Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-15 Thread David Wright
On Mon 15 Jan 2024 at 18:27:14 (-0500), gene heskett wrote:
> On 1/15/24 14:57, David Wright wrote:
> > On Sun 14 Jan 2024 at 20:15:16 (-0500), gene heskett wrote:
> > > On 1/14/24 18:57, Felix Miata wrote:
> > > > gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 18:39 (UTC-0500):
> > > > > Felix Miata wrote:
> > > > > > My point was entirely about suitability of /mnt/ for fstab entries.
> > > > > And my point is that for a one time copy, its was handy. I didn't have
> > > > > to mkdir a mount point for it.

Obviously you mean something different from what would be
a conventional interpretation of those two sentences.

> > > > /mnt/ is intended for one-time copies, just the ticket for that 
> > > > particular
> > > > exercise.
> > > I don't recall ever mounting something to /mnt, always to a subdir in 
> > > mount.
> > 
> > How did you mount to a subdir in /mnt without making a mount point?
> > Your two statements appear contradictory.
> 
> On this particular ball of rock and water at least, called a planet in
> most circles, you "mkdir /mnt/whatever".  You don't have to mount
> directly on /mnt and I don't think I ever have. Do it 50 times with
> your own version of "whatever", same with any path to anyplace on the
> system. Nothing special about it.

And I've never created any mount point under /mnt. For a one time
copy, /mnt is handy; always there, I don't have to mkdir at all.

Cheers,
David.



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-15 Thread gene heskett

On 1/15/24 14:57, David Wright wrote:

On Sun 14 Jan 2024 at 20:15:16 (-0500), gene heskett wrote:

On 1/14/24 18:57, Felix Miata wrote:

gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 18:39 (UTC-0500):

Felix Miata wrote:

My point was entirely about suitability of /mnt/ for fstab entries.

And my point is that for a one time copy, its was handy. I didn't have
to mkdir a mount point for it.


/mnt/ is intended for one-time copies, just the ticket for that particular
exercise.

I don't recall ever mounting something to /mnt, always to a subdir in mount.


How did you mount to a subdir in /mnt without making a mount point?
Your two statements appear contradictory.


On this particular ball of rock and water at least, called a planet in 
most circles, you "mkdir /mnt/whatever".  You don't have to mount 
directly on /mnt and I don't think I ever have. Do it 50 times with your 
own version of "whatever", same with any path to anyplace on the system. 
Nothing special about it.



Cheers,
David.

.


Cheers, Gene Heskett.
--
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author, 1940)
If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
 - Louis D. Brandeis



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-15 Thread David Wright
On Sun 14 Jan 2024 at 20:15:16 (-0500), gene heskett wrote:
> On 1/14/24 18:57, Felix Miata wrote:
> > gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 18:39 (UTC-0500):
> > > Felix Miata wrote:
> > > > My point was entirely about suitability of /mnt/ for fstab entries.
> > > And my point is that for a one time copy, its was handy. I didn't have
> > > to mkdir a mount point for it.
> > 
> > /mnt/ is intended for one-time copies, just the ticket for that particular
> > exercise.
> I don't recall ever mounting something to /mnt, always to a subdir in mount.

How did you mount to a subdir in /mnt without making a mount point?
Your two statements appear contradictory.

Cheers,
David.



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread tomas
On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 06:15:13PM -0500, gene heskett wrote:

[...]

> /home/coyotebak would be in the raid, but something in the system
> /backupdisk/ as a mount point would not be in the raid. But I have mount
> points scattered about this system, literaaly all over that just work, since
> when is /mnt some special thing? [...]

It's not, and it is fine as a mount point; Felix only took issue with
putting that mount on fstab, which isn't the conventional way of doing
things. Technically there's no issue with it.

If you shared your system with another sysadmin, you better refrain
from this.

If you are alone at home, and remember you did it two days down, no
problem.

[...]

> Or are you saying I should mkdir that mount point in the rad10, and then
> mount one of these SSD's to it? [...]

Please don't.

Cheers
-- 
t


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Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread tomas
On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 01:37:05PM -0500, Felix Miata wrote:
> tomas composed on 2024-01-14 19:15 (UTC+0100):

[Gene]

> >> > I have not been able to use that last line as a target for rsync 
> 
> >> That's not unexpected. /mnt/ is intended for /temporary/ or /transient/ 
> >> mounting,
> >> while /etc/fstab is OTOH intended for routine.
> 
> > How should the mount point have an influence on transfer rates?
> 
> AFAIK, nothing I wrote would be expected to have any relationship to transfer
> rates. My point was entirely about suitability of /mnt/ for fstab entries.

