Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-09-04 2:49 AM, Marc Stürmer m...@marc-stuermer.de wrote: Well in my point of view it boils down to that: someone wants to use ZFS on Linux. Fine. This means you've got to be a good citizen and obey its license, of course. It is for those legal reasons that ZFS is not included into the Linux kernel mainline source tree. It is also for those reasons you got to compile it as a module. One of the points made was that this is FUD, and that there is NO logel reason that it cannot be included. There is also the fact that it *could* be included, as long as it wasn't provided directly in the kernel sources, but as an overlay/patch type process, which could still be provided by the gentoo source repositories.
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Am 02.09.2013 10:47, schrieb Joerg Schilling: Solaris is dynamic from the beginning: Well in my point of view it boils down to that: someone wants to use ZFS on Linux. Fine. This means you've got to be a good citizen and obey its license, of course. It is for those legal reasons that ZFS is not included into the Linux kernel mainline source tree. It is also for those reasons you got to compile it as a module. So somebody wants it being static into his kernel, modules being disabled on his machine because of security concerns. Unless he is going to do that stuff himself this is unlikely to ever happen. So it boils down to those possible solutions: a) writing that stuff himself (unlikely to happen), b) just using the module and going to be happy (also unlikely to happen as it seems), c) choosing another, native file system like Btrfs (which is still yet not production ready as a fast moving target) or going with something like XFS or Ext4 (and LVM), or the most natural choice then, which is d) choosing an operating system, which supports ZFS out of the box like FreeBSD and forget about all the rest of the problems. I would go for d and forget about all of the rest of the problems. FreeBSD has been around long enough, and is stable and mature enough for most anything you can throw at and it is a nice, clean, well structured system anyway. There's also Gentoo/FreeBSD around, but personally I would use the native ports system instead.
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: Grub works this way: 1) It loads /platform/i86pc/kernel/$ISADIR/unix Question... how does it read that file off a ZFS partition? OK, so ZFS code has to be installed statically into GRUB instead of statically into the kernel. Please stop the shell game. Grub was enhanced by Sun to understand ZFS. You need such an enhanced grub if you like to boot off ZFS. Note also that this is a Gentoo *LINUX* mailing list. We're more concerned about how Linux works. Linux does not contain code to boot AFAIK Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Mon, Sep 2, 2013 at 4:47 PM, Joerg Schilling joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de wrote: Mark David Dumlao madum...@gmail.com wrote: the disk... OOPS. This is a classic chicken and egg situation. On Solaris no problem with loadable modules - everything is dynamically loaded. ***YOU NEED A GRUB THAT UNDERSTANDS ZFS AND THAT GIVES A ZFS INTERFACE TO THE KERNEL TO USE BEFORE ZFS WAS LOADED***. I'm confused as to what this means. Grub reads a filesystem, loads a kernel with options, and may give it an initrd. What happens from then on is none of grub's business. The filesystem it reads from and the one the kernel uses may be completely unrelated - this is why we have /boot filesystems. At what point does grub present a zfs interface for the kernel to use? After it booted the kernel You may not know dynamic kernels as Linux is a static kernel that just may load additional modules _after_ it mounted the root fs. Solaris is dynamic from the beginning: Ah I see. But I think by default when we talk about the kernel on this mailing list, it's assumed that we're talking about Linux. And in the Linux case, Grub does not do anything like provide a filesystem interface to Linux. It just loads the kernel into memory, and passes it any arguments, like the initrd. So your grub needs to be able to read the filesystem containing the kernel and that's it. If the filesystem containing the kernel is also a zfs filesystem, then your grub needs a driver that can read that filesystem. Well sys-boot/grub-2.00 provides one. See /boot/grub/zfs.mod -- This email is:[ ] actionable [x] fyi[ ] social Response needed: [ ] yes [ ] up to you [x] no Time-sensitive: [ ] immediate[ ] soon [x] none
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Mark David Dumlao madum...@gmail.com wrote: containing the kernel is also a zfs filesystem, then your grub needs a driver that can read that filesystem. Well sys-boot/grub-2.00 provides one. See /boot/grub/zfs.mod You don't need grub2, a capable older grub does it also, see: http://hg.berlios.de/repos/schillix-on for a related source. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re:[gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
The 04/09/13, Joerg Schilling wrote: Linux does not contain code to boot AFAIK Sure, it does. You can boot on the kernel directly without a boot manager. -- Nicolas Sebrecht
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sun, Sep 1, 2013 at 10:30 AM, Tanstaafl tansta...@libertytrek.orgwrote: Is there any reason that the creation, use and maintenance of the initramfs couldn't be as simple as a checkbox in the kernel config, so that running 'make' after the kernel was configured would automatically build it? Then, all I'd have to do is move it into /boot along with the new kernel (just like I do now), with *nothing* else required, and the kernel would call it, and things would just work (as long as it was there and I didn't forget to copy it to /boot). This exists. You can built initramfs right into the kernel. I've been doing it here for quite some time. You just tell the kernel either: * where to find a filespec so it knows what to include in the initramfs * what directory contains everything you want in the initramfs and then the kernel builds is and attaches it to itself during 'make' It's actually pretty trivial -- Douglas J Hunley (doug.hun...@gmail.com) Twitter: @hunleyd Web: douglasjhunley.com G+: http://goo.gl/sajR3
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Douglas J Hunley wrote: On Sun, Sep 1, 2013 at 10:30 AM, Tanstaafl tansta...@libertytrek.org mailto:tansta...@libertytrek.org wrote: Is there any reason that the creation, use and maintenance of the initramfs couldn't be as simple as a checkbox in the kernel config, so that running 'make' after the kernel was configured would automatically build it? Then, all I'd have to do is move it into /boot along with the new kernel (just like I do now), with *nothing* else required, and the kernel would call it, and things would just work (as long as it was there and I didn't forget to copy it to /boot). This exists. You can built initramfs right into the kernel. I've been doing it here for quite some time. You just tell the kernel either: * where to find a filespec so it knows what to include in the initramfs * what directory contains everything you want in the initramfs and then the kernel builds is and attaches it to itself during 'make' It's actually pretty trivial -- Douglas J Hunley (doug.hun...@gmail.com mailto:doug.hun...@gmail.com) Twitter: @hunleyd Web: douglasjhunley.com http://douglasjhunley.com G+: http://goo.gl/sajR3 I tried that a while back. Followed a howto step by step, Gentoo one I think, and it never worked, not even once. Trivial, not hardly. Dale :-) :-) -- I am only responsible for what I said ... Not for what you understood or how you interpreted my words!
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Mon, Sep 02, 2013 at 10:47:35AM +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote Mark David Dumlao madum...@gmail.com wrote: At what point does grub present a zfs interface for the kernel to use? After it booted the kernel You may not know dynamic kernels as Linux is a static kernel that just may load additional modules _after_ it mounted the root fs. Solaris is dynamic from the beginning: - no static loading at all - no predefined data sizes - everything is allocated - no predefined major device numbers - numbers are assigned at first load Grub works this way: 1)It loads /platform/i86pc/kernel/$ISADIR/unix Question... how does it read that file off a ZFS partition? OK, so ZFS code has to be installed statically into GRUB instead of statically into the kernel. Please stop the shell game. Note also that this is a Gentoo *LINUX* mailing list. We're more concerned about how Linux works. -- Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org I don't run desktop environments; I run useful applications
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Mark David Dumlao madum...@gmail.com wrote: the disk... OOPS. This is a classic chicken and egg situation. On Solaris no problem with loadable modules - everything is dynamically loaded. ***YOU NEED A GRUB THAT UNDERSTANDS ZFS AND THAT GIVES A ZFS INTERFACE TO THE KERNEL TO USE BEFORE ZFS WAS LOADED***. I'm confused as to what this means. Grub reads a filesystem, loads a kernel with options, and may give it an initrd. What happens from then on is none of grub's business. The filesystem it reads from and the one the kernel uses may be completely unrelated - this is why we have /boot filesystems. At what point does grub present a zfs interface for the kernel to use? After it booted the kernel You may not know dynamic kernels as Linux is a static kernel that just may load additional modules _after_ it mounted the root fs. Solaris is dynamic from the beginning: - no static loading at all - no predefined data sizes - everything is allocated - no predefined major device numbers - numbers are assigned at first load Grub works this way: 1) It loads /platform/i86pc/kernel/$ISADIR/unix 2) It checks the file unix and sees ELF dependencies. It loads the ELF dependencies (genunix and dtracestubs) listed in the ELF headers from unix. 3) It loads /platform/i86pc/$ISADIR/boot_archive The Kernel then uses the filesystem callbacks in grub to load modules from the filesystem in the boot archive. After the kernel did mount the root filesystem, it switches to the normal kernel drivers just loaded and frees the memory space used by grub before. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: You can get away with most stuff as modules; ***BUT NOT THE ROOT FILESYSTEM***. Think about it for a minute. Gentoo reads modules off the disk. If the code for the root filesystem is a module, Gentoo would have to read the module off the disk to enable it to read the module off the disk... OOPS. This is a classic chicken and egg situation. On Solaris no problem with loadable modules - everything is dynamically loaded. You need a grub that understands ZFS and that gives a ZFS interface to the kernel to use before ZFS was loaded. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-31 7:29 AM, Joerg Schilling joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de wrote: Tanstaafltansta...@libertytrek.org wrote: You must have missed the point that this is for*servers*, that most people*disable modules* on. I*know* that it is available as a module. Why, for security reasons? Because if you don't need something, why enable it? If modules are totally disabled, then there is no worry about any security issue involving modules at all.
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-31 11:55 PM, Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: Also, I really wonder what the point is in having to use initramfs on a system where /usr is part of /. You don't, it is only *required* if you have a separate /usr... in fact that is what the whole argument was about. At least that is my understanding of the situation now... please don't tell me I'm wrong and there was another vote and it is now required just to be able to use gentoo?
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-31 7:32 AM, Alon Bar-Lev alo...@gentoo.org wrote: If this is not mainline, and it is not trivial gentoo kernels maintainer patch, and you must have this as static, you can just put the patch within/etc/portage/patches/sys-kernel/gentoo-sources/, so it will patch your kernel every time you emerge new one. Interesting, but this would require manually updating the patch every time, right? Or could the 'patch' be configured to automatically pull the right version (compatible with the kernel being installed) every time? That would not be such a bad thing... but if not... well... Computers excel at automating things. People excel at breaking things, and I'd like this to be automated as much as possible. That said, I've never applied patches in this manner, so, is there an up to date how-to on how to do this? It might be something I can get comfortable with unless/until an automated process is implemented. On 2013-08-31 8:19 AM, Joerg Schilling wrote: So there seems to be no real need to create a static linux kernel with ZFS inside. sigh There is for those who *do not want modules enabled on their servers*. Why is it so hard for some people to just not get that their way is not the only way. Again, Joerg... please *stop arguing* about this point, it has *nothing* to do with the thread. On 2013-08-31 2:44 PM, Mark David Dumlao madum...@gmail.com wrote: You must have missed the point that this is for *servers*, that most people *disable modules* on. I*know* that it is available as a module. Ok, I was just asking. But as for what most people do on their servers, speak for yourself. Ok, I left out two words: '... I know ... ' - and the fact is, most everyone I know (over a dozen) who runs linux servers (not just gentoo) runs them with modules disabled, and I've seen countless others say the same thing over the years... The fact is, *many* people do this, and if it trivial to implement it in gentoo (which appears it is), then why not do so?
