'out of inodes' while installing 9.0-RC3 to 4Gb VM image

[techtonik]

I'm trying to install 9.0-RC3 inside QEMU, but installation fails with the message "out of inodes". QEMU disk image in QCOW2 format grew to 1.8Gb before the fail, but the disk size is 4Gb partitioned in Auto mode.

$ qemu-img info freebsd.qcow
image: freebsd.qcow
file format: qcow2
virtual size: 4.0G (4294967296 bytes)
disk size: 1.8G
cluster_size: 65536

 

[monkeyboy]

Increase the inode numbers? (actually decrease size per inode spec).

-i # option of newfs, which you can hand to newfs in the installer (I hope... you can with sysinstall).

See newfs(8).

Looks like you encountered the problem while installing the port files, which there are A LOT of them. So you can always defer installing ports until later when you are better set up to tackle the problem (like re-run newfs on the /usr partition to allow for more inodes). But not sure you can fit all that in 4GB.

 

[techtonik]

Shouldn't installer check for available space/inodes prior to installing ports and packages? Seems like a bug to me.

 

[monkeyboy]

Shouldn't installer check for available space/inodes prior to installing ports and packages? Seems like a bug to me.

I don't think it does and I am certain that at least in the past it did not (what happened to you also happened to me several years ago). I suppose you could consider it a bug, or at least a non-nicety, but it is not exactly trivial to do it in a way that is always correct.

For example, you could always on the side, mid-installation, mount a new filesystem or create a link to a new bigger area and then you *would* have more space. How is the installer supposed to know if you are going to do that? Or mid-install, you could delete some stuff you don't want... Mostly it would require the installer to have info as to just how many files and space is need, something that changes constantly with all the work being done. And calculating how much space is needed is also hard to be exact because of file system overhead.

Nevertheless, the installer *could* at least issue a warning that you are likely to be lacking sufficient file space (or inodes), given a ROUGH estimate of what is needed. I believe the Handbook and elsewhere *does* give you a very very rough idea of recommended space also.

BTW, at least sysinstall is not all that smart to begin with. There are other, very serious flaws that I trip over constantly, some that cause the kernel to panic, so this particular "bug" is far from the worse that can be found with the installer.

 

[techtonik]

A pity the stuff can not be compiled into some scripting language that's easier to write and debug. I am sure that with more users jumping in, the installer could be greatly improved. Unfortunately, C is not the best language to program user interfaces, and Bash is not even in top 50 of TIOBE rating.

 

[erik006]

I ran into this as well a few weeks back. A problem report was filed (though not by me):

http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/query-pr.cgi?pr=162659+&cat=bin

I ended up doing what was suggested above, increasing the inodes on disk, by firing up a command line during the partitioning phase of the installation. This ridiculously old article talks about it as well:

http://www.freebsddiary.org/inodes.php

Erik

 

[higonnet]

To my mind this is a bug.

Joe Schmoe does a clean install, lets himself be guided (sic), devotes the entire disk to the installation and it fails?

 

[wblock@]

PR 162659 has been fixed in 9-STABLE.

 

[lockdoc]

PR 162659 has been fixed in 9-STABLE.

Are you sure?


I ran into the same problem

[root@vm1 /usr/ports]# uname -a
FreeBSD vm1 9.0-RELEASE FreeBSD 9.0-RELEASE #0: Tue Jan  3 07:15:25 UTC 2012     root@obrian.cse.buffalo.edu:/usr/obj/usr/src/sys/GENERIC  i386

[root@vm1 /usr/ports]# dmesg |grep mem
real memory  = 536805376 (511 MB)
avail memory = 506142720 (482 MB)

[root@vm1 /usr/ports]# df -hi
Filesystem     Size    Used   Avail Capacity iused ifree %iused  Mounted on
/dev/ada0p2    5.7G    2.7G    2.6G    51%    378k     0  100%   /
devfs          1.0k    1.0k      0B   100%       0     0  100%   /dev

pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
Feb 23 22:28:29 vm1 last message repeated 30 times
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1482 (bsdtar), uid 0 inumber 330868 on /: out of inodes
pid 1584 (sh), uid 0 inumber 189501 on /: out of inodes
Feb 23 22:28:47 vm1 last message repeated 17 times
Feb 23 22:29:16 vm1 kernel: pid 1584 (sh), uid 0 inumber 189501 on /: out of inodes
pid 1659 (sh), uid 0 inumber 189501 on /: out of inodes
Feb 23 22:29:18 vm1 kernel: pid 1659 (sh), uid 0 inumber 189501 on /: out of inodes
Feb 23 22:29:19 vm1 login: ROOT LOGIN (root) ON ttyv0
pid 1765 (fetch), uid 0 inumber 189501 on /: out of inodes
Feb 23 22:29:43 vm1 kernel: pid 1765 (fetch), uid 0 inumber 189501 on /: out of inodes
pid 1821 (fetch), uid 0 inumber 189501 on /: out of inodes
Feb 23 22:29:45 vm1 kernel: pid 1821 (fetch), uid 0 inumber 189501 on /: out of inodes
pid 1944 (fetch), uid 0 inumber 189501 on /: out of inodes
Feb 23 22:30:51 vm1 kernel: pid 1944 (fetch), uid 0 inumber 189501 on /: out of inodes
pid 2004 (sh), uid 0 inumber 189459 on /: out of inodes
Feb 23 22:33:00 vm1 kernel: pid 2004 (sh), uid 0 inumber 189459 on /: out of inodes

Also had trouble installing it and I got this error many times
http://forums.freebsd.org/attachment.php?attachmentid=1426&d=1325182539
before actually succeeding.

This is on VirtualBox

 

[kpa]

9-STABLE is the work towards the next release, 9.1 RELEASE so naturally the fix is not included in 9.0-RELEASE.

 

[lockdoc]

OK, Sorry for the misunderstanding