Oh, I understand. And I do agree that it isn't generally a good idea
to put /mnt in fstab -- unless you know well what you're doing.

Cheers
-- 
t


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Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread Felix Miata
gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 20:03 (UTC-0500):

> Felix Miata wrote:

>> I'm only suggesting you find a place other than /mnt/ for anything found in
>> /etc/fstab, based upon the definition of /mnt/ in FHS. Conforming your 
>> machinery
>> to FHS is not mandatory, just recommended, a good idea.

> so I should use /media?

That's also not a good place to match with fstab entries, also for temporary,
transient use:
[quote]
/media
Mount points for removable media such as CD-ROMs (appeared in FHS-2.3 in 2004).
[/quote]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filesystem_Hierarchy_Standard

Something you do /not/ find on that page may best serve matching up with fstab.
Think something up, /Z370/, /coypup/, /bakmnt/, /disk/, /rsync-mnt/ or /rsync/.
-- 
Evolution as taught in public schools is, like religion,
based on faith, not based on science.

 Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread gene heskett

On 1/14/24 20:07, David Wright wrote:

On Sun 14 Jan 2024 at 18:15:13 (-0500), gene heskett wrote:


/home/coyotebak would be in the raid, but something in the system
/backupdisk/ as a mount point would not be in the raid. But I have
mount points scattered about this system, literaaly all over that just
work, since when is /mnt some special thing?  its just an empty dir I
can mount any block thing to. one furinstance is an /sshnet directory,
inside of which is a few nore directories that I mount the rest of my
cnc and 3d printers to using sshfs, so they are a direct link to the
/home/me directories of every machine on the premises. I have a script
in my private bin directory that mounts them all. I get tired of
repeating my user pw while the script is running, but it just works.


When I save a file, I use bash-completion to help write directory
names etc, but I know where I'm going, so to speak. But I have this
idea at the back of my mind that when a GUI dialog box opens up for
you to save a file, it has an extensive look around the filesystem.
Direct links (symlinks, I assume) to networked machines is a great
way of slowing this process down, and any unresolvable names will
make things far worse. Is this a possible cause for your problem?

Cheers,
David.



That thought too has crossed my mind. readable logs might show that, but 
we no longer have readable logs, they are all filtered by journalctl and 
I wasn't invited to that semester of how to run journalctl. That manpage 
no doubt has that data but it is buried in a wall of text that is a 
sleeping pill to read.


Thanks David

Cheers, Gene Heskett.
--
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author, 1940)
If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
 - Louis D. Brandeis



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread gene heskett

On 1/14/24 18:57, Felix Miata wrote:

gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 18:39 (UTC-0500):


Felix Miata wrote:



AFAIK, nothing I wrote would be expected to have any relationship to transfer
rates. My point was entirely about suitability of /mnt/ for fstab entries.

And my point is that for a one time copy, its was handy. I didn't have
to mkdir a mount point for it.


/mnt/ is intended for one-time copies, just the ticket for that particular
exercise.

I don't recall ever mounting something to /mnt, always to a subdir in mount.

 But, fstab entries for one-time mounting is not normal, and neither are

subdirectories in /mnt/ unless a filesystem is temporarily mounted there. It's
allowed, but not particularly a product of wisdom, particularly if you forget to
undo it before rebooting without the configured filesystem available, or an
unexpected reboot occurs first. Remember your short-term memory quality?


Absolutely plus its the end of a long day for me, so the next copy try 
will be tomorrow. With an extra argument to rsync, --bwlimit=5m.  That 
should limit the write to 5megs a second which should give the SSD time 
to process its cache.



This whole thing has just one objective, making a copy of the raid10
/home onto a single drive that I could us to edit the raid out of fstab,
substituting the single drive copy. This raid has 2 of its 4 drives
complaining to smartctl.  Get my data off it, by whatever means works.--

Evolution as taught in public schools is, like religion,
based on faith, not based on science.

  Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata



Thanks Felix.


