2.4.0 -> 2.4.1 Update Failed

rmkilc

She boots just fine. My hardware is an APU1D with an mSATA SSD if that helps.

I have the same filesystems.


: mount
zroot/ROOT/default on / (zfs, local, noatime, nfsv4acls)
devfs on /dev (devfs, local)
zroot/tmp on /tmp (zfs, local, noatime, nosuid, nfsv4acls)
zroot/var on /var (zfs, local, noatime, nfsv4acls)
zroot on /zroot (zfs, local, noatime, nfsv4acls)
/dev/md0 on /var/run (ufs, local)
devfs on /var/dhcpd/dev (devfs, local)
: zfs list
NAME                 USED  AVAIL  REFER  MOUNTPOINT
zroot                480M  4.71G    88K  /zroot
zroot/ROOT           397M  4.71G    88K  none
zroot/ROOT/default   397M  4.71G   397M  /
zroot/tmp            264K  4.71G   264K  /tmp
zroot/var           80.8M  4.71G  80.8M  /var

Well this is different. Why would it be like this? I did a normal 2.4.0 install.


: ls -ld /boot
lrwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  13 Oct 10 05:04 /boot -> bootpool/boot
: ls -ld /boot/kernel
ls: /boot/kernel: No such file or directory
ls -l /boot/kernel
ls: /boot/kernel: No such file or directory

Looks similar.


: pkg info pfSense-kernel-pfSense
pfSense-kernel-pfSense-2.4.0
Name           : pfSense-kernel-pfSense
Version        : 2.4.0
Installed on   : Tue Oct 10 05:04:47 2017 PDT
Origin         : security/pfSense-kernel
Architecture   : FreeBSD:11:amd64
Prefix         : /
Categories     : security
Licenses       : APACHE20
Maintainer     : development@pfsense.org
WWW            : https://www.pfsense.org/
Comment        : pfSense kernel (pfSense)
Annotations    :
Flat size      : 23.9MiB
Description    :
pfSense kernel (pfSense)

WWW: https://www.pfsense.org/

jimp

Do you happen to remember which ZFS partition scheme you selected (e.g. GPT, BIOS, etc)?

rmkilc

Yes, GPT and BIOS. Should I have chosen a different partition scheme? As for BIOS vs UEFI, I just assumed my hardware didn't support UEFI.

jimp

No, that's the same one I used on that box, I'm fairly certain. I spot checked a few systems here running ZFS and I don't see that on any of them. One of them is a single disk the other is a mirror.

What other ZFS options did you choose? Do you remember?

jimp

I don't have any setup for it, but it looks like maybe that can end up that way with GELI encryption for the disk

rmkilc

You might have to refresh my memory on what options there were. I deleted the swap partition if I remember correctly. I didn't enable encryption.

jimp

Looks like MBR can also result in a bootpool (looking at the source, haven't tested it, no time today)

What does "zpool list" show? Do you see bootpool there?

rmkilc

: zpool list
NAME    SIZE  ALLOC   FREE  EXPANDSZ   FRAG    CAP  DEDUP  HEALTH  ALTROOT
zroot  5.34G   481M  4.87G         -     8%     8%  1.00x  ONLINE  -

jimp

I finally had some time to look into this today and it turns out that in those cases (Using MBR or geli), the zfs pool called "bootpool" isn't getting imported due to a fun chicken-and-egg scenario with the zfs cache file. The zfs pool cache tells the OS what pools to mount, but that cache file is in /boot/, so it doesn't get read at boot time because the file isn't there.

https://redmine.pfsense.org/issues/8063

I just pushed a fix. Once that is in snapshots you can upgrade to a 2.4.2 snapshot, you will need to run "zpool import bootpool" first and then it should proceed from there.

rmkilc

Am I running with install options that are untested and/or in beta? I just want to be able to click the update button and have it update without issues every time. What do you recommend? This isn't the first time I have had updating issues.

jimp

ZFS support as a whole is new and still considered experimental. People are excited about it, but it's not something we recommend yet. That said, it works fine for the majority of those using it.

Even more rare are those that need MBR support in ZFS, most people that can run 2.4 can run GPT which does not have this problem.

ZFS Encryption is also new and rarely used, and not practical to test since it requires a lot of manual intervention and direct console access.

If you install using the default ZFS options (which is GPT, no encryption) then you'll be OK.

rmkilc

Like I said before, the options I used were GPT and no encryption.

jimp

If you ended up with /bootpool, that cannot be true. It only gets activated for MBR or encrypted drives in the installer code.

rmkilc

Is there a way to verify without reinstalling?

jimp

gpart list | grep scheme

If it says MBR/BSD then it's MBR, if it's says GPT/GPT then it's GPT

Either way though, once the bootpool fix is in snapshots it will be fine no matter what you chose.

rmkilc

Ok, you are right, it's MBR. I had installed it twice and the first go-around I had chosen GPT. I thought I had the second time too but I guess not.