Installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive

Installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive

[Divan Santana]

Hi Guix,

So I'm installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive.

This is obviously quite useful to test and setup all before you switch
to it. I plan to eventually install on laptop.

I could do it in a VM but...

Anyway, the install went flawless and docs are great.

*After a reboot*, I did a guix pull and system reconfigure.

(I did change the drive letter, since post reboot grub was on sdb, not c)

I got an error saying:

unknown location, you may need these modules in the initrd: uas
usb_storage .

It then pastes the snippet of code. Really cool and useful.

Though, bit confused why the install worked and rebooted, yet post
reboot I now require it?

Moving on, I add the snippet of code but it errors out with:

usb_storage module not found.

A find shows the module is in the 4.16 dir, named usb-storage.

Note - not _.

I thought perhaps that's the issue so I changed the code to specify mod
usb-storage (not _).

However I then get the orig error, that I should add usb_storage mod in
initrd-modules.

Suppose the question is why is usb_storage not found?

Any ideas?

(sorry for lack of exact messages, don't have remote access to system at mo)
--
Divan

Re: Installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive

[Pierre Neidhardt]

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But did you _add_ the module into the initrd?  This should be done in your
configuration file upon which you run `guix system reconfigure`.

  (operating-system
   ;...

   (initrd-modules (append (list "usb_module")
                         %base-initrd-modules))

Also see the info page "(guix) operating-system Reference".

--
Pierre Neidhardt

Reporter:   "What would you do if you found a million dollars?"
Yogi Berra: "If the guy was poor, I would give it back."

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Re: Installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive

[Divan Santana]

Pierre Neidhardt <ambrevar@gmail.com> writes:

> But did you _add_ the module into the initrd?  This should be done in your
> configuration file upon which you run `guix system reconfigure`.
>
>   (operating-system
>    ;...
>
>    (initrd-modules (append (list "usb_module")
>                          %base-initrd-modules))
>
> Also see the info page "(guix) operating-system Reference".

Yes I did add it exactly like that. Well with "uas" too.

I did say that in my email:

> It then pastes the snippet of code.

> Moving on, *I add the snippet of code* but it errors out with:

> usb_storage module not found.

Hence, it's obviously reading the code since it produces a diff error.

The Q is why it doesn't find the module.

--
Divan

Re: Installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive

[Pierre Neidhardt]

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> I did say that in my email:
>
>> It then pastes the snippet of code.

OK, I hadn't understood what you meant with "snippet of code".

-- 
Pierre Neidhardt

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Re: Installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive

[Divan Santana]

Divan Santana <divan@santanas.co.za> writes:

> Hi Guix,
>
> So I'm installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive.
>
> This is obviously quite useful to test and setup all before you switch
> to it. I plan to eventually install on laptop.
>
> I could do it in a VM but...
>
> Anyway, the install went flawless and docs are great.
>
> *After a reboot*, I did a guix pull and system reconfigure.
>
> (I did change the drive letter, since post reboot grub was on sdb, not c)
>
> I got an error saying:
>
> unknown location, you may need these modules in the initrd: uas
> usb_storage .
>
> It then pastes the snippet of code. Really cool and useful.
>
> Though, bit confused why the install worked and rebooted, yet post
> reboot I now require it?
>
> Moving on, I add the snippet of code but it errors out with:
>
> usb_storage module not found.
>
> A find shows the module is in the 4.16 dir, named usb-storage.
>
> Note - not _.
>
> I thought perhaps that's the issue so I changed the code to specify mod
> usb-storage (not _).
>
> However I then get the orig error, that I should add usb_storage mod in
> initrd-modules.
>
> Suppose the question is why is usb_storage not found?
>
> Any ideas?
>
> (sorry for lack of exact messages, don't have remote access to system at mo)

OK, I think this is a bug.

The way I worked around it was to:

1) remount /gnu/store rw

2)

cd
/gnu/store/n9ym4yl7s55pm57rnc5whjlzjgvxas32-linux-libre-4.16.2/lib/modules/4.16.2-gnu/kernel/drivers/usb/storage/
cp usb_storage.ko usb-storage.ko

As said earlier guix doesn't allow me to specify usb-storage in the scm
file and it suggests usb_storage, which it fails to find without the
above hack. Prob gets it from lsmod which reports usb_storage while the
file is usb-storage.ko

This is obviously not right.

Prob a simple fix but out of my capabilities at the mo.

lol
--
Divan

Re: Installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive

[Chris Marusich]

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Hi Divan!

Thank you for taking the time to write to us about the problem.  These
kinds of but reports are very helpful!

On Tue, Apr 17, 2018, 06:43 Divan Santana <divan@santanas.co.za> wrote:

> OK, I think this is a bug.


