Comment # 9 on bug 1205374 from Felix Miata

(In reply to Arvin Schnell from comment #2)
> According to the documentation the 64bit feature can be changed on an
> already existing filesystem.

Of this I was not aware. But, WFM because of tune2fs capability fails to deal
with:

(In reply to Stefan Hundhammer from comment #6)
> So, for the future, please use "tune2fs" after the installation to set that
> option. That will hopefully also have some sanity checks if it is even
> possible to set or unset the option in the exact setup.

This begs the comment #0 issue not responded to in comments through #8, why
when I have gone all the way back to the license screen in YaST, then formatted
via vtty2, and run partprobe, after which returning to installation, that the
partitioner continues to label the partition as unformatted, thus preventing
its mounting without forced formatting.

Normally I partition and format in advance, but in this case I had forgotten to
do so before starting the installer, which BTW I normally do with Grub. I only
download the installer's linux and initrd in advance, and let them download the
installation system. This allows to decide in advance, and apply via copy &
paste, the lengthy string of linuxrc's cmdline options I typically use to boot
the installer.

(In reply to Stefan Hundhammer from comment #3)
> I just checked in the partitioner: Arbitrary options are only supported for
> fstab options, not for format options.

IMO, both fstab mounting and formatting should allow arbitrary options.
Without, the formatting options that are provided seem too arbitrary a
selection.

(In reply to Stefan Hundhammer from comment #7)
> I am not sure what downsides that might have; larger meta data structures
> probably that consume a little more disk space. Is that really worth the
> hassle?

The bigger issue for me is backward compatibility, but the larger data
structures also play a part on these test installations going on 8G or smaller
/ filesystems. All my installations to MBR disks are presumptively so because
they are on old systems with old installations, thus may be running old kernels
that may not support the newer feature. All my Linux distro installations are
on hardware, and in multiboot of as many as 40+ installations per PC.

This would be an upstream issue I would think, but it just seems wrong that
64bit can be forced when 128bit inode size and/or 1024 byte block size are also
allowable and applied options.

Better resolution to either add an arbitrary option box to formatting, to
parallel the one in mounting options, and/or add another tick box for disabling
the 64bit default. Undoing with tune2fs for me does not constitute working.