install the system outside of the DOMU altogether; I
was just following the suggestion in the NetBSD Xen Howto
(http://www.netbsd.org/ports/xen/howto.html) which is to boot an
INSTALL kernel.

> "root = xbd0a" is enough, but usually this is not needed.

Yes, I found that it works to include the root= statement, but that it
is not necessary.

> - using the image file as a partition, rather than a disk. This can
> lead to all kind of weird errors, like EROFS when attempting to
> overwrite the disklabel.

I'm not certain I understand what you mean by this.  I am creating an
image file, using vnconfig on that to create a virtual disk from it,
and passing that virtual disk as a xen phy: device.  That seems to
work fine.  Is that not correct?

Thanks for your help.

Cheers,
Brook