It could be.  Please report it to bug-guix@gnu.org.  If you have an
operating system configuration file that reproduces the problem
consistently, please share it in your report.  In particular, if you can
reproduce the problem using "guix system vm", it will make things much
easier for us to debug.  The manual describes how to use that command:

https://www.gnu.org/software/guix/manual/html_node/Invoking-guix-system.html

The way I worked around it was to:


> 1) remount /gnu/store rw
>
> 2)
>
> cd
>
> /gnu/store/n9ym4yl7s55pm57rnc5whjlzjgvxas32-linux-libre-4.16.2/lib/modules/4.16.2-gnu/kernel/drivers/usb/storage/
> cp usb_storage.ko usb-storage.ko
>

That's good to know, but you should not modify files in the store or mount
it rw.  It can lead to unpredictable behavior because doing so may violate
certain invariants.  When hacking around on a throw-away system to
investigate an issue like this, don't this might be useful, but on systems
you care about, essentially the only way you should interact with the store
is via the public Guix scheme APIs and the Guix command line tools, since
they will ensure that the store's invariants are never violated.

Again, thank you for the report!  I hope everything is smooth sailing from
this point on.

-- 
Chris

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Re: Installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive

[Divan Santana]

Chris Marusich <cmmarusich@gmail.com> writes:

> Hi Divan!
>
> Thank you for taking the time to write to us about the problem.  These
> kinds of but reports are very helpful!

Your welcome. Thanks for the great reply.


> On Tue, Apr 17, 2018, 06:43 Divan Santana <divan@santanas.co.za> wrote:
>
>> OK, I think this is a bug.
>
>
> It could be.  Please report it to bug-guix@gnu.org.  If you have an
> operating system configuration file that reproduces the problem
> consistently, please share it in your report.  In particular, if you can
> reproduce the problem using "guix system vm", it will make things much
> easier for us to debug.  The manual describes how to use that command:
>
> https://www.gnu.org/software/guix/manual/html_node/Invoking-guix-system.html

I need to spend time on this and try reproduce it and report it
properly. For the moment I've worked around it.
>
> The way I worked around it was to:
>
>
>> 1) remount /gnu/store rw
>>
>> 2)
>>
>> cd
>>
>> /gnu/store/n9ym4yl7s55pm57rnc5whjlzjgvxas32-linux-libre-4.16.2/lib/modules/4.16.2-gnu/kernel/drivers/usb/storage/
>> cp usb_storage.ko usb-storage.ko
>>
>
> That's good to know, but you should not modify files in the store or mount
> it rw.

Absolutely. I just did it to try test the theory. I've undone the hack
and will see if things break later. But this is a test system.

> It can lead to unpredictable behavior because doing so may violate
> certain invariants.  When hacking around on a throw-away system to
> investigate an issue like this, don't this might be useful, but on systems
> you care about, essentially the only way you should interact with the store
> is via the public Guix scheme APIs and the Guix command line tools, since
> they will ensure that the store's invariants are never violated.


> Again, thank you for the report!  I hope everything is smooth sailing from
> this point on.

Thanks again.

Doubt it will be smooth sailing lol. But I'm learning and guix is
awesome and hope to continue learning and cotribute more in time.

--
Divan

Re: Installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive

[myglc2]

On 04/16/2018 at 20:04 Divan Santana writes:

> Hi Guix,
>
> So I'm installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive.
>
> This is obviously quite useful to test and setup all before you switch
> to it. I plan to eventually install on laptop.
>
> I could do it in a VM but...
>
> Anyway, the install went flawless and docs are great.
>
> *After a reboot*, I did a guix pull and system reconfigure.
>
> (I did change the drive letter, since post reboot grub was on sdb, not c)

Hi Divan,

GuixSD is intolerant to a change in logical assignment of the boot drive
after the the "git init" ...

Ref: https://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=23072

Maybe your problem is related?

HTH - George

Re: Installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive

[Divan Santana]

myglc2@gmail.com writes:

> On 04/16/2018 at 20:04 Divan Santana writes:
>
>> Hi Guix,
>>
>> So I'm installing GuixSD on an external USB hard drive.
>>
>> This is obviously quite useful to test and setup all before you switch
>> to it. I plan to eventually install on laptop.
>>
>> I could do it in a VM but...
>>
>> Anyway, the install went flawless and docs are great.
>>
>> *After a reboot*, I did a guix pull and system reconfigure.
>>
>> (I did change the drive letter, since post reboot grub was on sdb, not c)
>
> Hi Divan,
>
> GuixSD is intolerant to a change in logical assignment of the boot drive
> after the the "git init" ...
>
> Ref: https://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=23072
>
> Maybe your problem is related?

Thanks! Seems similar, though I think not quite the same.

--
Divan