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-09-01 12:31 AM, Canek Peláez Valdés can...@gmail.com wrote: Of course, support for an initramfs is not actually a file system (it's not even in the File systems section of the kernel configuration, is in General setup); it's not possible to have initramfs as a module (that would make no sense at all); and it's code that is several orders of magnitude more simpler than the one used by ext4 (or any other journal file system). Is there any reason that the creation, use and maintenance of the initramfs couldn't be as simple as a checkbox in the kernel config, so that running 'make' after the kernel was configured would automatically build it? Then, all I'd have to do is move it into /boot along with the new kernel (just like I do now), with *nothing* else required, and the kernel would call it, and things would just work (as long as it was there and I didn't forget to copy it to /boot).
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 01/09/2013 16:30, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-09-01 12:31 AM, Canek Peláez Valdés can...@gmail.com wrote: Of course, support for an initramfs is not actually a file system (it's not even in the File systems section of the kernel configuration, is in General setup); it's not possible to have initramfs as a module (that would make no sense at all); and it's code that is several orders of magnitude more simpler than the one used by ext4 (or any other journal file system). Is there any reason that the creation, use and maintenance of the initramfs couldn't be as simple as a checkbox in the kernel config, so that running 'make' after the kernel was configured would automatically build it? Then, all I'd have to do is move it into /boot along with the new kernel (just like I do now), with *nothing* else required, and the kernel would call it, and things would just work (as long as it was there and I didn't forget to copy it to /boot). That would require a config file of some sort to define what files you want in the initramfs, and it must be available to the kernel build process. It also has to read your self-defined arbitrary stuff from your userland. The kernel build machinery is a self-contained environment, the kernel devs work very hard to keep userland out of it. So expect Linux to shoot you down in flames for the very suggestion. You keep asking for tools to automate the production of an initramfs; you should realize that the thing has got absolutely nothing to do with building and running a kernel, it's a helper function, and not really tied to the kernel per se. Just rig your kernel update process to add a section where you run the command that builds an initramfs. You already have so many steps where you do exactly that in other areas so it's not a realistic issue, and you take that in your stride. Or at it to the end of your kernel build wrapper script if you wrote such a thing for yourself. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sun, Sep 01, 2013 at 09:49:23AM +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: You can get away with most stuff as modules; ***BUT NOT THE ROOT FILESYSTEM***. Think about it for a minute. Gentoo reads modules off the disk. If the code for the root filesystem is a module, Gentoo would have to read the module off the disk to enable it to read the module off the disk... OOPS. This is a classic chicken and egg situation. On Solaris no problem with loadable modules - everything is dynamically loaded. ***YOU NEED A GRUB THAT UNDERSTANDS ZFS AND THAT GIVES A ZFS INTERFACE TO THE KERNEL TO USE BEFORE ZFS WAS LOADED***. So instead of needing ZFS built into the kernel, you need ZFS built into GRUB... ***AND*** you need a ZFS module for the main system... ***AND*** you need to keep both versions in sync. I'm not impressed. -- Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org I don't run desktop environments; I run useful applications
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sun, Sep 01, 2013 at 10:11:01AM -0400, Tanstaafl wrote You don't, it is only *required* if you have a separate /usr... in fact that is what the whole argument was about. At least that is my understanding of the situation now... please don't tell me I'm wrong and there was another vote and it is now required just to be able to use gentoo? This is for the people who want *EVERYTHING INCLUDING THE ROOT FILE SYSTEM CODE* built as a module. Note that the Gentoo (AMD64) docs at http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-amd64.xml?full=1#book_part1_chap7say... Don't compile the file system you use for the root filesystem as module, otherwise your Gentoo system will not be able to mount your partition. Using an initramfs allows you to ignore that warning. -- Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org I don't run desktop environments; I run useful applications
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sep 2, 2013 5:21 AM, Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: On Sun, Sep 01, 2013 at 09:49:23AM +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: You can get away with most stuff as modules; ***BUT NOT THE ROOT FILESYSTEM***. Think about it for a minute. Gentoo reads modules off the disk. If the code for the root filesystem is a module, Gentoo would have to read the module off the disk to enable it to read the module off the disk... OOPS. This is a classic chicken and egg situation. On Solaris no problem with loadable modules - everything is dynamically loaded. ***YOU NEED A GRUB THAT UNDERSTANDS ZFS AND THAT GIVES A ZFS INTERFACE TO THE KERNEL TO USE BEFORE ZFS WAS LOADED***. I'm confused as to what this means. Grub reads a filesystem, loads a kernel with options, and may give it an initrd. What happens from then on is none of grub's business. The filesystem it reads from and the one the kernel uses may be completely unrelated - this is why we have /boot filesystems. At what point does grub present a zfs interface for the kernel to use?
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sun, Sep 01, 2013 at 01:41:30PM +0800, Mark David Dumlao wrote Case in point - do you enable all the ext4 options, like acls and whatnot? Let's say no. What if you suddenly have to mount an external hard disk to recover some system on your server and the hard disk uses those ext4 options? If ext4 is hard built into your kernel, your recompile will have to basically redo the whole thing, whereas if ext4 was a module you would only recompile ext4 itself. Have you ever actually done this? I'd be very leery of pulling such a stunt. The clean way of switching module versions is to... * unload the old module, and * load the new module You obviously can't do this in your setup, because unloading the old module would mean you could no longer access the file system to read in the new module... OOPS. You could run a script that creates /dev/shm/lib/3.1.4.1.5.9-gentoo/ (easy as pieG) and copies the new module to that dir. Then unload the old module and load the new one, using modprobe with -d /dev/shm/. That still looks impossible. The problem is that you generally have a whole bunch of files open at any time. E.g. try... lsof -d txt | grep -v /proc/ | less ...and look at the output. Shutting down all those open files would be disastrous. But that's not what you're saying. You seem to imply that file system code can be overwritten *IN PLACE, WHILE IN USE*, without any problems. Colour me skeptical about that one. -- Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org I don't run desktop environments; I run useful applications
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Friday 30 Aug 2013 21:21:10 Alan McKinnon wrote: Ahem, Mr Bothwick! Our friend with the thing about free lunches needs you to demonstrate your penmanship, considering you have some proven results in this area. ...and I'd happily act as editor... :-) ;-) -- Regards, Peter
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 12:10 PM, Mark David Dumlao madum...@gmail.com wrote: On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 4:16 AM, Mick michaelkintz...@gmail.com wrote: On Friday 30 Aug 2013 15:44:35 Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-30 10:34 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 30/08/2013 16:29, Tanstaafl wrote: Why would there be a problem if someone decided to create a 3rd party overlay *not* part of the official gentoo portage tree that contained *only* the zfs stuff, and when this overlay was installed combined with a zfs keyword for the kernel, portage would then pull in the required files, and automagically build a kernel with an up to date version of zfs properly and fully integrated? Would this not work, *and* have no problems with licensing? there is no problem with licensing in that case. The ebuild could even go in the portage tree, as Gentoo is not redistributing sources when it publishes an ebuild. Thanks Alan! Just the answer I wanted. Ok, so... how hard would this be then? What would the chances be that this could actually happen? I'll happily go open a bug for it if you think the work would be minimal... It seems to me that I can't be the only one who would like to see this happen? Nope! I will vote for you. ;-) -- Regards, Mick Sounds like an awful lot of trouble for a problem that's already solved by installing sys-kernel/module-rebuild and running module-rebuild rebuild after every kernel update, which is how nvidia, broadcom, and other kernel modules are dealt painlessly with anyways... Well, if you follow Tanstaafl in the other thread, you'll see that he wants ZFS to be integrated into the kernel, not existing as a kernel module. Rgds, -- FdS Pandu E Poluan ~ IT Optimizer ~ • LOPSA Member #15248 • Blog : http://pepoluan.tumblr.com • Linked-In : http://id.linkedin.com/in/pepoluan
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Pandu Poluan pa...@poluan.info wrote: Well, if you follow Tanstaafl in the other thread, you'll see that he wants ZFS to be integrated into the kernel, not existing as a kernel module. But why does someone want things to be inside a static kernel? Since 1991/1992, Solaris does not have anything in the static kernel than the startup code, the basic scheduler code and the pager daemon. You need a bootloader that knows about ELF dependencies, but grub has been enhanced for that feature. Everything is dynamic, you would however put a lot of effort into the linux kernel to get to that state...e.g. automated major device numbering. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-31 1:10 AM, Mark David Dumlao madum...@gmail.com wrote: Sounds like an awful lot of trouble for a problem that's already solved by installing sys-kernel/module-rebuild and running module-rebuild rebuild after every kernel update, which is how nvidia, broadcom, and other kernel modules are dealt painlessly with anyways... You must have missed the point that this is for *servers*, that most people *disable modules* on. I *know* that it is available as a module.
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-31 7:04 AM, Joerg Schilling joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de wrote: Everything is dynamic, you would however put a lot of effort into the linux kernel to get to that state...e.g. automated major device numbering. ??? I've been running my servers without modules since... I started running servers. Servers are not like desktops - constantly changing devices. They - in most cases - *are* static, and most people *want* them that way. Regardless, please do *not* distract this thread with arguments about it. If you don't want or see the benefit, fine, just ignore this thread.
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Tanstaafl tansta...@libertytrek.org wrote: On 2013-08-31 1:10 AM, Mark David Dumlao madum...@gmail.com wrote: Sounds like an awful lot of trouble for a problem that's already solved by installing sys-kernel/module-rebuild and running module-rebuild rebuild after every kernel update, which is how nvidia, broadcom, and other kernel modules are dealt painlessly with anyways... You must have missed the point that this is for *servers*, that most people *disable modules* on. I *know* that it is available as a module. Why, for security reasons? On Solaris, you can disable loading unsigned modules, is this not supported by Linux? Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 2:28 PM, Tanstaafl tansta...@libertytrek.org wrote: On 2013-08-31 7:04 AM, Joerg Schilling joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de wrote: Everything is dynamic, you would however put a lot of effort into the linux kernel to get to that state...e.g. automated major device numbering. ??? I've been running my servers without modules since... I started running servers. Servers are not like desktops - constantly changing devices. They - in most cases - *are* static, and most people *want* them that way. Regardless, please do *not* distract this thread with arguments about it. If you don't want or see the benefit, fine, just ignore this thread. I do not understand this thread. If this is not mainline, and it is not trivial gentoo kernels maintainer patch, and you must have this as static, you can just put the patch within /etc/portage/patches/sys-kernel/gentoo-sources/, so it will patch your kernel every time you emerge new one. Regards, Alon
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
In linux.gentoo.user, Mr Schilling wrote: On Solaris, you can disable loading unsigned modules, is this not supported by Linux? CONFIG_MODULE_SIG -- Regards, Gregory.