Cheers, Gene Heskett.
--
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author, 1940)
If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
 - Louis D. Brandeis



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread David Wright
On Sun 14 Jan 2024 at 18:15:13 (-0500), gene heskett wrote:

> /home/coyotebak would be in the raid, but something in the system
> /backupdisk/ as a mount point would not be in the raid. But I have
> mount points scattered about this system, literaaly all over that just
> work, since when is /mnt some special thing?  its just an empty dir I
> can mount any block thing to. one furinstance is an /sshnet directory,
> inside of which is a few nore directories that I mount the rest of my
> cnc and 3d printers to using sshfs, so they are a direct link to the
> /home/me directories of every machine on the premises. I have a script
> in my private bin directory that mounts them all. I get tired of
> repeating my user pw while the script is running, but it just works.

When I save a file, I use bash-completion to help write directory
names etc, but I know where I'm going, so to speak. But I have this
idea at the back of my mind that when a GUI dialog box opens up for
you to save a file, it has an extensive look around the filesystem.
Direct links (symlinks, I assume) to networked machines is a great
way of slowing this process down, and any unresolvable names will
make things far worse. Is this a possible cause for your problem?

Cheers,
David.



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread gene heskett

On 1/14/24 18:43, Felix Miata wrote:

gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 18:15 (UTC-0500):


Felix Miata wrote:

...

I have mount
points scattered about this system, literaaly all over that just work,


Fine! It's your stuff.


since when is /mnt some special thing?


Since 1994, 30 years ago next month:
...
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/docs/fsstnd/old/fsstnd-1.1/fsstnd-1.1.txt

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filesystem_Hierarchy_Standard

Or are you saying I should mkdir that mount point in the rad10, and then
mount one of these SSD's to it?  Sounds like the long way around the
bush but it might work, I'll try it. But that would be forever recursive
w/o excluding that dir from the copy.

...
I'm only suggesting you find a place other than /mnt/ for anything found in
/etc/fstab, based upon the definition of /mnt/ in FHS. Conforming your machinery
to FHS is not mandatory, just recommended, a good idea.
so I should use /media? In any event that line is now commented out of 
fstab.

Cheers, Gene Heskett.
--
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author, 1940)
If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
 - Louis D. Brandeis



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread Felix Miata
gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 18:39 (UTC-0500):

> Felix Miata wrote:

>> AFAIK, nothing I wrote would be expected to have any relationship to transfer
>> rates. My point was entirely about suitability of /mnt/ for fstab entries. 
> And my point is that for a one time copy, its was handy. I didn't have 
> to mkdir a mount point for it.

/mnt/ is intended for one-time copies, just the ticket for that particular
exercise. But, fstab entries for one-time mounting is not normal, and neither 
are
subdirectories in /mnt/ unless a filesystem is temporarily mounted there. It's
allowed, but not particularly a product of wisdom, particularly if you forget to
undo it before rebooting without the configured filesystem available, or an
unexpected reboot occurs first. Remember your short-term memory quality?

> This whole thing has just one objective, making a copy of the raid10 
> /home onto a single drive that I could us to edit the raid out of fstab, 
> substituting the single drive copy. This raid has 2 of its 4 drives 
> complaining to smartctl.  Get my data off it, by whatever means works.-- 
Evolution as taught in public schools is, like religion,
based on faith, not based on science.

 Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread Felix Miata
gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 18:15 (UTC-0500):

> Felix Miata wrote:
...
> I have mount 
> points scattered about this system, literaaly all over that just work, 

Fine! It's your stuff.

> since when is /mnt some special thing?  

Since 1994, 30 years ago next month:
...
http://www.ibiblio.org/pub/Linux/docs/fsstnd/old/fsstnd-1.1/fsstnd-1.1.txt
>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filesystem_Hierarchy_Standard
> Or are you saying I should mkdir that mount point in the rad10, and then 
> mount one of these SSD's to it?  Sounds like the long way around the 
> bush but it might work, I'll try it. But that would be forever recursive 
> w/o excluding that dir from the copy.
...
I'm only suggesting you find a place other than /mnt/ for anything found in
/etc/fstab, based upon the definition of /mnt/ in FHS. Conforming your machinery
to FHS is not mandatory, just recommended, a good idea.
-- 
Evolution as taught in public schools is, like religion,
based on faith, not based on science.

 Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread gene heskett

On 1/14/24 13:37, Felix Miata wrote:

tomas composed on 2024-01-14 19:15 (UTC+0100):


On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 12:33:39PM -0500, Felix Miata wrote:



gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 12:04 (UTC-0500):



# first put it where it is now & reboot
#LABEL=homesde1 /mnt/homesde1 ext4 errors=remount-ro 0 2

...

