3rd install failed hardware setup

This query refers to a Mepis (Debian variant) install I've done, as well
as to the live-CD version of that distro, from which the installation
runs. I'm setting up a computer for a friend who is not very
computer-literate, but who also can't afford XP, so I wanted a fairly
user-friendly distro, but something not too far removed from what I know
better (Debian). The choice really was decided by the fact that, of those
distros I tried on the target hardware (P3 500, 128MB RAM, 4GB HD--found
in the garbage), Mepis was the only one that autoconfigured the Lucent
winmodem the thing has. Because the machine was a bit tight on space, I
added a second drive--1.2GB. Unfortunately the automated install Mepis
runs does not allow for much in the way of partition tweaking: in fact,
it's set up to only install to a single drive. So, I installed it to the
4GB drive, planning on moving some large dir over to the second drive and
creating a mount point and fstab entry for it. It took me a couple of
install attempts to get that right. In both of my previous attempts, as
well as during sessions run from the live-CD, the modem was working fine.
On the third attempt, before actually booting into the newly-installed
system, I found a suitably large directory to move over to the second
drive--/usr/lib (640+ MB). I copied it's contents over to the second drive
(as root cp -R /usr/lib/* /mnt/hdb2), renamed the original dir to
/usr/slib on the main drive, created a new /usr/lib (using Konqueror as
root) on the main drive, and edited /etc/fstab to mount the second drive
at /usr/lib. On boot, it all seemed to go successfully. The drive mounts
at the specified place, and files are accessible. But I was greeted on KDE
startup with the message "/dev/dsp not found." I didn't see that on
previous install attempts or on running from the live-CD. And when I tried
to query the modem, it told me the modem cannot be opened. I'm trying to
find out what went wrong.

Could moving the directory /usr/lib to the second drive have caused this
problem? Did I maybe screw up some permissions in copying? Any
suggestions--short of another install--for fixing it if it does seem like
this is where the problem lies?

Thanks, James
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Re: 3rd install failed hardware setup

At 08:50 AM 2/4/2005 -0600, James Miller wrote:
>This query refers to a Mepis (Debian variant) install I've done, as well
>as to the live-CD version of that distro, from which the installation
>runs. I'm setting up a computer for a friend who is not very
>computer-literate, but who also can't afford XP, so I wanted a fairly
>user-friendly distro, but something not too far removed from what I know
>better (Debian). The choice really was decided by the fact that, of those
>distros I tried on the target hardware (P3 500, 128MB RAM, 4GB HD--found
>in the garbage), Mepis was the only one that autoconfigured the Lucent
>winmodem the thing has. Because the machine was a bit tight on space, I
>added a second drive--1.2GB. Unfortunately the automated install Mepis
>runs does not allow for much in the way of partition tweaking: in fact,
>it's set up to only install to a single drive. So, I installed it to the
>4GB drive, planning on moving some large dir over to the second drive and
>creating a mount point and fstab entry for it. It took me a couple of
>install attempts to get that right. In both of my previous attempts, as
>well as during sessions run from the live-CD, the modem was working fine.
>On the third attempt, before actually booting into the newly-installed
>system, I found a suitably large directory to move over to the second
>drive--/usr/lib (640+ MB). I copied it's contents over to the second drive
>(as root cp -R /usr/lib/* /mnt/hdb2), renamed the original dir to
>/usr/slib on the main drive, created a new /usr/lib (using Konqueror as
>root) on the main drive, and edited /etc/fstab to mount the second drive
>at /usr/lib. On boot, it all seemed to go successfully. The drive mounts
>at the specified place, and files are accessible. But I was greeted on KDE
>startup with the message "/dev/dsp not found." I didn't see that on
>previous install attempts or on running from the live-CD. And when I tried
>to query the modem, it told me the modem cannot be opened. I'm trying to
>find out what went wrong.
>
>Could moving the directory /usr/lib to the second drive have caused this
>problem? Did I maybe screw up some permissions in copying? Any
>suggestions--short of another install--for fixing it if it does seem like
>this is where the problem lies?


First, "cp -R" is not the safest way to cp an important directory like
/usr/lib . "cp -a" (or its equivalent, "cp -dpR") is much safer. It is
possible you introduced some sort of ownership or permissions or symlink
problem with your approach ...but I can't actually think of one that would
affect the contents of /dev . That makes me wonder if the info about
/dev/dsp is a red herring (/dev/dsp normally accesses the sound subsystem,
not the modem ... but I am not familiar with the Lucent driver or its
peculiarities).