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Gregory Shearman zek...@gmail.com wrote: In linux.gentoo.user, Mr Schilling wrote: On Solaris, you can disable loading unsigned modules, is this not supported by Linux? CONFIG_MODULE_SIG So there seems to be no real need to create a static linux kernel with ZFS inside. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 7:25 PM, Tanstaafl tansta...@libertytrek.org wrote: On 2013-08-31 1:10 AM, Mark David Dumlao madum...@gmail.com wrote: Sounds like an awful lot of trouble for a problem that's already solved by installing sys-kernel/module-rebuild and running module-rebuild rebuild after every kernel update, which is how nvidia, broadcom, and other kernel modules are dealt painlessly with anyways... You must have missed the point that this is for *servers*, that most people *disable modules* on. I *know* that it is available as a module. Ok, I was just asking. But as for what most people do on their servers, speak for yourself. -- This email is:[ ] actionable [ ] fyi[x] social Response needed: [ ] yes [ ] up to you [x] no Time-sensitive: [ ] immediate[ ] soon [x] none
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 02:19:56PM +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote So there seems to be no real need to create a static linux kernel with ZFS inside. See http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-amd64.xml?full=1#book_part1_chap7 Now go to File Systems and select support for the filesystems you use. Don't compile the file system you use for the root filesystem as module, otherwise your Gentoo system will not be able to mount your partition. You can get away with most stuff as modules; ***BUT NOT THE ROOT FILESYSTEM***. Think about it for a minute. Gentoo reads modules off the disk. If the code for the root filesystem is a module, Gentoo would have to read the module off the disk to enable it to read the module off the disk... OOPS. This is a classic chicken and egg situation. -- Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org I don't run desktop environments; I run useful applications
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 7:13 PM, Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 02:19:56PM +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote So there seems to be no real need to create a static linux kernel with ZFS inside. See http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-amd64.xml?full=1#book_part1_chap7 Now go to File Systems and select support for the filesystems you use. Don't compile the file system you use for the root filesystem as module, otherwise your Gentoo system will not be able to mount your partition. You can get away with most stuff as modules; ***BUT NOT THE ROOT FILESYSTEM***. Think about it for a minute. Gentoo reads modules off the disk. If the code for the root filesystem is a module, Gentoo would have to read the module off the disk to enable it to read the module off the disk... OOPS. This is a classic chicken and egg situation. I usally use ext4 as filesystem. # lsmod|grep ext ext3 100768 0 jbd39586 1 ext3 ext2 49572 0 ext4 263621 1 crc16 1255 2 ext4,bluetooth mbcache 4450 3 ext2,ext3,ext4 jbd2 48679 1 ext4 Isn't great what an initramfs can do? Regards. -- Canek Peláez Valdés Posgrado en Ciencia e Ingeniería de la Computación Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sun, Sep 1, 2013 at 8:13 AM, Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 02:19:56PM +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote So there seems to be no real need to create a static linux kernel with ZFS inside. See http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-amd64.xml?full=1#book_part1_chap7 Now go to File Systems and select support for the filesystems you use. Don't compile the file system you use for the root filesystem as module, otherwise your Gentoo system will not be able to mount your partition. You can get away with most stuff as modules; ***BUT NOT THE ROOT FILESYSTEM***. Think about it for a minute. Gentoo reads modules off the disk. If the code for the root filesystem is a module, Gentoo would have to read the module off the disk to enable it to read the module off the disk... OOPS. This is a classic chicken and egg situation. And this is why the initrd was actually invented. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Initrd It's a means of loading kernel modules so that the root filesystem can be mounted as a module. -- This email is:[ ] actionable [x] fyi[ ] social Response needed: [ ] yes [ ] up to you [x] no Time-sensitive: [ ] immediate[ ] soon [x] none
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sep 1, 2013 7:51 AM, Mark David Dumlao madum...@gmail.com wrote: On Sun, Sep 1, 2013 at 8:13 AM, Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 02:19:56PM +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote So there seems to be no real need to create a static linux kernel with ZFS inside. See http://www.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-amd64.xml?full=1#book_part1_chap7 Now go to File Systems and select support for the filesystems you use. Don't compile the file system you use for the root filesystem as module, otherwise your Gentoo system will not be able to mount your partition. You can get away with most stuff as modules; ***BUT NOT THE ROOT FILESYSTEM***. Think about it for a minute. Gentoo reads modules off the disk. If the code for the root filesystem is a module, Gentoo would have to read the module off the disk to enable it to read the module off the disk... OOPS. This is a classic chicken and egg situation. And this is why the initrd was actually invented. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Initrd It's a means of loading kernel modules so that the root filesystem can be mounted as a module. Not everyone is willing to use an initr* thingy. It's another potential breaking point. I have no problem with /usr being 'merged' with /, in fact I have been doing that for a couple of years now. But I will keep myself a mile away from an initr* thingy. Rgds, --
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
I usally use ext4 as filesystem. # lsmod|grep ext ext3 100768 0 jbd39586 1 ext3 ext2 49572 0 ext4 263621 1 crc16 1255 2 ext4,bluetooth mbcache 4450 3 ext2,ext3,ext4 jbd2 48679 1 ext4 Isn't great what an initramfs can do? In this case, initramfs is your root filesystem, from which you load another fs and then transfer (pivot root?) to it. You have to build initramfs support into the kernel, to boot an initramfs. So my argument still stands, regardless of whether your *INITIAL* filesystem is ext4fs, or ZFS, or initramfs, that *INITIAL* filesystem has to be built into the kernel. Also, I really wonder what the point is in having to use initramfs on a system where /usr is part of /. -- Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org I don't run desktop environments; I run useful applications
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 10:55 PM, Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: I usally use ext4 as filesystem. # lsmod|grep ext ext3 100768 0 jbd39586 1 ext3 ext2 49572 0 ext4 263621 1 crc16 1255 2 ext4,bluetooth mbcache 4450 3 ext2,ext3,ext4 jbd2 48679 1 ext4 Isn't great what an initramfs can do? In this case, initramfs is your root filesystem, from which you load another fs and then transfer (pivot root?) to it. You have to build initramfs support into the kernel, to boot an initramfs. So my argument still stands, regardless of whether your *INITIAL* filesystem is ext4fs, or ZFS, or initramfs, that *INITIAL* filesystem has to be built into the kernel. Interesting perspective. Of course, support for an initramfs is not actually a file system (it's not even in the File systems section of the kernel configuration, is in General setup); it's not possible to have initramfs as a module (that would make no sense at all); and it's code that is several orders of magnitude more simpler than the one used by ext4 (or any other journal file system). But you are right that for booting with an initramfs, you need initramfs support. Also, I really wonder what the point is in having to use initramfs on a system where /usr is part of /. Well, since some months ago I've been running as a module almost everything that can be compiled as a module. This allows me to run a *truly* minimal kernel, and only the necessary modules autoload automatically (one big exception: binfmt_script, I compiled that into the kernel because it was not loading automatically). I can also unload some modules when not in use anymore (and this is great to debug sometimes). This also lets me to add a lot of stuff in the kernel, as long as I add them as modules, without me worrying about bloating my kernel. Only when they are needed they are loaded. I have USB speakers, but I almost never use them; no problem, they (like almost everything else) live as modules, and only are loaded (automagically, thanks to udev) when needed. And again, I can unload them when not in use. And also, it turns out that by using dracut+systemd you could boot faster than without initramfs (although I can't find the link anymore). Finally, using only modules and dracut liberates me from thinking what should it be compiled in and what not; I just put *everything* as a module, and the kernel, udev and dracut take care of loading what's necessary. Thus, my kernel (the one running in memory) is as minimal as it can be, all the time. Oh, and one more thing; by having everything as a module, if suddenly I need support for new hardware, usually I can do a quick make menuconfig; make modules_install, and the new module can be modprobe'd into the kernel without needing a reboot. That's convenient. Regards. -- Canek Peláez Valdés Posgrado en Ciencia e Ingeniería de la Computación Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sun, Sep 1, 2013 at 11:55 AM, Walter Dnes waltd...@waltdnes.org wrote: I usally use ext4 as filesystem. # lsmod|grep ext ext3 100768 0 jbd39586 1 ext3 ext2 49572 0 ext4 263621 1 crc16 1255 2 ext4,bluetooth mbcache 4450 3 ext2,ext3,ext4 jbd2 48679 1 ext4 Isn't great what an initramfs can do? In this case, initramfs is your root filesystem, from which you load another fs and then transfer (pivot root?) to it. You have to build initramfs support into the kernel, to boot an initramfs. So my argument still stands, regardless of whether your *INITIAL* filesystem is ext4fs, or ZFS, or initramfs, that *INITIAL* filesystem has to be built into the kernel. Also, I really wonder what the point is in having to use initramfs on a system where /usr is part of /. It allows you to keep some kernel bits in modules. If ever you change your mind on whether to include / exclude / reconfigure those kernel bits in the future, your kernel recompile will take a lot, lot, shorter. Case in point - do you enable all the ext4 options, like acls and whatnot? Let's say no. What if you suddenly have to mount an external hard disk to recover some system on your server and the hard disk uses those ext4 options? If ext4 is hard built into your kernel, your recompile will have to basically redo the whole thing, whereas if ext4 was a module you would only recompile ext4 itself. -- This email is:[ ] actionable [x] fyi[ ] social Response needed: [ ] yes [ ] up to you [x] no Time-sensitive: [ ] immediate[ ] soon [x] none
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-28 7:12 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: Whether the code is compile in or a module makes no difference wrt licenses as far as I know. There's no limitation on*running* the code, you can fetch and patch and edit and compile and run all you want and have it on as many of your (or the company's) machines as you want - neither license interferes with your right to do that. You may not redistribute the code though. So, can you answer me this... Why would there be a problem if someone decided to create a 3rd party overlay *not* part of the official gentoo portage tree that contained *only* the zfs stuff, and when this overlay was installed combined with a zfs keyword for the kernel, portage would then pull in the required files, and automagically build a kernel with an up to date version of zfs properly and fully integrated? Would this not work, *and* have no problems with licensing?
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 30/08/2013 16:29, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-28 7:12 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: Whether the code is compile in or a module makes no difference wrt licenses as far as I know. There's no limitation on*running* the code, you can fetch and patch and edit and compile and run all you want and have it on as many of your (or the company's) machines as you want - neither license interferes with your right to do that. You may not redistribute the code though. So, can you answer me this... Why would there be a problem if someone decided to create a 3rd party overlay *not* part of the official gentoo portage tree that contained *only* the zfs stuff, and when this overlay was installed combined with a zfs keyword for the kernel, portage would then pull in the required files, and automagically build a kernel with an up to date version of zfs properly and fully integrated? Would this not work, *and* have no problems with licensing? there is no problem with licensing in that case. The ebuild could even go in the portage tree, as Gentoo is not redistributing sources when it publishes an ebuild. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-30 10:34 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 30/08/2013 16:29, Tanstaafl wrote: Why would there be a problem if someone decided to create a 3rd party overlay *not* part of the official gentoo portage tree that contained *only* the zfs stuff, and when this overlay was installed combined with a zfs keyword for the kernel, portage would then pull in the required files, and automagically build a kernel with an up to date version of zfs properly and fully integrated? Would this not work, *and* have no problems with licensing? there is no problem with licensing in that case. The ebuild could even go in the portage tree, as Gentoo is not redistributing sources when it publishes an ebuild. Thanks Alan! Just the answer I wanted. Ok, so... how hard would this be then? What would the chances be that this could actually happen? I'll happily go open a bug for it if you think the work would be minimal... It seems to me that I can't be the only one who would like to see this happen?
