On Sat, May 6, 2017 at 10:03 PM, Julian Elischer <jul...@freebsd.org> wrote: > On 6/5/17 4:01 am, Toomas Soome wrote: >> >> >>> On 5. mai 2017, at 22:07, Julian Elischer <jul...@freebsd.org >>> <mailto:jul...@freebsd.org>> wrote: >>> >>> Subject says it all really, is this an option at this time? >>> >>> we'd like to try boot the main zfs root partition and then fall back to a >>> small UFS based recovery partition.. is that possible? >>> >>> I know we could use grub but I'd prefer keep it in the family. >>> >>> >>> >> >> >> it is, sure. but there is an compromise to be made for it. >> >> Lets start with what I have done in illumos port, as the idea there is >> exactly about having as “universal” binaries as possible (just the binaries >> are listed below to get the size): >> >> -r-xr-xr-x 1 root sys 171008 apr 30 19:55 bootia32.efi >> -r-xr-xr-x 1 root sys 148992 apr 30 19:55 bootx64.efi >> -r--r--r-- 1 root sys 1255 okt 25 2015 cdboot >> -r--r--r-- 1 root sys 154112 apr 30 19:55 gptzfsboot >> -r-xr-xr-x 1 root sys 482293 mai 2 21:10 loader32.efi >> -r-xr-xr-x 1 root sys 499218 mai 2 21:10 loader64.efi >> -r--r--r-- 1 root sys 512 okt 15 2015 pmbr >> -r--r--r-- 1 root sys 377344 mai 2 21:10 pxeboot >> -r--r--r-- 1 root sys 376832 mai 2 21:10 zfsloader >> >> the loader (bios/efi) is built with full complement - zfs, ufs, dosfs, >> cd9660, nfs, tftp + gzipfs. The cdboot is starting zfsloader (thats trivial >> string change). >> >> The gptzfsboot in illumos case is only built with zfs, dosfs and ufs - as >> it has to support only disk based media to read out the loader. Also I am >> building gptzfsboot with libstand and libi386 to get as much shared code as >> possible - which has both good and bad sides, as usual;) >> >> The gptzfsboot size means that with ufs the dedicated boot partition is >> needed (freebsd-boot), with zfs the illumos port is always using the 3.5MB >> boot area after first 2 labels (as there is no geli, the illumos does not >> need dedicated boot partition with zfs). >> >> As the freebsd-boot is currently created 512k, the size is not an issue. >> Also using common code does allow the generic partition code to be used, so >> GPT/MBR/BSD (VTOC in illumos case) labels are not problem. >> >> >> So, even just with cd boot (iso), starting zfsloader (which in fbsd has >> built in ufs, zfs etc), you already can get rescue capability. >> >> Now, even with just adding ufs reader to gptzfsboot, we can use gpt + >> freebsd-boot and ufs root but loading zfsloader on usb image, so it can be >> used for both live/install and rescue, because zfsloader itself has support >> for all file systems + partition types. >> >> I have kept myself a bit off from freebsd gptzfsboot because of simple >> reason - the older setups have smaller size for freebsd boot, and not >> everyone is necessarily happy about size changes:D also in freebsd case >> there is another factor called geli - it most certainly does contribute some >> bits, but also needs to be properly addressed on IO call stack (as we have >> seen with zfsbootcfg bits). But then again, here also the shared code can >> help to reduce the complexity. >> >> Yea, the zfsloader/loader*.efi in that listing above is actually built >> with framebuffer code and compiled in 8x16 default font (lz4 compressed >> ascii+boxdrawing basically - because zfs has lz4, the decompressor is always >> there), and ficl 4.1, so thats a bit of difference from fbsd loader. >> >> Also note that we can still build the smaller dedicated blocks like boot2, >> just that we can not use those blocks for more universal cases and >> eventually those special cases will diminish. > > > thanks for that.. > > so, here's my exact problem I need to solve. > FreeBSD 10 (or newer) on Amazon EC2. > We need to have a plan for recovering the scenario where somethign goes > wrong (e.g. during an upgrade) and we are left with a system where the > default zpool rootfs points to a dataset that doesn't boot. It is possible > that mabe the entire pool is unbootable into multi-user.. Maybe somehow it > filled up? who knows. It's hard to predict future problems. > There is no console access at all so there is no possibility of human > intervention. So all recovery paths that start "enter single user mode > and...." are unusable. > > The customers who own the amazon account are not crazy about giving us the > keys to the kingdom as far as all their EC2 instances, so taking a root > drive off a 'sick' VM and grafting it onto a freebsd instance to 'repair' it > becomes a task we don't want to really have to ask them to do. They may not > have the in-house expertise to do it. confidently. > > This leaves us with automatic recovery, or at least automatic methods of > getting access to that drive from the network. > Since the regular root is zfs, my gut feeling is that to deduce the chances > of confusion during recovery, I'd like the (recovery) system itself to be > running off a UFS partition, and potentially, with a memory root filesystem. > As long as it can be reached over the network we can then take over. > > we'd also like to have the boot environment support in the bootcode. > so, what would be the minimum set we'd need? > > Ufs support, zfs support, BE support, and support for selecting a completely > different boot procedure after some number of boot attempts without getting > all the way to multi-user. > > How does that come out size-wise? And what do I need to configure to get > that? > > The current EC2 Instances have a 64kB boot partition , but I have a window > to convince management to expand that if I have a good enough argument. > (since we a re doing a repartition on the next upgrade, which is "special" > (it's out upgrade to 10.3 from 8.0). > Being able to self heal or at least 'get at' a sick instance might be a good > enough argument and would make the EC2 instances the same as all the other > versions of the product..
You should convince them to move to 512k post-haste. I doubt 64k will suffice, and 512k is enough to get all the features you desire. Warner > /me has thought.. I wonder if the ec2 instance bios has enough network > support to allow PXE-like behaviour? or at least being able to receive > packets..? > >> >> rgds, >> toomas >> > > _______________________________________________ > freebsd-current@freebsd.org mailing list > https://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-current > To unsubscribe, send any mail to "freebsd-current-unsubscr...@freebsd.org" _______________________________________________ freebsd-current@freebsd.org mailing list https://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-current To unsubscribe, send any mail to "freebsd-current-unsubscr...@freebsd.org"
