On Saturday September 3, pml@xxxxxxxx wrote: > >Type FD doesn't work with version-1 superblocks. The kernel will not > >auto-assemble them at all. Just use mdadm to assemble them (in an > >rc.d script). > > > >NeilBrown > > > Neil, is this something that will be changed in the future, where FD > partition types will work with version 1 superblocks again at some point? > > Tyler. No. I've never liked kernel autodetect, and while I won't break it, I would like to migrate people away from it. What will, very likely, be implemented is something in 'mdadm' which automatically detects and assembles md arrays. The version-1 superblocks contains a 32byte 'name' field. I imagine something like (but probably different from) putting host:array in here, e.g. vger:mirror notabene:md2 shellpower:scratch You run mdadm -As --config=partitions --hostid=notabene then it scans all partitions for md arrays, looks at those with 'notabene' as the hostname in the 'name' field, and assembles them, creating /dev/$array (e.g. /dev/mirror, /dev/md2, /dev/scratch). If the name looks like mdX, then the obvious minor is chosen. If something else, then some unused minor is chosen. Such a command would reliably assemble all arrays with any need for a config file, and without any risk of getting confused if arrays are imported from another machine (which is one of my issues with autodetect). Then putting such a command in an appropriate 'rc' script, in an initrd image would make everything 'just work', just like in-kernel auto-detect, only better. The reason why it is 'probably different from' is that there are uses like stacking of devices (raid0 on raid1) and creation of partitions that need to be properly understood first. I hope you find that acceptable. NeilBrown - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-raid" in the body of a message to majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