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 30/08/2013 16:44, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-30 10:34 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 30/08/2013 16:29, Tanstaafl wrote: Why would there be a problem if someone decided to create a 3rd party overlay *not* part of the official gentoo portage tree that contained *only* the zfs stuff, and when this overlay was installed combined with a zfs keyword for the kernel, portage would then pull in the required files, and automagically build a kernel with an up to date version of zfs properly and fully integrated? Would this not work, *and* have no problems with licensing? there is no problem with licensing in that case. The ebuild could even go in the portage tree, as Gentoo is not redistributing sources when it publishes an ebuild. Thanks Alan! Just the answer I wanted. Ok, so... how hard would this be then? What would the chances be that this could actually happen? I'll happily go open a bug for it if you think the work would be minimal... It seems to me that I can't be the only one who would like to see this happen? Ahem, Mr Bothwick! Our friend with the thing about free lunches needs you to demonstrate your penmanship, considering you have some proven results in this area. :-) -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Friday 30 Aug 2013 15:44:35 Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-30 10:34 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 30/08/2013 16:29, Tanstaafl wrote: Why would there be a problem if someone decided to create a 3rd party overlay *not* part of the official gentoo portage tree that contained *only* the zfs stuff, and when this overlay was installed combined with a zfs keyword for the kernel, portage would then pull in the required files, and automagically build a kernel with an up to date version of zfs properly and fully integrated? Would this not work, *and* have no problems with licensing? there is no problem with licensing in that case. The ebuild could even go in the portage tree, as Gentoo is not redistributing sources when it publishes an ebuild. Thanks Alan! Just the answer I wanted. Ok, so... how hard would this be then? What would the chances be that this could actually happen? I'll happily go open a bug for it if you think the work would be minimal... It seems to me that I can't be the only one who would like to see this happen? Nope! I will vote for you. ;-) -- Regards, Mick signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: Integrated ZFS for Gentoo - WAS Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 4:16 AM, Mick michaelkintz...@gmail.com wrote: On Friday 30 Aug 2013 15:44:35 Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-30 10:34 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 30/08/2013 16:29, Tanstaafl wrote: Why would there be a problem if someone decided to create a 3rd party overlay *not* part of the official gentoo portage tree that contained *only* the zfs stuff, and when this overlay was installed combined with a zfs keyword for the kernel, portage would then pull in the required files, and automagically build a kernel with an up to date version of zfs properly and fully integrated? Would this not work, *and* have no problems with licensing? there is no problem with licensing in that case. The ebuild could even go in the portage tree, as Gentoo is not redistributing sources when it publishes an ebuild. Thanks Alan! Just the answer I wanted. Ok, so... how hard would this be then? What would the chances be that this could actually happen? I'll happily go open a bug for it if you think the work would be minimal... It seems to me that I can't be the only one who would like to see this happen? Nope! I will vote for you. ;-) -- Regards, Mick Sounds like an awful lot of trouble for a problem that's already solved by installing sys-kernel/module-rebuild and running module-rebuild rebuild after every kernel update, which is how nvidia, broadcom, and other kernel modules are dealt painlessly with anyways... -- This email is:[ ] actionable [x] fyi[ ] social Response needed: [ ] yes [x] up to you [ ] no Time-sensitive: [ ] immediate[ ] soon [x] none
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Tue, Aug 27, 2013 at 8:03 PM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 27/08/2013 14:05, Tanstaafl wrote: [-- snippy --] Thanks Alan, starting to get excited about playing with ZFS. How would you rate their docs and support community (for the free version)? Support is top-notch, on par with what you find around here if that helps ;-) Each major.minor version has a .pdf manual published, while the next version is in development, the docs get updated on a wiki and the final version is an export of that. There's a forum with knowledgeable users and the devs hang around just in case regular users can't help with a question. No mailing list though :-( And the forum does have a lot of noise from n00bs, but that's common with web forums. Like on Gentoo, you quickly learn to spot those posts and scan over them. Actually, there *is* a mailing list. I happened upon it accidentally several minutes ago. Two of them in fact. https://groups.google.com/a/zfsonlinux.org/forum/#!forum/zfs-discuss ... and if you want to partake in development of ZFS-on-Linux: https://groups.google.com/a/zfsonlinux.org/forum/#!forum/zfs-devel (I've just subscribed to the first list) Rgds, -- FdS Pandu E Poluan ~ IT Optimizer ~ • LOPSA Member #15248 • Blog : http://pepoluan.tumblr.com • Linked-In : http://id.linkedin.com/in/pepoluan
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-27 5:06 PM, Joerg Schilling joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de wrote: You wrote that modules become derivatives of the Linux kernel and this is the same as writing ZFS would become a kernel derivative. Just for clarification, I was talking about compiling ZFS support INTO the kernel, not running it as a module. Do you claim that support for compiling ZFS directly into the kernel also does not violate the license?
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 28/08/2013 12:58, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-27 5:06 PM, Joerg Schilling joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de wrote: You wrote that modules become derivatives of the Linux kernel and this is the same as writing ZFS would become a kernel derivative. Just for clarification, I was talking about compiling ZFS support INTO the kernel, not running it as a module. Do you claim that support for compiling ZFS directly into the kernel also does not violate the license? Whether the code is compile in or a module makes no difference wrt licenses as far as I know. There's no limitation on *running* the code, you can fetch and patch and edit and compile and run all you want and have it on as many of your (or the company's) machines as you want - neither license interferes with your right to do that. You may not redistribute the code though. A common misconception with these license is that they have something to do with whether you may run the code or not. That is incorrect. Free licenses are all about redistribution and your obligations about sharing when you hand the code over to others. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Tanstaafl tansta...@libertytrek.org wrote: On 2013-08-27 5:06 PM, Joerg Schilling joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de wrote: You wrote that modules become derivatives of the Linux kernel and this is the same as writing ZFS would become a kernel derivative. Just for clarification, I was talking about compiling ZFS support INTO the kernel, not running it as a module. Do you claim that support for compiling ZFS directly into the kernel also does not violate the license? There is no difference, both is permitted. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 27/08/2013 04:04, Thomas Mueller wrote: On the issue of whether ZFS can be shipped with the Linux kernel, FreeBSD includes ZFS with the kernel, binary and source. So does that mean it would be OK for Linux too? No. FreeBSD has a different license (BSD) than Linux (GPL 2 or 3). Please read file COPYING in the kernel sources, the Linux kernel ships with license GPL-2 Not a later version at your choice (2.x) and certainly never GPL-3 The issue is that the Linux kernel devs consider the license terms for ZFS to be incompatible with GPL-2.0 and therefore ZFS cannot be redistributed as a Linux kernel module. There's nothing in the GPL-2 to stop you as a user from building and running ZFS on Linux, as GPL does not interfere with your right to run whatever you wish. The GPL only kicks in when code is redistributed. The BSD license has none of these conditions, in layman terms that license essentially says you can take this code and pretty much do with it whatever you want, we don't care I am not a lawyer! Tom -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 26/08/2013 23:37, Joerg Schilling wrote: Neil Bothwick n...@digimed.co.uk wrote: On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 19:30:05 +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote: The licensing conflict means that would not be possible. You have the install the kernel source and then merge in the ZFS source yourself, it can't be done for you and distributed. Why do you believe this? ZFS id doubtlessly an own work independent from the rest of the Linux kernel and for this reason, adding ZFS just creates a collective work that is not affected by the GPL. But the CCDL licence of ZFS precludes its being distributed with the kernel. At least, that's how I understand it and the fact that no distro distributes a ZFS-enabled kernel makes me believe it is true. Did you ever read the CDDL? People who believe that there is a problem use a wrong interpretation of the GPL. The CDDL definitely does not prevent combinations with other software. The problem is not with CDDL, the problem is with the GPL. ZFS in the kernel requires that ZFS as shipped be relicensed as GPL, it forms a derivative work of the kernel. No external license can change the terms of the GPL. Admittedly this gets murky due to XFS. But the clincher would appear to be that Oracle own ZFS and also distribute a branded RedHat derivative distro. To the best of my knowledge Oracle themselves do not ship a ZFS-enabled kernel. Surely, as the owners of the code and with a large dev team, Oracle themselves could solve this issue by doing just that? But they haven't done so. Especially as ZFS is production-ready today whereas the competing btrfs is not. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Thomas Mueller mueller6...@bellsouth.net wrote: On the issue of whether ZFS can be shipped with the Linux kernel, FreeBSD includes ZFS with the kernel, binary and source. So does that mean it would be OK for Linux too? FreeBSD has a different license (BSD) than Linux (GPL 2 or 3). For FreeBSD, things are less easy than for Linux. FreeBSD comes with a license that gives real freedom and the CDDL being copyleft, is a license that intentionally limits the freedom a bit in order to achieve other benefits. The GPL limits freedom in a way far beyond what the CDDl does. Adding code (ZFS) that gives more freedom than the base project (Linux) is easy... It however was a real challenge for me to convince the FreeBSD people in early 2006 to add something to their code that reduces the freedom of the FreeBSD project. I succeeded because I could explain them that ZFS is not code that is _needed_ in order to run FreeBSD - you just could use their UFS variant instead. The same arguments worked for integrating DTrace into FreeBSD. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: The issue is that the Linux kernel devs consider the license terms for ZFS to be incompatible with GPL-2.0 and therefore ZFS cannot be redistributed as a Linux kernel module. Isn't it strange that those people seem to have less problems with closed source than with a license that gives more freedom than the GPL? But you are correct that the problem seem to be humans and not a license text. There's nothing in the GPL-2 to stop you as a user from building and running ZFS on Linux, as GPL does not interfere with your right to run whatever you wish. The GPL only kicks in when code is redistributed. There is nothing non-void in the GPL that stops you from distributing binaries. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: People who believe that there is a problem use a wrong interpretation of the GPL. The CDDL definitely does not prevent combinations with other software. The problem is not with CDDL, the problem is with the GPL. ZFS in the kernel requires that ZFS as shipped be relicensed as GPL, it forms a derivative work of the kernel. No external license can change the terms of the GPL. The law can! The GPL is in conflict with the law and therefore the parts you have in mind are just void. BTW: I am still waiting for a legally acceptable explanation on why the GPL should be compatible to the BSD license. Note that the BSD license is very liberal, but it definitely does not permit to relicense code that was published under the BSD license withour written permission of the Copyright holder. So is the problem just a social problem given the fact that Linux comes with BSD licensed parts? Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 27/08/2013 09:59, Joerg Schilling wrote: Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: People who believe that there is a problem use a wrong interpretation of the GPL. The CDDL definitely does not prevent combinations with other software. The problem is not with CDDL, the problem is with the GPL. ZFS in the kernel requires that ZFS as shipped be relicensed as GPL, it forms a derivative work of the kernel. No external license can change the terms of the GPL. The law can! The GPL is in conflict with the law and therefore the parts you have in mind are just void. Which law is the GPL in conflict with, and in which jurisdiction, and what is the extent of the conflict? To the best of my knowledge, what you claim has not been tested in a court of law with jurisdiction, and is not a matter of law. Until that happens, it is an untested legal opinion and as we know, opinions can vary. The kernel devs have their position, you have yours. In this case, the opinion of the kernel devs is the one that carries as they control what does and does not ship. BTW: I am still waiting for a legally acceptable explanation on why the GPL should be compatible to the BSD license. Note that the BSD license is very liberal, but it definitely does not permit to relicense code that was published under the BSD license withour written permission of the Copyright holder. There is no requirement that the GPL should be compatible with the BSD license. The GPL only requires that derivative works comply with the terms of the GPL. If BSD code is shipped with GPL code and the BSD code is the derivative work, the BSD license does not demand that the code be published. However, the GPL does so the entire codebase is published under the terms of the GPL. Thus the conditions of both licenses are satisfied, and no relicensing is involved. So is the problem just a social problem given the fact that Linux comes with BSD licensed parts? I don't follow your reasoning here. How does the BSD license affect CDDL code in this case? Jörg -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 27/08/2013 09:53, Joerg Schilling wrote: Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: The issue is that the Linux kernel devs consider the license terms for ZFS to be incompatible with GPL-2.0 and therefore ZFS cannot be redistributed as a Linux kernel module. Isn't it strange that those people seem to have less problems with closed source than with a license that gives more freedom than the GPL? But you are correct that the problem seem to be humans and not a license text. You are aware that the GPL was not really intended to be used together with other licenses? It was really intended to create an entire operating system, all of which was 100% licensed as GPL, all of which comprise an original work written from scratch Stallman never makes this claim as bluntly as I've said it here, but it's the only intelligent reading of his intent as far as I can make out. This is why so many arguments arise over the GPL, the wording of that license was not really intended to have it co-exist with other licenses. That's how I see it anyway. There's nothing in the GPL-2 to stop you as a user from building and running ZFS on Linux, as GPL does not interfere with your right to run whatever you wish. The GPL only kicks in when code is redistributed. There is nothing non-void in the GPL that stops you from distributing binaries. That's a question of packaging and bundling, which is not covered by the GPL. But kernel code and kernel modules are not mere bundles, they are derivative works by virtue of how tightly they integrate with the kernel, and how the code can only ever run unchanged on Linux. That is how ZFS as a fuse module works, no license issues with the kernel there at all. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: The law can! The GPL is in conflict with the law and therefore the parts you have in mind are just void. Which law is the GPL in conflict with, and in which jurisdiction, and what is the extent of the conflict? The GPL is in conflict with US Copyright law Section 17 Paragraph 106. In Europe, the law on business conditions apply and allow the licensee to chose his best interpretation in case of To the best of my knowledge, what you claim has not been tested in a court of law with jurisdiction, and is not a matter of law. Until that happens, it is an untested legal opinion and as we know, opinions can vary. There is no need to test something so obvious in court. A license is not allowed to redefine the definition of what a derivative work is and the problem with the GPL only exists in case the GPL succeeds to redefine the lawful definition of a drivative work. The kernel devs have their position, you have yours. In this case, the opinion of the kernel devs is the one that carries as they control what does and does not ship. While I am quoting the papers from lawyers (Determann, Rosen, Gordon) you are quoting laymen. Note that Lothar Determan is professor of law at Freie Univerität Berlin _and_ the university of San Francisco. BTW: I am still waiting for a legally acceptable explanation on why the GPL should be compatible to the BSD license. Note that the BSD license is very liberal, but it definitely does not permit to relicense code that was published under the BSD license withour written permission of the Copyright holder. There is no requirement that the GPL should be compatible with the BSD license. The GPL only requires that derivative works comply with the terms of the GPL. The GPL requires to relicense the whole work under the GPL and this is not permitted for code under the BSD license. If BSD code is shipped with GPL code and the BSD code is the derivative work, the BSD license does not demand that the code be published. However, the GPL does so the entire codebase is published under the terms of the GPL. Thus the conditions of both licenses are satisfied, and no relicensing is involved. If the Linux kernel uses the BSD code, it is the Linux kernel that has become the derivative work. Note that you cannot publishe the entire codebase under GPL as parts are under BSD license already. So is the problem just a social problem given the fact that Linux comes with BSD licensed parts? I don't follow your reasoning here. How does the BSD license affect CDDL code in this case? It demonstrates that the Linux kernel people do not really honor the GPL and I see no difference between adding code under BSD compared to code under CDDL. Both licenses do not allow relicensing without written permission of the Copyright owner. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: Isn't it strange that those people seem to have less problems with closed source than with a license that gives more freedom than the GPL? But you are correct that the problem seem to be humans and not a license text. You are aware that the GPL was not really intended to be used together with other licenses? It was really intended to create an entire operating system, all of which was 100% licensed as GPL, all of which comprise an original work written from scratch But it has been proven that you cannot create a 100% GPL OS. More than 50% of all Linux distros are under different licenses... Stallman never makes this claim as bluntly as I've said it here, but it's the only intelligent reading of his intent as far as I can make out. This is why so many arguments arise over the GPL, the wording of that license was not really intended to have it co-exist with other licenses. Stallman does not look at reality. The first GCC version in 1986 has been published under something I call GPLv0 and this license did not permit a legal use of the GCC in public. The license was later converted to GPLv1 by using proposals I made but Stallman still only talks about what has been in GPLv0. There is nothing non-void in the GPL that stops you from distributing binaries. That's a question of packaging and bundling, which is not covered by the GPL. But kernel code and kernel modules are not mere bundles, they are derivative works by virtue of how tightly they integrate with the kernel, and how the code can only ever run unchanged on Linux. If a kernel uses ZFS, you have to decide on whether the kernel is a derivative work of ZFS or whether just a collective work exists. _Using_ ZFS definitely does not make ZFS a derivative work. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Joerg Schilling joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de wrote: Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: Isn't it strange that those people seem to have less problems with closed source than with a license that gives more freedom than the GPL? But you are correct that the problem seem to be humans and not a license text. You are aware that the GPL was not really intended to be used together with other licenses? It was really intended to create an entire operating system, all of which was 100% licensed as GPL, all of which comprise an original work written from scratch But it has been proven that you cannot create a 100% GPL OS. More than 50% of all Linux distros are under different licenses... Sorry, this should be: More than 50% of a typical Linux distro is under different licenses... Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Ummm... I didn't suggest that ZFS be shipped with or distributed with the kernel... I was talking about some kind of overlay or patch system, where I could add zfs to my kernel use flag, and it would pull the gentoo-sources from wherver it pulls them, and pul;l the patch from a *separate*/*different* source/location, and then put the patch where it needs to go to be properly compiled into the kernel. Again, the overlay would *not* contain or provide the kernel sources, only the zfs 'patch'. I don't see a problem with that. On 2013-08-26 10:04 PM, Thomas Mueller mueller6...@bellsouth.net wrote: On the issue of whether ZFS can be shipped with the Linux kernel, FreeBSD includes ZFS with the kernel, binary and source. So does that mean it would be OK for Linux too? FreeBSD has a different license (BSD) than Linux (GPL 2 or 3). I am not a lawyer! Tom
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-26 2:23 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: I run it on my NASes, and the thing that really sold me was what it lets me as the admin do: I get all the benefits of directories with none of the downsides. I get all the benefits of mount points with none of the downsides. I get all the benefits of discrete filesystems with none of the downsides. Like you say, a truly modern fs built for modern needs. Are these home-built NAS's running FreeBSD (or maybe FreeNAS)? Or TrueNAS or Nexenta boxes? I'm wondering what the best way would be to get something set up for ZFS file storage. I have some older servers that I can use, so was leaning toward FreeNAS...
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 27/08/2013 13:36, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-26 2:23 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: I run it on my NASes, and the thing that really sold me was what it lets me as the admin do: I get all the benefits of directories with none of the downsides. I get all the benefits of mount points with none of the downsides. I get all the benefits of discrete filesystems with none of the downsides. Like you say, a truly modern fs built for modern needs. Are these home-built NAS's running FreeBSD (or maybe FreeNAS)? Or TrueNAS or Nexenta boxes? I'm wondering what the best way would be to get something set up for ZFS file storage. I have some older servers that I can use, so was leaning toward FreeNAS... Mine are HP mini-servers (the cube shaped ones) with 4 SATA bays running FreeNAS 8.0.something. Dunno if you've worked with FreeNAS before, but it's literally a case of write the image to USB or flash storage and boot off it. Then play. You will need to be able to boot off a USB stick, CF card or similar, FreeNAS uses an entire drive for it's system partition and it's a shame to waste a whole high-capacity disk just for a 2G system image -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-27 7:42 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 27/08/2013 13:36, Tanstaafl wrote: I'm wondering what the best way would be to get something set up for ZFS file storage. I have some older servers that I can use, so was leaning toward FreeNAS... Mine are HP mini-servers (the cube shaped ones) with 4 SATA bays running FreeNAS 8.0.something. Dunno if you've worked with FreeNAS before, but it's literally a case of write the image to USB or flash storage and boot off it. Then play. You will need to be able to boot off a USB stick, CF card or similar, FreeNAS uses an entire drive for it's system partition and it's a shame to waste a whole high-capacity disk just for a 2G system image I haven't worked with it before, but this comment of yours means I soon will be - thanks... :) So, once I have something up and running and fully configured, it is relatively easy to backup the new/running system image, in case the flash drive ever crashes and burns? Thanks Alan, starting to get excited about playing with ZFS. How would you rate their docs and support community (for the free version)? Thanks again Alan Charles
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 06:33:52 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: Ummm... I didn't suggest that ZFS be shipped with or distributed with the kernel... I was talking about some kind of overlay or patch system, where I could add zfs to my kernel use flag, and it would pull the gentoo-sources from wherver it pulls them, and pul;l the patch from a *separate*/*different* source/location, and then put the patch where it needs to go to be properly compiled into the kernel. I already posted the script I use to do exactly that. emerge gentoo-sources run the script I wonder it it would be possible to have the spl and zfs-kmod ebuilds do this with an appropriate USE flag. -- Neil Bothwick Bury a lawyer 12 feet under, because deep down they're nice. signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-27 8:25 AM, Neil Bothwick n...@digimed.co.uk wrote: On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 06:33:52 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: Ummm... I didn't suggest that ZFS be shipped with or distributed with the kernel... I was talking about some kind of overlay or patch system, where I could add zfs to my kernel use flag, and it would pull the gentoo-sources from wherver it pulls them, and pul;l the patch from a *separate*/*different* source/location, and then put the patch where it needs to go to be properly compiled into the kernel. I already posted the script I use to do exactly that. emerge gentoo-sources run the script I wonder it it would be possible to have the spl and zfs-kmod ebuilds do this with an appropriate USE flag. Thats what I'm looking for... something that is automatic and basically 'just works'. Manually running a script as part of each kernel update just... well, computers do automation best. But thanks very much for your script. I'm just not comfortable (at this point at least) doing it that way on a production system...
