SLES9: Reread of partition table failed

17 Aug 2005

      I've got fully automated SLES9 installations almost working with our 
software (we provide a virtualized system, with virtual network and 
virtual disk).  The only problem I've yet to solve is that the install 
pauses halfway through with the above error, making the user press ok to 
continue.  When you do press ok, the install works fine, and the right 
partitions are set up and installed.

Well, ok, that's not the only problem, but the others (network config not 
getting setup even though specified in the xml, and inittab trying to run 
getty's on tty1-6 even though its a serial port install) I think are 
solvable.  This one however..

Looking at the yast2-storage source, it appears it's searching the fdisk 
output for WARNING (which fdisk prints out if the BLKRRPART ioctl fails). 
however, if i run fdisk manually on the system, and set up the partitions 
exactly the same way, I don't see that error.  I've even gone so far as to 
mount the root install image via loopback/chroot and run that version of 
fdisk, and i still don't see that error message. So I don't know why yast, 
which seems to be reading the output of fdisk(?) would fail and trigger 
this dialog.

Also, looking at the <report> section of my xml file, I see that errors, 
messages, and warnings are all set to timeout in 10 seconds.  Why does 
this message not time out?

Any thoughts?  I'm including the partition section of the XML below my sig 
if it helps.  Checking the archives it looks like something like this has 
happened before, but it seems it should have been solved years ago. I'm 
guessing I'm doing something wrong..

john.c

- --
John Clemens			jclemens@virtualiron.com

     <partitioning config:type="list">
       <drive>
         <device>/dev/sda</device>
         <initialize config:type="boolean">true</initialize>
         <partitions config:type="list">
           <partition>
             <crypt>twofish256</crypt>
             <filesystem config:type="symbol">reiser</filesystem>
             <format config:type="boolean">true</format>
             <loop_fs config:type="boolean">false</loop_fs>
             <mount>/</mount>
             <partition_id config:type="integer">131</partition_id>
             <partition_type>primary</partition_type>
             <size>4.3GB</size>
           </partition>
           <partition>
             <crypt>twofish256</crypt>
             <format config:type="boolean">false</format>
             <loop_fs config:type="boolean">false</loop_fs>
             <partition_id config:type="integer">131</partition_id>
             <partition_type>primary</partition_type>
             <size>4.3GB</size>
           </partition>
           <partition>
             <crypt>twofish256</crypt>
             <format config:type="boolean">false</format>
             <loop_fs config:type="boolean">false</loop_fs>
             <partition_id config:type="integer">131</partition_id>
             <partition_type>primary</partition_type>
             <size>4.3GB</size>
           </partition>
           <partition>
             <crypt>twofish256</crypt>
             <format config:type="boolean">false</format>
             <loop_fs config:type="boolean">false</loop_fs>
             <partition_id config:type="integer">130</partition_id>
             <partition_type>primary</partition_type>
             <size>max</size>
           </partition>
         </partitions>
         <use>1,4</use>
       </drive>
     </partitioning>