All else I can suggest, really, is that you round up the usual suspects and
see if they shed any light on the problem. Look at (and if you want help
with the process, show us) the output of:

more /etc/fstab
df
ls -l /dev/ds*
ls -l /dev/modem*
lsmod
(in particular, is lt_modem loaded?)

And can a lightweight command-line app (minicom is the usual one) access
the modem? That is, might this be a KDE problem (your cp approach *may*
have interfered with its access to some needed library)?



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Re: 3rd install failed hardware setup

On Fri, 4 Feb 2005, Ray Olszewski wrote:

> At 08:50 AM 2/4/2005 -0600, James Miller wrote:
> >Could moving the directory /usr/lib to the second drive have caused this
> >problem? Did I maybe screw up some permissions in copying? Any
> >suggestions--short of another install--for fixing it if it does seem like
> >this is where the problem lies?
>
>
> First, "cp -R" is not the safest way to cp an important directory like
> /usr/lib . "cp -a" (or its equivalent, "cp -dpR") is much safer. It is
> possible you introduced some sort of ownership or permissions or symlink
> problem with your approach ...but I can't actually think of one that would
> affect the contents of /dev . That makes me wonder if the info about
> /dev/dsp is a red herring (/dev/dsp normally accesses the sound subsystem,
> not the modem ... but I am not familiar with the Lucent driver or its
> peculiarities).
>
> All else I can suggest, really, is that you round up the usual suspects and
> see if they shed any light on the problem. Look at (and if you want help
> with the process, show us) the output of:
>
> more /etc/fstab
> df
> ls -l /dev/ds*
> ls -l /dev/modem*
> lsmod
> (in particular, is lt_modem loaded?)
>
> And can a lightweight command-line app (minicom is the usual one) access
> the modem? That is, might this be a KDE problem (your cp approach *may*
> have interfered with its access to some needed library)?

I've made some time to proceed further with this. I basically reinstalled
the system and moved things around. To reiterate, the problem was shortage
of disk space (4GB at /dev/hda and 1.2GB at /dev/hdb) and an install
routine that only wanted to use the 4GB drive and didn't offer much in the
way of alternate mount points. My solution was to copy parts of /usr (the
largest dir on the root filesystem) onto /dev/hdb and make a mount point
for it, editing fstab accordingly. This worked--i.e., the system booted
successfully and the dir on /dev/hdb got mounted--but I lost certain
device functionality. Namely the modem and sound.

I took a bit of a different approach on subsequent attempts. I divided
/dev/hda into 2 2GB partitions. The install routine let me make one of
these /home, thankfully, and I installed the system to the other one. I
installed Grub to /dev/hdb, where I planned on locating the root
filesystem this time. Later, I booted from a different CD and copied
everything from / over to /dev/hdb *except* the contents of /usr, which
remained on /dev/hda(1). I then created mount points and the like, and
edited /etc/fstab. It pretty much worked. But again I had those device
failures--modem and sound. I've resolved that by adding the names of
relevant modules to /etc/modules. Now the modem works, and I don't get the
/dev/dsp not found error message on boot (no speakers, so I can't test if
it really, really works). So, something in the /usr directory--probably
under /lib--not getting mounted when expected (along with the root
filesystem) seems to be the problem. Modules seem to not be loading
because of it. I do get an error message during boot about a shared
library--libpci.so.2--not being able to load, but the system seems to work
ok nonetheless. I've confirmed that this file is located in /usr/lib. This
is probably a situation where an initrd is needed, no? Does it seem like
that libpci.so.2 not getting loaded will cause any system functionality
problems later?

Finally, to get the system to boot I had to leave the /boot directory on
/dev/hda1 (which gets mounted later under /usr) since that's where Grub
was expecting to find it. I don't like the idea of doing this, but I don't
know how else to handle the problem of where Grub thinks the root
filesystem is (thinks it's on /dev/hda and so only looks for the /boot
directory there). Any advice on resolving that problem so I can undo the
kludge I've done to get the system booting? Having the /boot directory
under /usr is wierd at the least: maybe it's even dangerous? Editing
menu.lst does NOT do it. I think the location of the root filesystem must
be specified to Grub eslewhere: maybe in device.map?

James
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