vgscan goes into an infinite loop (migration issues)

Hi,

I have an LVM1 system working under 2.4. I've installed 2.6.0 with devmapper and the LVM2 tools. Now I'm trying to get 2.6.0 to mount my LVM1 system or at least to convert LVM1 to LVM2.

I have a single IDE harddrive with one VG named /dev/bytepool containing four LVM partitions. I have a few LVs under /dev/bytepool/.

vgconvert runs for a long long time, uses more than 3G of memory (including swap) and then fails with an out of memory error. I can increase swap if it will help, but I don't think it will.

vgscan does the same thing with global/format set to LVM1. So I put vgscan in verbose and debug mode:

locking/file_locking.c:158 Locking /var/lock/lvm/V_bytepool RB
toollib.c:305 Finding volume group "bytepool"
device/dev-io.c:325 Opened /dev/hda6
format1/disk-rep.c:353 Found /dev/hda6 in VG bytepool
device/dev-io.c:325 Opened /dev/hda7
format1/disk-rep.c:353 Found /dev/hda7 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392 Ignoring duplicate PV on /dev/hda7
device/dev-io.c:325 Opened /dev/hda8
format1/disk-rep.c:353 Found /dev/hda8 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392 Ignoring duplicate PV on /dev/hda8
device/dev-io.c:325 Opened /dev/hda9

format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda9 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda9
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda6 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda6
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda7 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda7
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda8 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda8
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda9 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda9
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda6 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda6
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda7 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda7
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda8 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda8
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda9 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda9
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda6
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda7 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda7
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda8 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda8
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda9 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda9
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda6 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda6
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda7 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda7
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda8 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda8
format1/disk-rep.c:353   Found /dev/hda9 in VG bytepool
format1/disk-rep.c:392   Ignoring duplicate PV  on /dev/hda9

[...]

Basically it's an infinite loop. Any idea what is going on? I would greatly appreciate any suggestions.

Btw, it was quite an unpleasant shock to find that Linux 2.6.0 no longer supported my LVM filesystems -- the kernel documentation completely fails to mention anything at all about LVM changes. Can someone take care of this oversight?

I *am* really glad my partitions and data have not been toasted so far... :-)

Thanks,
Navin.

Whatever goes wrong, it shouldn't loop!

And there's a clue in that error message: the PV's UUID is meant to appear between 'PV' and 'on' - but it's empty.

Please send me a copy of your metadata so I can try to reproduce the problem.

Alasdair

[email protected]

Hmmm. Does this help:

[navindra@vinata navindra]# lvm1-pvdisplay /dev/hda6 --- Physical volume ---

PV Name               /dev/ide/host0/bus0/target0/lun0/part6
VG Name               bytepool
PV Size               10 GB [20964762 secs] / NOT usable 32.19 MB [LVM: 129 KB]
PV#                   1
PV Status             available
Allocatable           yes (but full)
Cur LV                5
PE Size (KByte)       32768
Total PE              318
Free PE               0
Allocated PE          318
PV UUID               none

As you see, it claims there is no UUID.

Thanks a lot for your followup! I've sent the information you requested.

Cheers,
Navin.

LVM2 uses the UUID to distinguish between PVs - so it sees all the devices as duplicates of each other.

I'll try to change the code so it generates a UUID if it's missing.

Alasdair

[email protected]