I have not been able to use that last line as a target for rsync



That's not unexpected. /mnt/ is intended for /temporary/ or /transient/ 
mounting,
while /etc/fstab is OTOH intended for routine.



How should the mount point have an influence on transfer rates?


AFAIK, nothing I wrote would be expected to have any relationship to transfer
rates. My point was entirely about suitability of /mnt/ for fstab entries.

And my point is that for a one time copy, its was handy. I didn't have 
to mkdir a mount point for it.


This whole thing has just one objective, making a copy of the raid10 
/home onto a single drive that I could us to edit the raid out of fstab, 
substituting the single drive copy. This raid has 2 of its 4 drives 
complaining to smartctl.  Get my data off it, by whatever means works.



The explosion could have occurred
by inserting a USB stick while rsync was running and you were engaging in root
activities. As regular user, most DEs now use /run/media/ instead of 
/tmp/.
Best anyway to find someplace besides your /mnt/ tree for that filesystem, maybe
/home/coyotebak/ or /backupdisk/.



You think an automounter mounted some stuff beneath /mnt/?



I think they don't do that for the last twenty years, at least
(before /run/media/ it has been /media/ for quite
a while already...


I don't have a working knowledge of all the deviations from FHS or other 
standards
that Gene employs, and neither am I familiar with behaviors of DEs I do not use.

When one has /mnt/ in fstab, where would one put a transient manual mount? 
Another
would need to be created, lest done to /mnt/ on coyote, /mnt/homesde1/'s
filesystem would disappear, no trivial danger in the context of deteriorated 
short
term memory.


Cheers, Gene Heskett.
--
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author, 1940)
If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
 - Louis D. Brandeis



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread gene heskett

On 1/14/24 12:34, Felix Miata wrote:

gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 12:04 (UTC-0500):


# first put it where it is now & reboot
#LABEL=homesde1 /mnt/homesde1 ext4 errors=remount-ro 0 2

...

I have not been able to use that last line as a target for rsync


That's not unexpected. /mnt/ is intended for /temporary/ or /transient/ 
mounting,
while /etc/fstab is OTOH intended for routine. The explosion could have occurred
by inserting a USB stick while rsync was running and you were engaging in root
activities. As regular user, most DEs now use /run/media/ instead of 
/tmp/.
Best anyway to find someplace besides your /mnt/ tree for that filesystem, maybe
/home/coyotebak/ or /backupdisk/.



/home/coyotebak would be in the raid, but something in the system 
/backupdisk/ as a mount point would not be in the raid. But I have mount 
points scattered about this system, literaaly all over that just work, 
since when is /mnt some special thing?  its just an empty dir I can 
mount any block thing to. one furinstance is an /sshnet directory, 
inside of which is a few nore directories that I mount the rest of my 
cnc and 3d printers to using sshfs, so they are a direct link to the 
/home/me directories of every machine on the premises. I have a script 
in my private bin directory that mounts them all. I get tired of 
repeating my user pw while the script is running, but it just works.



https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filesystem_Hierarchy_Standard
Or are you saying I should mkdir that mount point in the rad10, and then 
mount one of these SSD's to it?  Sounds like the long way around the 
bush but it might work, I'll try it. But that would be forever recursive 
w/o excluding that dir from the copy.


And I just found in the rsync man page --bwlimit=#1024 blocks/second 
with optional kmg as multipliers. Maybe that is what I need, say 
--bwlimit=5m which would limit the destination writes to nominally half 
what I see dd doing toward the end of writing an iso to an u-sd card.


There is also a --exclude=PATTERN to keep it from recursing to that 
subdir of the raid.  But why bother, move the mount point out of the 
raid's view by using the /mnt or /media points.


Food for experimentation, thank you Felix.

Thanks Felix.

Cheers, Gene Heskett.
--
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty:
 soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order."
-Ed Howdershelt (Author, 1940)
If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.
 - Louis D. Brandeis



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread Felix Miata
tomas composed on 2024-01-14 19:15 (UTC+0100):

> On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 12:33:39PM -0500, Felix Miata wrote:

>> gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 12:04 (UTC-0500):

>> > # first put it where it is now & reboot
>> > #LABEL=homesde1 /mnt/homesde1 ext4 errors=remount-ro 0 2
>> ...
>> > I have not been able to use that last line as a target for rsync 

>> That's not unexpected. /mnt/ is intended for /temporary/ or /transient/ 
>> mounting,
>> while /etc/fstab is OTOH intended for routine.

