Re: Removal of GEOM_BSD, GEOM_MBR, GEOM_PC98 and GEOM_SUNLABEL (recap)

Mario Lobo wrote:
> Hi to all;
> 
> Recently I've upgraded my home box from FreeBSD 7.2-stable i386 to 8-CURRENT 
> amd64 (specifically 200906 snapshot)because of a major CPU-BOARD-MEMORY 
> (Phenon 955-AOD790GX/128M-8G RAM)overhaul. 7.2 stable amd64 wouldn't install 
> on it (/dev/cd0 disapeared right after sysinstall screen, so no CD/DVD to 
> install from. Same with all attempts with any previous amd64 revision). So I 
> figured, what the heck, lets do it! 8-CURRENT intalled fine.
> 
> My box is pretty full of stuff. A lot of the files I have here have been 
> migrating from version to version of all these OSses along the years, without 
> any problem. Please, just try to bear with the fact that I do need to have all 
> this, leaving the "why" out of scope and knowing that I DO have backups for 
> almost all of it.
> 
> I use this box from pro audio productions (winedows) to devel (winedows 
> (VBox),BSD, & linux (Vbox), to network environment emulation (Vbox), and in-
> betweens. 
> 
> 2 500G SATA drives and 1 20G ide for XP64 "fun". 
> 
> On those sata drives I have: 
> 
> SATA1:1 primary FAT32 part, 
>       1 primary BSD /
>       1 EXT -> 3 FAT32, 1 NTFS
>       1 primary ext2fs
> SATA2:1 primary BSD (5 slices /usr, /apps, /var, /tmp and swap)
>       1 EXT -> 3 FAT32, 1 NTFS  
> 
> By now you should have a clue as to why I brought this subject back.
> 
> On the first boot, first question: Where were those nice GEOM devices that so 
> nicely showed up and held ALL of the above on my previous 7.2-STABLE?  
> 
> At first, I found out that sysinstall (label or fdisk, I don't know) did 
> something to my part table that made everything disappear. I went to the IDE 
> drive and restored everything with testdisk (nice program !).
> 
> booted BSD. result:
> 2 GEOM label mismatch errors (1 for /, 1 for the other SATA2 BSD part)
> only 2 FAT32 and 1 NTFS from SATA1
> only 1 FAT32 SATA2
> 
> Well, back and forth from my XP64 part, googling started (no X yet on 8).
> 
> I tried to manually mount the devices that didn't show up on 
> /dev/msdosfs,ntsf,ext2fs. Errors. Tried by taking GEOM_PART out of the picture 
> and kernel recompile. Didn't even boot. Livecd and loaded geom_part as 
> modules. Booted back but still no EXT parts.
> 
> After a good while, I picked up this subject, which gave me a clue to what to 
> do: 
> 1)I tried to put "options GEOM_MBR, _BSD & _LABEL" into the kernel. It 
> wouldn't config.

Maybe it is due to /sys/amd64/conf/DEFAULTS

which contains:

options 	GEOM_PART_BSD
options 	GEOM_PART_EBR
options 	GEOM_PART_EBR_COMPAT
options 	GEOM_PART_MBR

Henri
> 
> 2)I noticed that the modules geom_mbr,geom_bsd and geom_label were present in 
> /boot, so I kept the GEOMles kernel and loaded those from loader.conf. crossed 
> my fingers and rebooted.
> 
> BANG !! I could not believe my eyes ! EVERY SINGLE PARTITION showed up on my 
> face, as neatly arranged devices, asking "what are you waiting for?"
> 
> This is just a rough outline of many days of pain and agony.
> 
> Right now, I am typing this e-mail from a fully functional 8-CURRENT/X/KDE 
> 4.3.1 desktop (yes, BSD IS my desktop), accessing ALL my drives, thanks to 
> good old GEOM_XXX.
> 
> On one of the subject's thread, I quote Marcel Moolenaar:
> 
>>> 1. What's getting removed and why? 
>> GEOM_BSD, GEOM_MBR, GEOM_PC98 and GEOM_SUNLABEL They're so yesterday. 
>>> 2. What's it being replaced with? 
>> GEOM_PART_BSD, GEOM_PART_MBR, GEOM_PART_PC98 and GEOM_PART_VTOC8 
>>> 3. How do I migrate from the old system to the new one? 
>> No migration is needed. You already use the new kernel options. All I'm 
>> doing is remove the old not-to-be-used options. FYI, -- Marcel Moolenaar"
> 
> Well, # 3 DIDN'T work for me, no matter how hard I tried. GEOM_PART did not 
> "understand" what I had, while GEOM_ did, on the first attempt !
> 
> Then I quote John Baldwin, a few e-mails ahead on the thread:
> 
> "I think it is less painful for folks upgrading from 7 to just use the old 
> names. It is also a lot easier on the eyes. I'm also not sure people are going 
> to be changing their partition layout once it is done so having the names 
> 'change' would not seem to be something that would happen very often at all in 
> practice. -- John Baldwin"
> 
> This is my EXACT experience with GEOM, so this e-mail is and absolute plea to 
> the developers:
> 
> Please don't take GEOM_XXX away. Folks on the same situation as mine won't be 
> able to work if, after one fine csup src and make buildworld/kernel day, those 
> geom_xxx.kos are not there !.
> 
> A put myself and my box at your disposal in trying to find out what went 
> wrong. Meanwhile, please keep them in the source tree.
> 
> My apologies for such a long e-mail, but believe me, I made it as short as I 
> could.
> 
> Best regards to all,