[NTLUG:Discuss] RE: File system problem, on a RH 7.3 machine

[Bryan J. Smith]

On Thu, 2004-09-16 at 09:59, Burton M. Strauss III wrote:
> Go into single user mode via init 1, unmount the drive, fsck it, remount it
> and return to init 3 (normal run) or 5 (normal graphic mode)
> However if this is a backup server you can take down, it's easier to boot
> into single user mode directly (and the fsck should be done during boot
> anyway), via
> linux single
> on the boot prompt (LILO).  With grub, you need to edit the kernel line to
> add the single option.

That will certainly work as well.

I offered the "mount/remount" (now corrected w/"ro" ;-) command as an
option.  Once you mount read-only, you can fsck it -- because a
read-only filesystem is virtually the same as an "off-line" (not
mounted) filesystem.  Once it is done, then you can mount it read-write
with the same command (only the original option I gave w/"rw").

Of course, if it won't let you remount "ro", then you either have to
figure out what files are open with "write" access (use the "lsof"
command), or just do as Mr. Strauss has suggested above.

I'm still kinda curious how you were able to mount the drive if it was
not consistent?  Or did you get an error while the drive was already
mounted, and that's why you want to check the filesystem?

Any UNIX flavor, including Linux, will normally not let you mount a
filesystem read/write if it is marked inconsistent.  That title is
limited to DOS and NT-based Windows with FAT filesystems.


-- 
Bryan J. Smith                                  b.j.smith at ieee.org 
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