> How should the mount point have an influence on transfer rates?

AFAIK, nothing I wrote would be expected to have any relationship to transfer
rates. My point was entirely about suitability of /mnt/ for fstab entries.

>> The explosion could have occurred
>> by inserting a USB stick while rsync was running and you were engaging in 
>> root
>> activities. As regular user, most DEs now use /run/media/ instead of 
>> /tmp/.
>> Best anyway to find someplace besides your /mnt/ tree for that filesystem, 
>> maybe
>> /home/coyotebak/ or /backupdisk/.

> You think an automounter mounted some stuff beneath /mnt/?

> I think they don't do that for the last twenty years, at least
> (before /run/media/ it has been /media/ for quite
> a while already...

I don't have a working knowledge of all the deviations from FHS or other 
standards
that Gene employs, and neither am I familiar with behaviors of DEs I do not use.

When one has /mnt/ in fstab, where would one put a transient manual mount? 
Another
would need to be created, lest done to /mnt/ on coyote, /mnt/homesde1/'s
filesystem would disappear, no trivial danger in the context of deteriorated 
short
term memory.
-- 
Evolution as taught in public schools is, like religion,
based on faith, not based on science.

 Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata



Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread tomas
On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 12:33:39PM -0500, Felix Miata wrote:
> gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 12:04 (UTC-0500):
> 
> > # first put it where it is now & reboot
> > #LABEL=homesde1 /mnt/homesde1 ext4 errors=remount-ro 0 2
> ...
> > I have not been able to use that last line as a target for rsync 
> 
> That's not unexpected. /mnt/ is intended for /temporary/ or /transient/ 
> mounting,
> while /etc/fstab is OTOH intended for routine.

How should the mount point have an influence on transfer rates?

> The explosion could have occurred
> by inserting a USB stick while rsync was running and you were engaging in root
> activities. As regular user, most DEs now use /run/media/ instead of 
> /tmp/.
> Best anyway to find someplace besides your /mnt/ tree for that filesystem, 
> maybe
> /home/coyotebak/ or /backupdisk/.

You think an automounter mounted some stuff beneath /mnt/?

I think they don't do that for the last twenty years, at least
(before /run/media/ it has been /media/ for quite
a while already...

Cheers
-- 
t


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Description: PGP signature


Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help

2024-01-14 Thread Felix Miata
gene heskett composed on 2024-01-14 12:04 (UTC-0500):

> # first put it where it is now & reboot
> #LABEL=homesde1 /mnt/homesde1 ext4 errors=remount-ro 0 2
...
> I have not been able to use that last line as a target for rsync 

That's not unexpected. /mnt/ is intended for /temporary/ or /transient/ 
mounting,
while /etc/fstab is OTOH intended for routine. The explosion could have occurred
by inserting a USB stick while rsync was running and you were engaging in root
activities. As regular user, most DEs now use /run/media/ instead of 
/tmp/.
Best anyway to find someplace besides your /mnt/ tree for that filesystem, maybe
/home/coyotebak/ or /backupdisk/.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filesystem_Hierarchy_Standard
-- 
Evolution as taught in public schools is, like religion,
based on faith, not based on science.

 Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata



Re: Fact finding / clarification [WAS Re: Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help]

2024-01-14 Thread Andrew M.A. Cater
On Sun, Jan 14, 2024 at 12:04:58PM -0500, gene heskett wrote:
> On 1/14/24 06:59, Andrew M.A. Cater wrote:
> > Hi Gene,
> > 
> > There's a whole series of long threads which loop through several
> > subjects - I can tease out a couple of things.
> > 
> > 1.) You have one large deskside machine - large enough that it's tough
> > to lift or move - which is used for many things.
> Correct, a one size fits all machine.

OK. That much at least is understood :)
> > 
> > 2.) You've added various drive controllers and various drives over a
> > period.
> 
> Correct.
> 
> > Unclear: At least one of your RAID devices may be mixed between on
> > motherboard connections and on-card drive controller connections??
> No, I boot from /dev/sda, a 1T samsung 870 SSD plugged into the motherboards
> sata which has 6 ports

OK. I'd suggest you plug this into the *first* SATA port on the motherboard,
maybe, and the CD/DVD drive (/dev/sr0) into the second on the motherboard.

