Re: ppc64el Trixie Alpha 1 /boot may be ext2 not ext4

Hi,

Pascal Hambourg <[email protected]> wrote (Sun, 12 Jan 2025 14:13:40 +0100):
> Hello,
> 
> On 12/01/2025 at 11:53, Holger Wansing wrote:
> > Cyril Brulebois <[email protected]> wrote (Sun, 12 Jan 2025 11:21:08 +0100):
> >> [email protected] <[email protected]> (2025-01-12):
> >>> Hello,
> >>> installing Trixie Alpha 1 on Tyan TN71-BP012 (POWER8)
> >>> (/images/trixie_di_alpha1/ppc64el 2024/12/31)
> >>>
> >>> Installation goes well but installed system isn't bootable with Petitboot.
> >>> Installation was made choosing automated partitioning for an entrier disk with LVM and luks.
> >>> Doing that unencrypted /boot partition is ext4 and Petitboot can't see it.
> >>> When partitioning if I edit /boot partition and set it to ext2 then after finishing installation,
> >>> PetitBoot see it and I'm able to boot in the installed system.
> >>
> >> Sorry to hear about that. Looping in debian-boot@ who's responsible for
> >> the installer components that implement those choices.
> 
> The move from ext2 to ext4 for /boot was in response to bug #985463
> <https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=985463> after it was 
> considered that bootloaders such as GRUB and U-Boot currently used with 
> Debian supported ext4.
> 
> Inndeed it is unfortunate that a modern boot loader like Petitboot does 
> not support ext4. It is even unexpected from a boot loader based on a 
> Linux kernel, as mentioned in 
> <https://open-power.github.io/petitboot/overview.html>.
> 
> > thanks for pointing me on this.
> > I have just pushed a fix for this, reverting back to ext2:
> > https://salsa.debian.org/installer-team/partman-auto/-/commit/a87cccbe0198b4dea2cc46a39d5f5b99501aa095
> 
> Partitioning recipes for ppc64el create a separate /boot partition only 
> when using LVM (and this was never changed). When using plain 
> partitions, /boot is on the ext4 root partition so the above fix will 
> have no effect.

The report was for guided partitioning with encrypted LVM.
So I assumed the above would fit.
Am I missing something?

> According to 
> <https://github.com/open-power/petitboot/blob/master/README.md> and 
> <https://open-power.github.io/petitboot/platforms.html>, Petitboot is 
> also available for arm64 platforms. Partitioning recipes for arm64 also 
> use ext4 for /boot, so it would not work either.

Hmm, is it widely used on arm64, or only a cornercase?
Is it worth to change the default on arm64 just for petitboot?


Holger