[Pkg-sysvinit-devel] Bug#386347: initscripts: BOOT FAILURE: checkroot.sh can't fsck /dev/shm/root because /dev/shm is mounted nodev

[Petter Reinholdtsen]

[Chip Salzenberg]
> Hrm.  Shirley, there's some name in there it could use safely...?
> Whatever that name is, checkroot.sh could mount a tmpfs on
> /dev/shm/<thatname> and create the root dev node under it.  BTW,
> checkroot.sh *does* remove the 'root' node, once the fsck is done,
> so what's the pollution issue?

I do not believe it is a good idea.  First of all, the current version
of checkroot.sh do not remove /dev/shm/root after it is done with it,
so at the moment there is name polution.  Second, /dev/shm/ is ment
for the shm* funcitions in glibc only. And checkroot isn't the only
one trying to misuse /dev/shm/, so I believe it is best for it to
stop, and for the others to stop as well.

Did you test the patch?  Did it work?

> What's the mtab.sh problem?

/etc/mtab isn't updated by mount early in the boot, because /etc/mtab
isn't writable.  If we could tell mount to write to some other tmpfs
during boot, we did not have to try to recreate it in mtab.sh, and
could just copy it over to /etc/, or leave /etc/mtab as a symlink into
the tmpfs file.  This would make it easier for diskless machines
(those booting from read-only NFS file systems like LTSP and
lessdisks), as they no longer have to work around the fact that
/etc/mtab is written to.

Friendly,
-- 
Petter Reinholdtsen