> Because I didn't have 4 ports left for the raid, it on its own controller,
> one of 2 extra sata controllers currently plugged in. Both of the extra
> controlleres are just controllers, no raid in their pedigree, 1st extra has
> 6 ports, 2nd extra has 16 ports.
> > 

2a.) How many devices in the RAID in total?

2b.) How do you have these configured - what RAID configuration are
you looking to do in mdadm here?


> > 3.) You "lost" a RAID a while ago so you don't trust RAID on some devices
> > but you're persisting with RAIDs.
> No here, it was a pair of quite new 2T seagates that died and started this
> whole maryann. Lasted about a month from 1st powerup to going offline in the
> night with no warning about 3 weeks after 1st powerup. Lost everything back
> to about 2002. The only raid I've ever had is the current one, which
> smartctl was sending me emails about but not thru a normal chaanel, I only
> found them when I found a strange mbox file in my home dir. Last mail in the
> mbox file was dated Jan 7th of this year.
> But I've now sussed the smartctl syntax and all 4 drives of the raid say
> they are healthy.

If you have four drives in your RAID - maybe plug them up to channels
3-6 on your motherboard and remove the extra drive controllers?

That should simplify things mightily. mdadm will reassemble the RAID
appropriately.

> > 
> > 4.) You have various add in cards but you don't seem to know which RAID is
> > which / what's "locking" your filesystem / what's causing your problems.
> > 

OK. Possibly irrelevant given your reply below.

> > You now have a slow access to one/more of your RAID devices.
> Which from the very limited clues seems to be related to my original of of
> plasma for a desktop, with xfce4 on top of that. So I suspecting the problem
> might be mixed gui related. This lag or lockup, whatever you want to call it
> occurs for any app that opens a file requestor, there at least 30 seconds of
> this lag before the gui opens the requestor, at which point everything
> returns to normal. Failing ns reslution? I've NDI.  The lags are not logged
> anyplace I've managed to find a log to read.
> 
> > 5). Unclear: All / ("most"??) of those RAID devices are using Linux mdadm
> > rather than "RAID" supplied by the individual cards/controllers.
> 
> Correct.

OK - at least one more thing understood.
> 
> > Various of us - including myself - have suggested that you simplify things
> > / get another machine and divide up functionality. For various reasons
> > you can't / won't do that.
> 
> Mostly lack of space in this tiny childs bedroom to do that, over the last
> 35 years its best described as a midden heap. ;o)>
> 
> > Can you answer the questions I've posted above, please, to try
> > and clarify what you have. I would have asked you for /etc/fstab and
> > a couple of other files, but this is good enough to be going on with.
> Instant /etc/fstab:
> gene@coyote:/etc$ cat fstab
> # /etc/fstab: static file system information.
> #
> # Use 'blkid' to print the universally unique identifier for a
> # device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name devices
> # that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
> #
> # systemd generates mount units based on this file, see systemd.mount(5).
> # Please run 'systemctl daemon-reload' after making changes here.
> #
> #
> # / was on /dev/sda1 during installation
> UUID=f295334b-fdcb-4428-bed3-cb9e9e129be6 /   ext4
> errors=remount-ro 0   1
> # /tmp was on /dev/sda3 during installation
> UUID=518cb65d-21f0-493f-8bb5-a5f435796991 /tmpext4 defaults
> 0   2
> # swap was on /dev/sda2 during installation
> UUID=422b50db-9913-4ed3-92c3-dc18be72cc61 noneswapsw
> 0   0
> /dev/sr0/media/cdrom0   udf,iso9660 user,noauto 0   0
> UUID=bc6135de-0578-4e3b-b2c0-5c4687abd9bd /home ext4
> errors=remount-ro  0   2
> UUID=d24c3a99-9f40-4b71-92d4-916804553cb5 none  swapsw 0   0
> # first 

Re: Fact finding / clarification [WAS Re: Re: smartctl cannot access mystorage, need syntax help]

2024-01-14 Thread gene heskett

On 1/14/24 06:59, Andrew M.A. Cater wrote:

Hi Gene,

Frankly: Dealing with you over a mailing list can be very frustrating for
others trying to help (and especially for people trying to follow the list
who are reading the lists in the background and facing long, long threads).

