On Saturday 26 March 2011 17:20:48 Dale wrote: > Alan McKinnon wrote: > > On Saturday 26 March 2011 15:06:31 Elaine C. Sharpe wrote: > >>> Just because something works for most people, doesn't mean it will > >>> for > >>> everyone either. If you lose data, it doesn't matter. LVM just > >>> adds > >>> one more layer of something to go wrong. Me, I don't need the extra > >>> risk of having a system that doesn't boot and a loss of data. I'm > >>> sure > >>> there are a lot of people that see it the way I do too. They just > >>> don't > >>> need the extra risk. > >> > >> Using the least number of layers of abstraction you can get away with > >> is > >> a perfectly valid criteria. What I was pointing out was that informal > >> polls of users with a sad story to tell is not a very effective way to > >> conduct research. People say all kinds of things that just aren't > >> true. > > > > There's an elephant in this room. The number of actual layers is greater > > than just LVM plus FS. It's whatever the BIOS (or a reasonable > > substitute is doing), plus the drive firmware, kernel driver(s) - > > there's more than one of those - plus any RAID in use (hardware or > > software) and finally the file system. > > > > That's a lot of layers, a lot of code, a lot of opportunity for people > > to > > reveal the extent of their lack of knowledge. I've often heard it said > > that code like ZFS and brtfs eliminates several of these layers > > therefore it's technically a better option. That may be true, but let > > me just point out that whatever LVM+fs+other_stuff is doing as separate > > chunks of code also gets done by ZFS etc. You just don't see it, and > > just because it's abstracted away doesn't mean it's not there. > > I'll add this. Alan if I recall correctly runs a lot of systems. He > has a boatload of experience using all sorts of software/hardware. Me, > I don't. For the longest, I had one system and that was it. If I > upgrade my kernel, LVM, or some package that LVM depends on and I can't > boot, I'm screwed. If I can't boot, I can't google anything to find out > how to fix it. I also don't know enough about LVM to fix it myself. > Since there is so many layers of things that can already go wrong on a > system, adding one more layer that can be complicated only makes a > problem grow.
Yeah, I have a boatload of stuff. Also a boatload of project managers and sales people but that's another story. All I'm saying is that being put off a particular package due to having read something somewhere that it might be broken for somebody sometime makes no sense. There are heaps of other packages you use right now that fall in exactly the same category - critical stuff that can make a system unbootable. But you use them. Heck, you even used XFS if memory serves, and that was brave indeed. Far, far braver than using LVM with a much higher risk - and that's from features, not bugs. If fear of not being able to recover from a problem that is not likely to hit you is the driving factor, then you might as well sell the pcs and go onto to doing something else. But if I were you I wouldn't sell myself so short, we've both been around here for many a year now and you've yet to suffer a catastrophic unrecoverable failure, right? I read your posts, I know many pretenders to the title of "sysadmin" that would just reinstall when faced with some of the now routine stuff you've dealt with. Like emerge won't work after a python update - wanna bet money on the percentage of people that would floor? :-) > > I'm sure Alan and many others could go out and buy or build a new system > and put LVM on it and fix about any problem that comes along. Thing is, > there are others that can't. Add to this that when I was thinking about > using it, I read where a lot of people, for whatever reason, couldn't > get it back working again and lost data. For me, I don't care if it was > LVM itself, the kernel or some combination of other things, if I can't > boot or lose data, the result is the same. I can fix a kernel problem, > a broken package but if LVM fails, I'm stuck. > > That said, I now have a second rig. I may at some point use LVM because > I can always go to the other room and use my old rig to get help. I > already have a 750Gb drive that is about full of pictures, I got a > camera and get a little happy at times, and videos I have downloaded, > everything from TV series to stuff off youtube. I may buy another large > drive and use LVM or something to give me more room since I really don't > want to have to break up my filing system across two separate drives. I > won't consider putting the booting part of my OS on LVM tho. > > Of course, I did see a 3Tb drive on sale the other day at newegg. o_O > That would last a while. ;-) > > Dale > > :-) :-) -- alan dot mckinnon at gmail dot com