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 27/08/2013 14:05, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-27 7:42 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 27/08/2013 13:36, Tanstaafl wrote: I'm wondering what the best way would be to get something set up for ZFS file storage. I have some older servers that I can use, so was leaning toward FreeNAS... Mine are HP mini-servers (the cube shaped ones) with 4 SATA bays running FreeNAS 8.0.something. Dunno if you've worked with FreeNAS before, but it's literally a case of write the image to USB or flash storage and boot off it. Then play. You will need to be able to boot off a USB stick, CF card or similar, FreeNAS uses an entire drive for it's system partition and it's a shame to waste a whole high-capacity disk just for a 2G system image I haven't worked with it before, but this comment of yours means I soon will be - thanks... :) So, once I have something up and running and fully configured, it is relatively easy to backup the new/running system image, in case the flash drive ever crashes and burns? It's a small image (100M compressed), so just keep a copy handy somewhere and reflash. The GUI has a function where you can backup the running config, a restore is a simple matter of click restore in the GUI The USBstick/CF card you boot off will keep a copy of the current image and one version back (i.e. the one the current one replaced), so you can boot the old system by pressing F2 if the new one fails for some weird reason. Most of the config is GUI-driven in a browser, a lot but not all options can be set on the CLI. But honestly, it's a file server and you will find that once you set your shares up the way you like you will seldom change stuff. Your main interaction will probably be watching the pretty connectd graphs in a browser For shares you get everything you could possibly need - cifs, nfs (2,3 and 4), iSCSI, FTP, scp, some Apple thing, and tftp and a few more. And rsync! Thanks Alan, starting to get excited about playing with ZFS. How would you rate their docs and support community (for the free version)? Support is top-notch, on par with what you find around here if that helps ;-) Each major.minor version has a .pdf manual published, while the next version is in development, the docs get updated on a wiki and the final version is an export of that. There's a forum with knowledgeable users and the devs hang around just in case regular users can't help with a question. No mailing list though :-( And the forum does have a lot of noise from n00bs, but that's common with web forums. Like on Gentoo, you quickly learn to spot those posts and scan over them. Thanks again Alan Charles -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-27 9:03 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: Each major.minor version has a .pdf manual published, while the next version is in development, the docs get updated on a wiki and the final version is an export of that. There's a forum with knowledgeable users and the devs hang around just in case regular users can't help with a question. Ok, that brings up another issue... One thing I've always loved about gentoo is it is a rolling release, which means no 'major update' pains to speak of (at least not like binary based distros like redhat etc)... So, have you ever gone through any major system updates, and if so, any issues to speak of? Thanks again for sharing this...
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 27/08/2013 15:11, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-27 9:03 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: Each major.minor version has a .pdf manual published, while the next version is in development, the docs get updated on a wiki and the final version is an export of that. There's a forum with knowledgeable users and the devs hang around just in case regular users can't help with a question. Ok, that brings up another issue... One thing I've always loved about gentoo is it is a rolling release, which means no 'major update' pains to speak of (at least not like binary based distros like redhat etc)... So, have you ever gone through any major system updates, and if so, any issues to speak of? Thanks again for sharing this... No issues ever whatsoever. An upgrade is almost exactly the same as upgrading firmware on your DSL router or reflashing OpenElec[1]. The longest part is waiting for the NAS to reboot twice and get through whatever your disk controller does at power up :-) Once in the early days I had an incompatible database format for configs and got a message at the start, so I had to do something manually to get past that. But that was long ago. These days the migration script always just dealt with it properly. [1] another awesome project that JustWorks. I'm getting to like these Unix-based appliances that JustWork. if I need to get under the overs and tweak stuff, I can. Most mostly I don't need to :-) -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Tue, 27 Aug 2013 08:37:54 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: I already posted the script I use to do exactly that. emerge gentoo-sources run the script I wonder it it would be possible to have the spl and zfs-kmod ebuilds do this with an appropriate USE flag. Thats what I'm looking for... something that is automatic and basically 'just works'. Manually running a script as part of each kernel update just... well, computers do automation best. I use a script to configure, build and install new kernels. It's called from there, so it is automatic for me :) But thanks very much for your script. I'm just not comfortable (at this point at least) doing it that way on a production system... That's the recommended way, since the script follows the instructions for merging the modules in the kernel tree and uses the make scripts that come with the sources. It will not mess up your kernel since it only adds code, code that isn't even used until you enable it in the .config. -- Neil Bothwick MACINTOSH: Most Applications Crash; If Not, The Operating System Hangs signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-27 9:03 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: It's a small image (100M compressed), so just keep a copy handy somewhere and reflash. The GUI has a function where you can backup the running config, a restore is a simple matter of click restore in the GUI The USBstick/CF card you boot off will keep a copy of the current image and one version back (i.e. the one the current one replaced), so you can boot the old system by pressing F2 if the new one fails for some weird reason. Crazy question... Wondering of I could run this in a VM on my ESXi server? Purpose would be threefold... hosting windows user homes and roaming profiles hosting alternate email storage for dovecot (for mail archival) hosting email backups (rsync) hmm maybe I could even make it primary mail storage? Have to give this some thought...
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 27/08/2013 17:55, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-27 9:03 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: It's a small image (100M compressed), so just keep a copy handy somewhere and reflash. The GUI has a function where you can backup the running config, a restore is a simple matter of click restore in the GUI The USBstick/CF card you boot off will keep a copy of the current image and one version back (i.e. the one the current one replaced), so you can boot the old system by pressing F2 if the new one fails for some weird reason. Crazy question... Wondering of I could run this in a VM on my ESXi server? Purpose would be threefold... hosting windows user homes and roaming profiles hosting alternate email storage for dovecot (for mail archival) hosting email backups (rsync) hmm maybe I could even make it primary mail storage? Have to give this some thought... Many people do just that (for testing and evaluation). ESXi lets you present an image file as a boot device so that's sorted. As always with VMs, IO performance is pretty sucky if you present file-based storage to the guest. It's OK to evaluate and learn the commands with, but for production you really want direct access to proper storage devices. Just make sure your backend storage is NOT itself doing RAID - ZFS doesn't play nicely with that. It really wants a JBOD with no firmware interference. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 27/08/2013 13:36, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-26 2:23 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: I run it on my NASes, and the thing that really sold me was what it lets me as the admin do: I get all the benefits of directories with none of the downsides. I get all the benefits of mount points with none of the downsides. I get all the benefits of discrete filesystems with none of the downsides. Like you say, a truly modern fs built for modern needs. Are these home-built NAS's running FreeBSD (or maybe FreeNAS)? Or TrueNAS or Nexenta boxes? I'm wondering what the best way would be to get something set up for ZFS file storage. I have some older servers that I can use, so was leaning toward FreeNAS... Mine are HP mini-servers (the cube shaped ones) with 4 SATA bays running FreeNAS 8.0.something. Dunno if you've worked with FreeNAS before, but it's literally a case of write the image to USB or flash storage and boot off it. Then play. You will need to be able to boot off a USB stick, CF card or similar, FreeNAS uses an entire drive for it's system partition and it's a shame to waste a whole high-capacity disk just for a 2G system image -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com Alan. How is the security settings on the shares now? I had issues when accessing through NFS and CIFS simultaneously where files written over NFS had to have the permissions altered before they were accessible over CIFS. Other issue I had was inability to have users only being able to access files they were allowed to. With CIFS it sort of worked. But with NFS I had full access to all files. That is the reason why I setup my NAS manually using Gentoo. -- Joost -- Sent from my Android phone with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity.
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 27/08/2013 21:24, jo...@antarean.org wrote: Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 27/08/2013 13:36, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-26 2:23 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: I run it on my NASes, and the thing that really sold me was what it lets me as the admin do: I get all the benefits of directories with none of the downsides. I get all the benefits of mount points with none of the downsides. I get all the benefits of discrete filesystems with none of the downsides. Like you say, a truly modern fs built for modern needs. Are these home-built NAS's running FreeBSD (or maybe FreeNAS)? Or TrueNAS or Nexenta boxes? I'm wondering what the best way would be to get something set up for ZFS file storage. I have some older servers that I can use, so was leaning toward FreeNAS... Mine are HP mini-servers (the cube shaped ones) with 4 SATA bays running FreeNAS 8.0.something. Dunno if you've worked with FreeNAS before, but it's literally a case of write the image to USB or flash storage and boot off it. Then play. You will need to be able to boot off a USB stick, CF card or similar, FreeNAS uses an entire drive for it's system partition and it's a shame to waste a whole high-capacity disk just for a 2G system image Alan. How is the security settings on the shares now? I had issues when accessing through NFS and CIFS simultaneously where files written over NFS had to have the permissions altered before they were accessible over CIFS. I've never run into this situation myself, my shares are either accessed via cfs or via nfs, but never both at the same time. The permissions issue is an artifact of how NFS works. Sun designed it to deliver entire filesystems over the network (most often /usr and-or /home) to trusted clients. trusted being the operative word. To get Unix permissions to work, the uid on the share and client have to match - that's why we also have NIS - but I've never seen NIS actually used anywhere, so UIDs tend to be a mix 'n match and almost always devolves into full access to get it to work. CIFS work different, it auths users by username and supports per-field access control. That's how that protocol works. There is no known way to fix NFS v2 v3 in a mixed network and still stay sane. NFS v4 does a good job but it's not NFS v3 :-) it's common for NAS vendors to recommend you not try share the same files over CIFS and NFS, especially if write access is involced. Other issue I had was inability to have users only being able to access files they were allowed to. With CIFS it sort of worked. But with NFS I had full access to all files. That is the reason why I setup my NAS manually using Gentoo. -- Joost -- Sent from my Android phone with K-9 Mail. Please excuse my brevity. