Problems with grml?

Problems related to UnionFS/aufs

'apt-get install foo' seems to freeze after a while

It seems you are running out of RAM - see 'free' while running 'apt-get…'. UnionFS and the debian packetmanagement require some more RAM for the ramdisk. Some tests showed that at least 164 MB RAM should be present for live-installation, otherwise you might run into a freeze.

Start/Stop of daemons

  • Initscript/maintainer-scripts using start-stop-daemon with the ‘–exec’ option might fail running because /proc/$PID/exe points to /GRML/$DAEMON instead of $DAEMON due to the unionfs overlay layout. Just run the start-stop-daemon command without the –exec option. If you want to stop a daemon manually use 'kill $PID'.

Problems related to booting

I'm dropped to the busybox shell during booting

  • If you are being dropped into the busybox shell when booting grml and never get through the whole booting sequence you might want to try bootoptions “debug”, and “rootdelay=9” and “break=live-bottom” for further investigations. (break={top,modules,premount,mount,bottom,init} might be interesting as well, especially for grml developers). [mika]

isolinux fails with 'Could not find kernel image: grml'

  • Another warning you might get is 'Unknown keyword in config file'. Your BIOS seems to be broken. The problem has been reported to isolinux/syslinux upstream. Try to boot with 'linux26'. If this still does not work try to boot via btmgr. [mika]

Booting fails with 'mount: Mounting /cdrom/GRML/GRML on /GRML failed: Invalid argument'

  • Make sure that the downloaded ISO is ok: compare md5sum of ISO with the one provided online
  • Make sure the CD-R/CD-RW is ok: sometimes there are problems with CD-RWs (this does not have to do with grml but hardware), check it via booting with 'grml testcd' and/or burn the ISO to a CD-R.
  • It still fails? Is it a SCSI-system? Then the appropriate driver could not be loaded. Take a look at the scsi-cheatcodes. Try 'grml scsi=probe' or 'grml scsi=ask' or 'grml scsi=modulename'.

Booting fails at all

  • Try the bootparam “failsafe”. Try to figure out which bootoption is relevant for you. Take a look at the available cheatcodes.

Booting from USB or Firewire fails

Booting fails with squashfs errors

You get the following output on the console:

SQUASHFS error: zlib_fs returned unexpected result 0x........
SQUASHFS error: Unable to read cache block [.....]
SQUASHFS error: Unable to read inode [.....]

Make sure the medium (ISO and CD-ROM) is ok. Verify it via booting with “grml testcd”. Check your CD low-level via running:

# readcd -c2scan dev=/dev/cdrom

If the medium is definitely ok and it still fails try to boot with deactivated DMA via using “grml nodma ide=nodma” at the bootprompt.

Booting hangs at 'Looking for CD-ROM in: /dev/hdc'

Make sure the medium (ISO and CD-ROM) is ok. Verify it via booting with “grml testcd”. Check your CD low-level via running:

# readcd -c2scan dev=/dev/cdrom

If the medium is definitely ok and it still fails try to boot with deactivated DMA via using “grml nodma ide=nodma” at the bootprompt.

Monitor is black when booting

Make sure your laptop uses the right output channel. Try pressing the VGA-key on your laptop.

Problems related to installing grml (grml2hd)

grml2hd hangs

grml2hd seems to hang? Switch to tty12 and take a look at the syslog. If you see something like:

SQUASHFS error: zlib_fs returned unexpected result 0x........
SQUASHFS error: Unable to read cache block [.....]
SQUASHFS error: Unable to read inode [.....]

your ISO/CD-ROM very probably is not ok. Verify it via booting with “grml testcd”. Check your CD low-level via running:

# readcd -c2scan dev=/dev/cdrom

If the medium really is ok and it still fails try to boot with deactivated DMA via using “grml nodma ide=nodma” at the bootprompt.

Miscellaneous Problems

Set TimeZone

Try querying a timeserver directly

ntpdate uk.pool.ntp.org

You can add relevant time-servers to '/etc/ntp.conf'

server 0.uk.pool.ntp.org iburst
server 1.uk.pool.ntp.org iburst
server 2.uk.pool.ntp.org iburst
server 3.uk.pool.ntp.org iburst

Set the correct timezone using:

dpkg-reconfigure tzdata

On my system the time as 1 hour off; This was because the timezone wasn't set right, so the DS setting was wrong.

Auto- fstab

You can turn off auto-fstab in /etc/grml/autoconfig

As well as other options.

NFS Client

I get the message ”NFS common utilities: statd failed!” on startup

restarting 'nfs-common' alone has the same result.

restarting 'nfs-kernel-server' and 'portsmap'/'rpcbind' first makes it work

/etc/init.d/nfs-kernel-server restart
/etc/init.d/portmap restart
/etc/init.d/nfs-common restart

now I can mount NFS partitions.

link

Update (2009-11-27): If “nfs-kernel-server restart” fails and/or is timed out, then try to restart it at last (restart “portmap” and “nfs-common” at first).

Update (2011-07-06): Replace “portmap” service with rpcbind. portmap has been removed in grml 2011.5

Keymapping in X11

the keymap when I boot into GRML are fine in the terminal (I chose UK setting on install);

but when I start up X, it switches to a US layout which affects all applications including xterm.

A temporary fix is

sudo setxkbmap gb

link

But more permanently, make sure the following is in your /etc/X11/xorg.conf

 Section "InputDevice"
         Identifier  "Keyboard0"
         Option      "CoreKeyboard"
         Driver      "kbd"
         Option      "XkbRules"   "xfree86"
         Option      "XkbRules"   "xorg"
         Option      "XkbModel"   "pc105"
         Option      "XkbLayout"  "gb"
         # Option      "XkbVariant" "nodeadkeys"
         # Option      "XkbOptions" "ctrl:swapcaps,grp:alt_shift_toggle,grp_led:scroll,compose:menu"
 EndSection

etckeeper

Here's a good '/etc/etckeeper/etckeeper.conf'

# The VCS to use.
# VCS="hg"
VCS="git"
# VCS="bzr"

# Options passed to git commit when run by etckeeper.
#GIT_COMMIT_OPTIONS=""

# Options passed to hg commit when run by etckeeper.
#HG_COMMIT_OPTIONS=""

# Options passed to bzr commit when run by etckeeper.
#BZR_COMMIT_OPTIONS=""

# The high-level package manager that's being used.
HIGHLEVEL_PACKAGE_MANAGER=apt

# The low-level package manager that's being used.
LOWLEVEL_PACKAGE_MANAGER=dpkg

After configuring etckeeper, initialise git (or whatever VCS you configured for)

cd /etc
etckeeper init

RAID

According to http://grml.supersized.org

” using grub on SW-RAID devices is not yet supported ”

link

Also, this snippet of code allow for grml2hd use with RAID (for target RAID device 'md0'):

SWRAID='mbr-only' grml2hd /dev/md0 -mbr /dev/md0

link

Note: mkinitrd-tools package is available via stable ftp.de.debian.org repository

Unwanted hibernation

My system kept hibernating when left alone for too long, which on a desktop was annoying.

The solution was to edit the settings in '/etc/default/acpi-support'.

/etc/resolv.conf not always updated with nameserver

When I start the image with ”/usr/bin/qemu -cdrom /mnt/E/download/grml_2011.05.iso -boot d -net nic -net tap,ifname=tap0,script=no,downscript=no -k de -m 512” and configure the network to use 19.2.168.0.10 as a static ip and 192.168.0.254 as a nameserver, than the later entry is sometimes not written into the file.

 
problems.txt · Last modified: 2011/11/07 18:56 by mika
 
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