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Description of problem: When doing an install via kickstart of RHEL 5 i386 or x86_64 and using LVM. The volume group can not be made active unless the SWAP partition is also part of the logvol setup. Since the volumegroup is not active the mount device "/dev/volumegroup/logcialvolume" doest not exist so anaconda fails when trying to format it. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): RHEL 5 Kernel 2.6.18-53.el5 How reproducible: The following partition info can be used to reproduce the problem: zerombr clearpart --all --initlabel part /boot --fstype ext3 --size=100 --asprimary part swap --size=1000 part pv.os --size=8000 volgroup os_volgroup01 pv.os logvol / --fstype ext3 --name=os_root --vgname=os_volgroup01 --size=1024 --grow FOR COMPARISON THE FOLLOWING WILL WORK: zerombr clearpart --all --initlabel part /boot --fstype ext3 --size=100 --asprimary part pv.os --size=8000 volgroup os_volgroup01 pv.os logvol / --fstype ext3 --name=os_root --vgname=os_volgroup01 --size=1024 --grow logvol swap --fstype swap --name=os_swap --vgname=os_volgroup01 --recommended Steps to Reproduce: 1. Start the install and use a kickstart file 2. Make sure the above partition layout is used in the kickstart file 3. The install will fail Actual results: Anaconda will report "An error occurred trying to format <volumegroup>/<logicalvolume>. This problem is serious and the install cannnont continue" Additional info: From a shell (ALT F2) after it has failed: 1. cat /tmp/lvmout shows 0 logical volume are active 2. lvm lvdisplay shows the volume group status as "NOT AVAILABLE" 3. Doing a 'lvm vgchange -ay' makes the volume group active and an lvm lvdisplay will show the status of available now. The mount device is now available and can be formatted. Google returned the following: http://alfa2linux.blogspot.com/2008/01/centos-51-kickstart-lvm-problems.html Michael Gale michael.gale@pason.com
I can reproduce this on 5.3 x86_64 when using a fixed size swap partition. Using the following in a kickstart fails: part /boot --fstype ext3 --size=100 --ondisk=xvda part swap --fstype swap --size=2000 --ondisk=xvda part pv.1 --size=1 --grow --ondisk=xvda volgroup vg --pesize=32768 pv.1 logvol / --fstype ext3 --name=root --vgname=vg --size=1 --grow Either changing the swap partition size to 'recommended' or making it a logical volume allow this to install correctly. ie: part swap --fstype swap --recommended --ondisk=xvda -or- logvol swap --fstype swap --name=swap --vgname=vg --size=2000
(In reply to comment #1) I am not able reproduce with your ks, could you attach /tmp/anaconda.log /tmp/lvmout and /tmp/syslog files if possible?
Even better - could you please test this with F11 and let us know if it's still broken for you? We've put a major storage rewrite into the latest version of anaconda and since this is destined to one day be RHEL6, it'll be good to know now whether we still need to work on this problem. Thanks.