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 27/08/2013 11:08, Joerg Schilling wrote: Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: Isn't it strange that those people seem to have less problems with closed source than with a license that gives more freedom than the GPL? But you are correct that the problem seem to be humans and not a license text. You are aware that the GPL was not really intended to be used together with other licenses? It was really intended to create an entire operating system, all of which was 100% licensed as GPL, all of which comprise an original work written from scratch But it has been proven that you cannot create a 100% GPL OS. More than 50% of all Linux distros are under different licenses... Stallman never makes this claim as bluntly as I've said it here, but it's the only intelligent reading of his intent as far as I can make out. This is why so many arguments arise over the GPL, the wording of that license was not really intended to have it co-exist with other licenses. Stallman does not look at reality. The first GCC version in 1986 has been published under something I call GPLv0 and this license did not permit a legal use of the GCC in public. The license was later converted to GPLv1 by using proposals I made but Stallman still only talks about what has been in GPLv0. I didn't bring this up to discuss fine points of licenses. I brought it up for those who might want to understand what the GPL is intended to do; that can only be truly understood by determining what Stallman intended. The GPL is a reflection of Stallman's intent, and can only be truly understood in that light. Whether the legal wording accurately matches his intent is another matter altogether. I personally feel it doesn't, won't and cannot, for reasons of psychology and philosophy, not for reasons of technology or law. What the GPL tries to do and how it does it is quite foreign to most who practice law. Humans don't like foreign concepts. Heck, GPL-2 doesn't even remotely read like something that came off a lawyer's desk. There is nothing non-void in the GPL that stops you from distributing binaries. That's a question of packaging and bundling, which is not covered by the GPL. But kernel code and kernel modules are not mere bundles, they are derivative works by virtue of how tightly they integrate with the kernel, and how the code can only ever run unchanged on Linux. If a kernel uses ZFS, you have to decide on whether the kernel is a derivative work of ZFS or whether just a collective work exists. _Using_ ZFS definitely does not make ZFS a derivative work. I never said it did. I was concentrating on those parts of ZFS that interact with kernel internals - that might not be been entirely clear You are making a spurious claim by saying you have to decide on whether the kernel is a derivative work of ZFS or ... In what possible way could the entire Linux kernel be considered a derivative work of ZFS? That doesn't make any sense. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: The permissions issue is an artifact of how NFS works. Sun designed it to deliver entire filesystems over the network (most often /usr and-or /home) to trusted clients. trusted being the operative word. To get Unix permissions to work, the uid on the share and client have to match - that's why we also have NIS - but I've never seen NIS actually used anywhere, so UIDs tend to be a mix 'n match and almost always devolves into full access to get it to work. This is how NFS was designed before 1987, when Kerberos came up CIFS work different, it auths users by username and supports per-field access control. That's how that protocol works. This is how NFSv4 works. BTW: as long as Linux does not support modern ACLs (originally defined by NTFS, now standardized by NFSv4) Linux will not be able to take advantage from CIFS ACLs. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 27/08/2013 11:26, Joerg Schilling wrote: Joerg Schilling joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de wrote: Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: Isn't it strange that those people seem to have less problems with closed source than with a license that gives more freedom than the GPL? But you are correct that the problem seem to be humans and not a license text. You are aware that the GPL was not really intended to be used together with other licenses? It was really intended to create an entire operating system, all of which was 100% licensed as GPL, all of which comprise an original work written from scratch But it has been proven that you cannot create a 100% GPL OS. More than 50% of all Linux distros are under different licenses... Sorry, this should be: More than 50% of a typical Linux distro is under different licenses... All we can state for sure is that no-one has yet created a fully 100% GPL operating system. If you persuade FSF to relicense glibc to you as GPL it *is* possible to do it for kernel and (a somewhat crippled) userland. But not for firmware. But this is beside the point, I was illustrating Stallman's intent, not whether that intent could be realized or not. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: That's a question of packaging and bundling, which is not covered by the GPL. But kernel code and kernel modules are not mere bundles, they are derivative works by virtue of how tightly they integrate with the kernel, and how the code can only ever run unchanged on Linux. If a kernel uses ZFS, you have to decide on whether the kernel is a derivative work of ZFS or whether just a collective work exists. _Using_ ZFS definitely does not make ZFS a derivative work. I never said it did. I was concentrating on those parts of ZFS that interact with kernel internals - that might not be been entirely clear You wrote that modules become derivatives of the Linux kernel and this is the same as writing ZFS would become a kernel derivative. The linux kernel does not come with a modern VFS implementation, so if you like to use ZFS on Linux you first need to provide a suitable VFS interface. ZFS will not interact with the Linux kernel directly but with the expected VFS layer. Shouldn't it be possible to put this intermediate layer under a license that makes even the zealots happy? You are making a spurious claim by saying you have to decide on whether the kernel is a derivative work of ZFS or ... If you go the non-lawful Stallman way and insist in a derivative work to be build, then the linux kernel is the derivative work. I prefer to assume that this just builds a collective work ;-) In what possible way could the entire Linux kernel be considered a derivative work of ZFS? That doesn't make any sense. I am just quoting claims from Stallman ;-) Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Aug 26, 2013 5:06 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: On 18/08/2013 21:38, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-18 5:16 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: While we're on the topic, what's the obsession with having different bits of the file hierarchy as different*mount points*? That harks back to the days when the only way to have a chunk of fs space be different was to have it as a separate physical thing and mount it. Nowadays we have something better - ZFS. To me this makes so much more sense. I have a large amount of storage called a pool, and set size limits and characteristics for various directories without having to deal with fixed size volumes. Eh? *Who* has ZFS? Certainly not the linux kernel. FreeBSD You can get ZFS on Linux with relative ease, you just have to build it yourself. Distros feel they can't redistribute that code. The bit you quoted shouldn't be read to mean that we have ZFS, it works on Linux and everyone should activate it and use it and chuck ext* out the window. I meant that we've been chugging along since 1982 or so with ancient disk concepts that come mostly from MS_DOS and limited by that hardware of that day. And here we are in 2013 *still* fiddling with partition tables, fixed file systems, fixed mountpoints and we still bang our heads weekly because sda3 has proven to be too small, and it's a *huge* mission to change it. Yes, LVM has made this so much easier (kudos to Sistina for that) but I believe the entire approach is wrong. The ZFS approach is better - here's the storage, now do with it what I want but don't employ arbitrary fixed limits and structures to do it. +1 on ZFS. It's honestly a truly *modern* filesystem. Been using it as the storage back-end of my company's email server. The zpool and zfs command may need some time to be familiar with, but the self-mounting self-sharing ability of zfs (i.e., no need to muck with fstab and exports files) is really sweet. I really leveraged its ability to do what I call delta snapshot shipping (i.e., send only the differences between two snapshots to another place). It's almost like an asynchronous DRBD, but with the added peace of mind that if the files become corrupted (due to buggy app, almost no way for ZFS to let corrupt data exist), I can easily 'roll back' to the time where the files are still uncorrupted. Rgds, --
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 26/08/2013 08:10, Pandu Poluan wrote: The ZFS approach is better - here's the storage, now do with it what I want but don't employ arbitrary fixed limits and structures to do it. +1 on ZFS. It's honestly a truly *modern* filesystem. Been using it as the storage back-end of my company's email server. The zpool and zfs command may need some time to be familiar with, but the self-mounting self-sharing ability of zfs (i.e., no need to muck with fstab and exports files) is really sweet. I really leveraged its ability to do what I call delta snapshot shipping (i.e., send only the differences between two snapshots to another place). It's almost like an asynchronous DRBD, but with the added peace of mind that if the files become corrupted (due to buggy app, almost no way for ZFS to let corrupt data exist), I can easily 'roll back' to the time where the files are still uncorrupted. I run it on my NASes, and the thing that really sold me was what it lets me as the admin do: I get all the benefits of directories with none of the downsides. I get all the benefits of mount points with none of the downsides. I get all the benefits of discrete filesystems with none of the downsides. Like you say, a truly modern fs built for modern needs. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 00:02:17 +0200, Alan McKinnon wrote: Eh? *Who* has ZFS? Certainly not the linux kernel. FreeBSD You can get ZFS on Linux with relative ease, you just have to build it yourself. Distros feel they can't redistribute that code. emerge zfs works too :) I really liek the way ZFS just lets you get on with things. -- Neil Bothwick Help put the fun back in dysfunctional ! signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Monday 26 Aug 2013 08:06:13 Neil Bothwick wrote: On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 00:02:17 +0200, Alan McKinnon wrote: Eh? *Who* has ZFS? Certainly not the linux kernel. FreeBSD You can get ZFS on Linux with relative ease, you just have to build it yourself. Distros feel they can't redistribute that code. emerge zfs works too :) I really liek the way ZFS just lets you get on with things. Does anyone run it on a desktop/laptop as their day to day fs? Any drawbacks or gotchas? Other than reliability, how does it perform compared say to ext4? -- Regards, Mick signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part.
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 09:45:15 +0100, Mick wrote: emerge zfs works too :) I really like the way ZFS just lets you get on with things. Does anyone run it on a desktop/laptop as their day to day fs? Yes. Any drawbacks or gotchas? Other than reliability, how does it perform compared say to ext4? I haven't benchmarked it. It feels as if it may be a little slower on my desktop with spinning disks, but that may be down to other factors, like impatience. It flies on my laptop's SSD. -- Neil Bothwick Why is bra singular and pants plural? signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Mon, Aug 26, 2013 at 4:56 PM, Neil Bothwick n...@digimed.co.uk wrote: On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 09:45:15 +0100, Mick wrote: emerge zfs works too :) I really like the way ZFS just lets you get on with things. Does anyone run it on a desktop/laptop as their day to day fs? Yes. Any drawbacks or gotchas? Other than reliability, how does it perform compared say to ext4? I haven't benchmarked it. It feels as if it may be a little slower on my desktop with spinning disks, but that may be down to other factors, like impatience. It flies on my laptop's SSD. Additional note: *Of course* it will be slower than ext*, because during every read it ensures that the block being read has a proper checksum. Likewise on writes. But that IMO is very worth it just for the additional peace-of-mind, knowing you will never ever have a silent corruption. -- FdS Pandu E Poluan * ~ IT Optimizer ~** * • LOPSA Member #15248 • Blog : http://pepoluan.tumblr.com • Linked-In : http://id.linkedin.com/in/pepoluan
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Am 26.08.2013 10:45, schrieb Mick: Does anyone run it on a desktop/laptop as their day to day fs? Any drawbacks or gotchas? Other than reliability, how does it perform compared say to ext4? Sorry for being shameless: I once described a ZFS-based gentoo setup with encryption for the german linux magazine. They translated it and it was published in other parts of the world as well: http://www.oops.co.at/en/publications/english-translation-of-zfs-article I delivered a demo-VM as well but I don't run that setup on my productive systems currently. Stefan (not earning anything from those pdf-downloads, btw)
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-25 6:02 PM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: You can get ZFS on Linux with relative ease, you just have to build it yourself. Distros feel they can't redistribute that code. I know you can do this as a module - but is there an overlay or patch to get it built directly into the kernel? I'd love to use ZFS on my gentoo server, but I disable modules on servers for security reasons. Thanks...
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 09:16:44 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote:
You can get ZFS on Linux with relative ease, you just have to build it
yourself. Distros feel they can't redistribute that code.
I know you can do this as a module - but is there an overlay or patch
to get it built directly into the kernel? I'd love to use ZFS on my
gentoo server, but I disable modules on servers for security reasons.
You can do it. You have to unmask the kernel_builtin USE flag to stop zfs
bringing in zfs_kmod, then unpack the sources and run the script to
install them into the kernel tree.
I run this script after emerging a new kernel
==
#!/bin/sh
[[ -f /usr/src/linux/.config ]] || zcat /proc/config.gz
/usr/src/linux/.config
SPL_EBUILD=$(ls -1 /var/portage/sys-kernel/spl/spl-0* | tail -n 1)
ZFS_EBUILD=$(ls -1 /var/portage/sys-fs/zfs/zfs-0* | tail -n 1)
SPL_DIR=$(ebuild $SPL_EBUILD clean prepare | awk '/Preparing source in/
{print $5}') ZFS_DIR=$(ebuild $ZFS_EBUILD clean prepare | awk '/Preparing
source in/ {print $5}')
cd $SPL_DIR
./configure --enable-linux-builtin --with-linux=/usr/src/linux
./copy-builtin /usr/src/linux
cd $ZFS_DIR
./configure --enable-linux-builtin --with-linux=/usr/src/linux
--with-spl=$SPL_DIR ./copy-builtin /usr/src/linux
==
Then run make oldconfig and compile as usual.
--
Neil Bothwick
Cross-country skiing is great in small countries.
