sles 11 on kvm

[ link: sles11-on-kvm | tags: kvm suse | updated: Mon, 08 Jun 2009 00:48:56 ]

I need a SLES 11 system for porting some software for a client. I got the DVD and tried to install in kvm.

First, I was pleasantly surprised that, like Debian, SuSE now supports virtio disks (/dev/vda) right from the installer. So far so good.

However, both SLES 11 and OpenSuse 11 fail to install because grub crashes. I tried booting the SuSE cd into "rescue" mode and tries to install grub manually using the chroot trick. Same thing, grub seg faults.

So I tried with a Debian CD. I was able to install grub without problem (well, almost... see below). This suggests that the fault lies with the kernel that SuSE installed, and it's incompatibility with /usr/sbin/grub that they ship. Using the SLES grub and another kernel seems to work. For refernece this is what I did, after booting to the console:

    $ mount /dev/vda2 /mnt
    $ mount none -t proc /mnt/proc
    $ mount none -t sysfs /mnt/sys
    $ mount -o rbind /dev /mnt/dev
    $ chroot /mnt
    # /usr/sbin/grub-install.unsupported /dev/vda

I'll use # to denote that we are in the chroot. Note that vda is the virtio disk, you may need to use /dev/sda here (check with cat /proc/partitions). Also, fi you do use virtio disks, you'll have to modify your grub-install.unsupported script as shown at the bottom of this write up.

But there is a bit more to do because when grub crashed during the install, there were tons of other things that needed to be done. I don't know them all, but we at least have to set the passwords:

    # passwd root
    New password: ...
    Reenter New password: ...

    # useradd -m bart
    # passwd bart
    New password: ...
    Reenter New password: ...

And now that were are done...

    # exit
    $ umount /mnt/dev
    $ umount /mnt/sys
    $ umount /mnt/proc
    $ umount /mnt
    $ reboot

Well, I am disappointed, but not all that surprised. SuSE Linux has yet to capture my praise.

fixing grub-install

Remember how I said that SLES supported virtio from the isntaller? Well, their grub-install script was not patched, like Debian's was.

This is not the reason for grub crashing, BTW. grub-install is just a script that calls to grub to do the low level bits. It has a .unsupported suffix on SLES because they replaced the official script with a yast wrapper.

Anyway, I had to this patch to /usr/sbin/grub-install.unsupported:

    --- /usr/sbin/grub-install.unsupported.orig 2009-02-21 01:34:59.000000000 +0000
    +++ /usr/sbin/grub-install.unsupported  2009-03-30 23:44:55.000000000 +0000
    @@ -107,12 +107,12 @@
         # Break the device name into the disk part and the partition part.
         case "$host_os" in
         linux*)
    -   tmp_disk=`echo "$1" | sed -e 's%\([sh]d[a-z]\)[0-9]*$%\1%' \
    +   tmp_disk=`echo "$1" | sed -e 's%\([vsh]d[a-z]\)[0-9]*$%\1%' \
                      -e 's%\(d[0-9]*\)p[0-9]*$%\1%' \
                      -e 's%\(fd[0-9]*\)$%\1%' \
                      -e 's%/part[0-9]*$%/disc%' \
                      -e 's%\(c[0-7]d[0-9]*\).*$%\1%'`
    -   tmp_part=`echo "$1" | sed -e 's%.*/[sh]d[a-z]\([0-9]*\)$%\1%' \
    +   tmp_part=`echo "$1" | sed -e 's%.*/[vsh]d[a-z]\([0-9]*\)$%\1%' \
                      -e 's%.*d[0-9]*p%%' \
                      -e 's%.*/fd[0-9]*$%%' \
                      -e 's%.*/floppy/[0-9]*$%%' \

This patch is not meant to be applied, just edit the file and add the the letter v in a couple of places.

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I am an embedded Linux software developer and consultant operating under Jukie Networks Inc in Ottawa, Canada.

sles 11 on kvm

[ link: sles11-on-kvm | tags: kvm suse | updated: Mon, 08 Jun 2009 00:48:56 ]

fixing grub-install

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