[Server-devel] Debugging booting problems with F9 on SD card...

[Jerry Vonau]

On Tue, 2009-04-14 at 20:45 +0200, Martin Langhoff wrote:
> On Tue, Apr 14, 2009 at 2:24 PM, Martin Langhoff
> <martin.langhoff at gmail.com> wrote:
> > If I replace the kernel with an OLPC kernel, at least it tries to open
> > mmcblk0p1 -- and fails, because the drivers we need are built as
> > modules.
> >
> > Have you had any success?
> 
not much really with F9..

> Using dsd's XO-alt-distro scripts we can get a kernel build that has
> all the relevant bits for the XO, and builds the MMC  modules we want
> statically.
> 
What version of the kernel does/can it build? I've looked at scripts,
it's looking at a local source tree, can we rig it work a remote git? or
maybe use a source tree based on the source rpm layout? I wouldn't have
time till the weekend to look at any of that.  


> As they are, dsd's scripts setup an initrd that fails exactly like the
> other ones. But as the modules we want are linked statically, we don't
> need the initrd. And without referring to the initrd, the image boots
> like a champ.
> 
Try to move around some large files and see if the kernel crashes, see
below.

> So now I have an XS booting on the XO :-) -- with a hand-compiled
> kernel, so not quite the ideal thing yet.
> 
That would work if somebody maintains a kernel and source rpms (repo
maybe?) for an XO kernel. No, that is not ideal. 

> The fact that merely adding an initrd breaks it means there must be
> something wrong (read: non-XO-compatible) with how initrds are built
> under F9.
> 
The livecd based stuff doesn't seem to have this issue, more like the
initrd needs a bit of a sleep while the module loads and finds the MMC
card, or as a module, it sort of broken(see below). 

I have F11's anaconda booting, formatting and installing to the MMC
card, only to have it kernel opps when installing the rpms.  

Thoughts anybody?

Jerry