https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c1 --- Comment #1 from Jean Delvare 2013-02-11 13:49:21 UTC --- Created an attachment (id=524117) --> (http://bugzilla.novell.com/attachment.cgi?id=524117) Debug log for grub2-install Gathered with: # grub2-install --debug --root-directory=/mnt/usb /dev/sdb > install.log 2>&1 -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c2 --- Comment #2 from Michael Chang 2013-02-18 04:13:39 UTC --- Jean, Sorry for late respond, just back from Chinese new year vacation. Thanks to posting the detailed analyze & log, are you using hybrid image? A hint from it could be grub2 confused /dev/sdb as ISO images (and trying an unusual setup on it). -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c4 --- Comment #4 from Michael Chang 2013-02-18 07:34:08 UTC --- An interesting finding on grub_iso9660_mount, it shouldn't reach set_rockridge() at all as superblock check should end probing it .. if (grub_disk_read (disk, block << GRUB_ISO9660_LOG2_BLKSZ, 0, sizeof (struct grub_iso9660_primary_voldesc), (char *) &voldesc)) { grub_error (GRUB_ERR_BAD_FS, "not a ISO9660 filesystem"); goto fail; } if (grub_strncmp ((char *) voldesc.voldesc.magic, "CD001", 5) != 0) { grub_error (GRUB_ERR_BAD_FS, "not a ISO9660 filesystem"); goto fail; } Do you have any cd image mounted on host that grub device (hd0) might point to (not sure it's caused by messing device.map in usb stick and host ..) :(? -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c6 --- Comment #6 from Jean Delvare 2013-02-18 08:55:44 UTC --- Doh. The drive _is_ an hybrid. As I was mounting it to perform the test you asked for, I mistyped the command and mounted /dev/sdb instead of /dev/sdb1. It should have failed, but worked: /dev/sdb on /mnt/usb type iso9660 (ro,relatime) This must be related to the history of this particular USB thumbdrive. Originally I had dumped the openSUSE 12.2 DVD on it. Then I found that changes done to live instances were no longer persistent, and went for a regular installation instead. Apparently some data from the previous installation is still present on the media. I can read some of the text files from the iso9660 mount, while others are corrupted (as expected, given that /dev/sdb1 occupies the whole space and holds the new installation.) This definitely explains why grub2-install goes into iso9660-related code at all. Partition Table for /dev/sdb First Last # Type Sector Sector Offset Length Filesystem Type (ID) Flag -- ------- ----------- ----------- ------ ----------- -------------------- ---- Pri/Log 0 2047* 0# 2048*Free Space None 1 Primary 2048* 15644671* 0 15642624*Linux (83) Boot Pri/Log 15644672* 15644911* 0 240*Free Space None The drive was partitioned that way by the openSUSE 12.2 installation system. -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c8 --- Comment #8 from Jean Delvare 2013-02-18 09:09:09 UTC --- At this point I suppose it can be argued that the problem if the original format of my USB thumbdrive and software isn't to blame. However, I still believe the situation is undesirable and could happen to others, as I did not do anything out of the ordinary to get there. I am fine with grub-install failing in this case, but then with a proper error message, not an endless loop. It might also make sense for the openSUSE installation system to fix the drive if it doesn't look good? -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c10 Michael Chang changed: What |Removed |Added ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- CC| |snwint@suse.com --- Comment #10 from Michael Chang 2013-02-25 04:30:31 UTC --- Jean, Sorry I was quite busy last week and somehow latest (two) comment not seen in my mailbox. :( I agree, grub2 iso9660 can possibly be improved with sanity check to avoid such problem to happen, but how? And even kernel is deceived and counts it as valid file-system. I'll try anyway but I'm not good at those formats but it's interesting to look at. I also agree with you that openSUSE installation should fix the drive, CC Steffen here and see if he has any other good idea ? Btw, is fixmbr work for you ? (I suppose not ..). -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c13 --- Comment #13 from Steffen Winterfeldt 2013-02-25 10:10:27 CET --- This bug shows actually a valid problem. :-/ The difference between 12.3 and 12.2 (at least with latest builds) is that we have a sane partition table in 12.3. In 12.2 the partition points to nowhere (and doesn't have a recognizable fs in it). So, if the strategy is to probe the entire block dev only if there are no valid data in any partitions, we are fine in 12.3. If we probe the entire device anyway, it's pure luck. The new fashion with partitioning tools is to leave the 1st MB empty. So any meta data from an hybrid-iso is not (entirely) destroyed. -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c16 --- Comment #16 from Jean Delvare 2013-02-25 13:22:11 UTC --- (In reply to comment #10)

Btw, is fixmbr work for you ? (I suppose not ..).