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Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 14:06:11 +0200, Stefan G. Weichinger wrote: Sorry for being shameless: I once described a ZFS-based gentoo setup with encryption for the german linux magazine. They translated it and it was published in other parts of the world as well: That is pretty shameless. I would never be so blatant as to mention the ZFS tutorial in the current issue (175) of Linux Format. -- Neil Bothwick Head: (n.) the part of a disk drive which detects sectors and decides which of the two possible values to return: 'lose a turn' or 'bankrupt.' signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 26/08/2013 16:38, Neil Bothwick wrote: On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 14:06:11 +0200, Stefan G. Weichinger wrote: Sorry for being shameless: I once described a ZFS-based gentoo setup with encryption for the german linux magazine. They translated it and it was published in other parts of the world as well: That is pretty shameless. I would never be so blatant as to mention the ZFS tutorial in the current issue (175) of Linux Format. If you give me a free subscription for life, I promise I won't breath a word of you never mentioning ZFS -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Am 26.08.2013 16:38, schrieb Neil Bothwick: On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 14:06:11 +0200, Stefan G. Weichinger wrote: Sorry for being shameless: I once described a ZFS-based gentoo setup with encryption for the german linux magazine. They translated it and it was published in other parts of the world as well: That is pretty shameless. I would never be so blatant as to mention the ZFS tutorial in the current issue (175) of Linux Format. ;-)
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-26 10:11 AM, Neil Bothwick n...@digimed.co.uk wrote: On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 09:16:44 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: You can get ZFS on Linux with relative ease, you just have to build it yourself. Distros feel they can't redistribute that code. I know you can do this as a module - but is there an overlay or patch to get it built directly into the kernel? I'd love to use ZFS on my gentoo server, but I disable modules on servers for security reasons. You can do it. You have to unmask the kernel_builtin USE flag to stop zfs bringing in zfs_kmod, then unpack the sources and run the script to install them into the kernel tree. snip Very interesting, thanks... nice to know it can be done, but I wouldn't be uncomfortable doing that myself... Would be nice if there was a kernel overlay for this...
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 12:36:30 -0400, Tanstaafl wrote: You can do it. You have to unmask the kernel_builtin USE flag to stop zfs bringing in zfs_kmod, then unpack the sources and run the script to install them into the kernel tree. snip Very interesting, thanks... nice to know it can be done, but I wouldn't be uncomfortable doing that myself... Would be nice if there was a kernel overlay for this... The licensing conflict means that would not be possible. You have the install the kernel source and then merge in the ZFS source yourself, it can't be done for you and distributed. -- Neil Bothwick OPERATOR ERROR: Nyah, Nyah, Nyah, Nyah, Nyah! signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Neil Bothwick n...@digimed.co.uk wrote: Would be nice if there was a kernel overlay for this... The licensing conflict means that would not be possible. You have the install the kernel source and then merge in the ZFS source yourself, it can't be done for you and distributed. Why do you believe this? ZFS id doubtlessly an own work independent from the rest of the Linux kernel and for this reason, adding ZFS just creates a collective work that is not affected by the GPL. BTW: this was already explained in the GPL book from Till Jaeger et al. published in March 2005. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 19:30:05 +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote: The licensing conflict means that would not be possible. You have the install the kernel source and then merge in the ZFS source yourself, it can't be done for you and distributed. Why do you believe this? ZFS id doubtlessly an own work independent from the rest of the Linux kernel and for this reason, adding ZFS just creates a collective work that is not affected by the GPL. But the CCDL licence of ZFS precludes its being distributed with the kernel. At least, that's how I understand it and the fact that no distro distributes a ZFS-enabled kernel makes me believe it is true. -- Neil Bothwick Friends come and friends go, but enemies accumulate. signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Neil Bothwick n...@digimed.co.uk wrote: On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 19:30:05 +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote: The licensing conflict means that would not be possible. You have the install the kernel source and then merge in the ZFS source yourself, it can't be done for you and distributed. Why do you believe this? ZFS id doubtlessly an own work independent from the rest of the Linux kernel and for this reason, adding ZFS just creates a collective work that is not affected by the GPL. But the CCDL licence of ZFS precludes its being distributed with the kernel. At least, that's how I understand it and the fact that no distro distributes a ZFS-enabled kernel makes me believe it is true. Did you ever read the CDDL? People who believe that there is a problem use a wrong interpretation of the GPL. The CDDL definitely does not prevent combinations with other software. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On Mon, 26 Aug 2013 23:37:02 +0200, Joerg Schilling wrote: But the CCDL licence of ZFS precludes its being distributed with the kernel. At least, that's how I understand it and the fact that no distro distributes a ZFS-enabled kernel makes me believe it is true. Did you ever read the CDDL? Not completely. People who believe that there is a problem use a wrong interpretation of the GPL. The CDDL definitely does not prevent combinations with other software. I didn't say the CDDL prevented this. I'm not blaming one of the other licence, but they are considered to be incompatible. I realise you believe otherwise, and you could well be correct, but those who distribute the software either believe otherwise or feel there is enough doubt to be cautious. If in doubt, don't. I wish your interpretation was correct, but the prevailing option is otherwise. -- Neil Bothwick Will we ever get out of this airport? asked Tom interminably. signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
Neil Bothwick n...@digimed.co.uk wrote: Did you ever read the CDDL? Not completely. You should do it - it is even much shorter then GPLv3 People who believe that there is a problem use a wrong interpretation of the GPL. The CDDL definitely does not prevent combinations with other software. I didn't say the CDDL prevented this. I'm not blaming one of the other licence, but they are considered to be incompatible. I realise you believe otherwise, and you could well be correct, but those who distribute the software either believe otherwise or feel there is enough doubt to be cautious. If in doubt, don't. There are several entities that frequently publish such unproven claims. This sounds like marketing using the cause fear uncertaintly and doubt method. You should not trust such entities that do not prove their claims. I wish your interpretation was correct, but the prevailing option is otherwise. It is not my interpretation, this is the interpretation of all lawyers in the net that are willing to explain the background of their decisions. This interpretation is based on two basic facts: - The CDDL was designed for best compatibilitiy with all licenses. - The parts of the GPL that are claimed to prevent this license combination are in conflict with the law and thus void. Jörg -- EMail:jo...@schily.isdn.cs.tu-berlin.de (home) Jörg Schilling D-13353 Berlin j...@cs.tu-berlin.de(uni) joerg.schill...@fokus.fraunhofer.de (work) Blog: http://schily.blogspot.com/ URL: http://cdrecord.berlios.de/private/ ftp://ftp.berlios.de/pub/schily
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On the issue of whether ZFS can be shipped with the Linux kernel, FreeBSD includes ZFS with the kernel, binary and source. So does that mean it would be OK for Linux too? FreeBSD has a different license (BSD) than Linux (GPL 2 or 3). I am not a lawyer! Tom
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-18 5:16 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: While we're on the topic, what's the obsession with having different bits of the file hierarchy as different*mount points*? That harks back to the days when the only way to have a chunk of fs space be different was to have it as a separate physical thing and mount it. Nowadays we have something better - ZFS. To me this makes so much more sense. I have a large amount of storage called a pool, and set size limits and characteristics for various directories without having to deal with fixed size volumes. Eh? *Who* has ZFS? Certainly not the linux kernel.
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 18/08/2013 21:38, Tanstaafl wrote: On 2013-08-18 5:16 AM, Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com wrote: While we're on the topic, what's the obsession with having different bits of the file hierarchy as different*mount points*? That harks back to the days when the only way to have a chunk of fs space be different was to have it as a separate physical thing and mount it. Nowadays we have something better - ZFS. To me this makes so much more sense. I have a large amount of storage called a pool, and set size limits and characteristics for various directories without having to deal with fixed size volumes. Eh? *Who* has ZFS? Certainly not the linux kernel. FreeBSD You can get ZFS on Linux with relative ease, you just have to build it yourself. Distros feel they can't redistribute that code. The bit you quoted shouldn't be read to mean that we have ZFS, it works on Linux and everyone should activate it and use it and chuck ext* out the window. I meant that we've been chugging along since 1982 or so with ancient disk concepts that come mostly from MS_DOS and limited by that hardware of that day. And here we are in 2013 *still* fiddling with partition tables, fixed file systems, fixed mountpoints and we still bang our heads weekly because sda3 has proven to be too small, and it's a *huge* mission to change it. Yes, LVM has made this so much easier (kudos to Sistina for that) but I believe the entire approach is wrong. The ZFS approach is better - here's the storage, now do with it what I want but don't employ arbitrary fixed limits and structures to do it. -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 18 August 2013, at 15:16, pk wrote: ... 1. Most of the time spent when cold booting is spent in the BIOS/UEFI cycle (around 30 seconds), the time from grub display to login (I'm using slim) is 5 seconds (max). Blimey! You must have a slow BIOS cycle. I mean, maybe my servers take that long (I'm not sure, I boot them annually and don't watch them rebooting) but I have a little eMachines nettop here - the first time I tried to enter BIOS, it look me several attempts, it boots past that so quick! I've now enabled the option to wait 5 seconds before loading the bootloader, but quickboot on this system is less than 2 seconds in BIOS cycle. (OTOH, going from grub to login in 5 seconds - that suggests to me that you're using an SSD and not a hard-drive). Stroller.
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 19/08/2013 11:21, Stroller wrote: On 18 August 2013, at 15:16, pk wrote: ... 1. Most of the time spent when cold booting is spent in the BIOS/UEFI cycle (around 30 seconds), the time from grub display to login (I'm using slim) is 5 seconds (max). Blimey! You must have a slow BIOS cycle. I mean, maybe my servers take that long (I'm not sure, I boot them annually and don't watch them rebooting) but I have a little eMachines nettop here - the first time I tried to enter BIOS, it look me several attempts, it boots past that so quick! I've now enabled the option to wait 5 seconds before loading the bootloader, but quickboot on this system is less than 2 seconds in BIOS cycle. (OTOH, going from grub to login in 5 seconds - that suggests to me that you're using an SSD and not a hard-drive). What pk says is quite normal in my experience. This laptop is a Dell Precision, from pressing enter on the grub screen to kdm showing on the screen is 3 seconds, another 4 seconds for KDE to appear and start responding to mouse clicks. From power-on to the grub menu showing, that's about 30 seconds. The first 8 or so is a ... blank screen ... then I get the Dell logo, followed by another 20 seconds or so where is does $SOMETHING. Server hardware is even worse - the R[357]* series can easily take 4 MINUTES to get through all the various BIOS thingies. Bi-monthly maintenance reboots get scary, 4 minutes is a lng time when you're flying blind on a critical machine that's physically on the other side of town :-) -- Alan McKinnon alan.mckin...@gmail.com
Re: [gentoo-user] Optional /usr merge in Gentoo
On 2013-08-19 11:21, Stroller wrote: Blimey! You must have a slow BIOS cycle. Yes, I bought the motherboard specifically for a slow BIOS cycle... ;-) Joke aside, I have a SAS raid card in the machine which probes the harddrives (four mechanical ones) which takes maybe half that time. I've been toying with the idea of replacing BIOS/UEFI with coreboot/seabios but time is lacking... :-( For the record, I've always felt BIOS have been slow... (OTOH, going from grub to login in 5 seconds - that suggests to me that you're using an SSD and not a hard-drive). I recently bought 4 SSDs (Intel 520 60GB) and have them installed as /usr, /var and /tmp with one spare. However / is still on the SAS raid card and boot time has not improved by much with the SSD. It's matter of what crap you load at boot that will affect your boot time. Best regards Peter K