You're not helping explain yourself well because the mails keep referring
to "other stuff that happened a while ago".

People ask to see mails / messages or whatever exactly because we can't
sit next to you, we can't see what you type, we can't see what you're
meaning.

That's why well-meaning folk keep asking questions to try
and establish what's going on and get a sense of where we can help
(if at all).

There's a whole series of long threads which loop through several
subjects - I can tease out a couple of things.

1.) You have one large deskside machine - large enough that it's tough
to lift or move - which is used for many things.

Correct, a one size fits all machine.


2.) You've added various drive controllers and various drives over a
period.


Correct.


Unclear: At least one of your RAID devices may be mixed between on
motherboard connections and on-card drive controller connections??
No, I boot from /dev/sda, a 1T samsung 870 SSD plugged into the 
motherboards sata which has 6 ports
Because I didn't have 4 ports left for the raid, it on its own 
controller, one of 2 extra sata controllers currently plugged in. Both 
of the extra controlleres are just controllers, no raid in their 
pedigree, 1st extra has 6 ports, 2nd extra has 16 ports.


3.) You "lost" a RAID a while ago so you don't trust RAID on some devices
but you're persisting with RAIDs.
No here, it was a pair of quite new 2T seagates that died and started 
this whole maryann. Lasted about a month from 1st powerup to going 
offline in the night with no warning about 3 weeks after 1st powerup. 
Lost everything back to about 2002. The only raid I've ever had is the 
current one, which smartctl was sending me emails about but not thru a 
normal chaanel, I only found them when I found a strange mbox file in my 
home dir. Last mail in the mbox file was dated Jan 7th of this year.
But I've now sussed the smartctl syntax and all 4 drives of the raid say 
they are healthy.


4.) You have various add in cards but you don't seem to know which RAID is
which / what's "locking" your filesystem / what's causing your problems.

You now have a slow access to one/more of your RAID devices.
Which from the very limited clues seems to be related to my original of 
of plasma for a desktop, with xfce4 on top of that. So I suspecting the 
problem might be mixed gui related. This lag or lockup, whatever you 
want to call it occurs for any app that opens a file requestor, there at 
least 30 seconds of this lag before the gui opens the requestor, at 
which point everything returns to normal. Failing ns reslution? I've 
NDI.  The lags are not logged anyplace I've managed to find a log to read.



5). Unclear: All / ("most"??) of those RAID devices are using Linux mdadm
rather than "RAID" supplied by the individual cards/controllers.


Correct.


Various of us - including myself - have suggested that you simplify things
/ get another machine and divide up functionality. For various reasons
you can't / won't do that.


Mostly lack of space in this tiny childs bedroom to do that, over the 
last 35 years its best described as a midden heap. ;o)>



Can you answer the questions I've posted above, please, to try
and clarify what you have. I would have asked you for /etc/fstab and
a couple of other files, but this is good enough to be going on with.

Instant /etc/fstab:
gene@coyote:/etc$ cat fstab
# /etc/fstab: static file system information.
#
# Use 'blkid' to print the universally unique identifier for a
# device; this may be used with UUID= as a more robust way to name devices
# that works even if disks are added and removed. See fstab(5).
#
# systemd generates mount units based on this file, see systemd.mount(5).
# Please run 'systemctl daemon-reload' after making changes here.
#
#
# / was on /dev/sda1 during installation
UUID=f295334b-fdcb-4428-bed3-cb9e9e129be6 /   ext4 
errors=remount-ro 0   1

# /tmp was on /dev/sda3 during installation
UUID=518cb65d-21f0-493f-8bb5-a5f435796991 /tmpext4 
defaults0   2

# swap was on /dev/sda2 during installation
UUID=422b50db-9913-4ed3-92c3-dc18be72cc61 noneswapsw 
 0   0

/dev/sr0/media/cdrom0   udf,iso9660 user,noauto 0   0
UUID=bc6135de-0578-4e3b-b2c0-5c4687abd9bd /home ext4 
errors=remount-ro  0   2
UUID=d24c3a99-9f40-4b71-92d4-916804553cb5 none  swapsw 
0   0

# first put it where it is now & reboot
#LABEL=homesde1 /mnt/homesde1 ext4 errors=remount-ro 0 2
gene@coyote:/etc$

I have not been able to use that last line as a target for rsync, it 
make around 13.5 gig of a 360G copy and locks up all i/o. So I've now 
refomatted