You are right, I just tried it and it did not help. -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c19 --- Comment #19 from Michael Chang 2013-02-27 09:34:49 UTC --- Created an attachment (id=527155) --> (http://bugzilla.novell.com/attachment.cgi?id=527155) stop iterate when bogus zero length System Usage entry met The cpu 100% problem seems to be fixed by above patch, it's caused by looping in non-incremented entry .. Testing package is at: http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/michael-chang:/bnc803078/ope... http://download.opensuse.org/repositories/home:/michael-chang:/bnc803078/ope... use grub2-mount you can mount /dev/sda and see it's contents. However grub2-install still cannot work because iso9660 fs doesn't provide any embedded area for bootloader (which is expected) .. -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c21 --- Comment #21 from Jean Delvare 2013-02-27 13:29:49 UTC --- I did indeed repartition the drive manually as I didn't want swap nor /home on a separate partition. But the start at 2048 has nothing to do with this, it is simply caused by partitions being aligned on 1 MB boundaries. Microsoft does that since Windows 7 (or maybe even Vista) and we decided to do the same for compatibility. After installing your updated grub2 package, I can confirm that grub2-mount /dev/sdb no longer hangs, it now works and the mount point contains the same ghost tree as when mounting /dev/sdb the regular way. This is the ghost tree from the hybrid image that was once written to the USB thumbdrive, but no longer reflects the reality. The new grub2-install fails with the following strange error message: rm: cannot remove '/mnt/usb/boot/grub2/i386-pc/acpi.mod': Function not implemented At this point my USB thumbdrive no longer boots. It displays "GRUB" with a blinking cursor and nothing happens. Don't worry too much about this, I can restore it from the snapshot I sent to you if needed. -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c23 --- Comment #23 from Steffen Winterfeldt 2013-02-27 16:00:37 CET --- Yes, if there's a gpt. I would just clear 1 block at 32k to remove the iso9660 magic. -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c25 --- Comment #25 from Jean Delvare 2013-03-01 13:19:43 UTC --- I cleared 3 sectors remaining from the ISO9660 image, as advised by Steffen: # dd if=/dev/zero seek=64 count=3 of=/dev/sdb After this, grub2-installed worked just fine, both Michael's version and the original version from openSUSE 12.2. I believe the Suse partitioning tool should do exactly that, to prevent the trouble I went through: if installing to a USB device and beginning of the first partition is beyond 64th sector, clear 64th sector (and possibly 65th and 66th as I did.) Or something like that - I'll let the experts decide of the details. Not that this did not only fix grub2-install in my case, it also altered the label displayed when the disk is being mounted. Beforehand, the old DVD label was being displayed, which was quite confusing. My problem is solved, so feel free to close this bug when you're finished working on it. Thanks a lot Michael and Steffen for explaining all the details and driving me to a solution. -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.

https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078 https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=803078#c27 --- Comment #27 from Michael Chang 2013-03-04 09:29:55 UTC --- (In reply to comment #20)

...

However grub2-install still cannot work because iso9660 fs doesn't provide any embedded area for bootloader (which is expected) ..

Actually iso9660 has 32k empty space at the fs start.

Yes you're right. I simply missed it. The problem now is grub2 as to why not offer any embed callback for iso9660 file system, like btrfs and zfs. To me it could be that iso9660 was designed on read-only optical media as it's mainstream usage (The hybrid iso could be an exotic product of isolinux project.) -- Configure bugmail: https://bugzilla.novell.com/userprefs.cgi?tab=email ------- You are receiving this mail because: ------- You are on the CC list for the bug.