RE: [gentoo-embedded] GNAP Media Formatting Error?

[Marcel Romijn]

The gnap_overlay script had no problem formatting the full 1 Gb CF.
During the gnap_overlay, the CF is attached to a USB card reader/writer.
In the target machine, the CF is directly attached to the IDE interface.

Marcel Romijn

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Marcel Romijn [mailto:MRomijn@×××××××××××××××.com]
> Sent: Friday, 19 August, 2005 17:35
> To: gentoo-embedded@l.g.o
> Subject: RE: [gentoo-embedded] GNAP Media Formatting Error?
>
> I'm using a CF of 1 Gb, but I only format 16 Mb of it for testing.
> I have not seen the timing problem you experienced (although my
> gnap_overlay runs on a slow machine ;-) ).
>
> I'll try to format the full 1Gb one of these days and report what
> happens...
>
> Marcel Romijn
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Ross Carlson [mailto:rcarlson@××××××.com]
> > Sent: Friday, 19 August, 2005 15:55
> > To: gentoo-embedded@l.g.o
> > Subject: RE: [gentoo-embedded] GNAP Media Formatting Error?
> >
> > Okay! We figured this thing out...
> >
> > Our compact flash disk is too slow essentially.  If we
> > formatted the media
> > manually, that worked.  If we then mounted the disk manually,
> > that worked as
> > well.  But if we let gnap_overlay perform those exact same
> > commands, it
> > failed.  After hacking at gnap_overlay a bit we discovered
> > that it seemed
> > like a timing issue.  Ian (Ennis) put a couple of simple
> > "sleep" statements
> > in gnap_overlay before and after the formatting code chunk.
> > 10 seconds was
> > not enough after the format, but it was sufficient before the
> > format.  He
> > bumped the sleep up to 20 seconds after the format and before
> > the mounting
> > and it worked perfectly!  Our CompactFlash was just too slow,
> > apparently.  I
> > wonder if anyone else has seen this?  Seems like it could
> > possibly be the
> > size of the CF Disk (256MB)? Perhaps with a smaller 16 or
> > 32mb disk the
> > format happens fast enough to allow proper mounting?  I don't
> > have a smaller
> > CF Disk here so I can't test this.
> >
> > Here is the output of "hdparm -Tt" for the SanDisk for those
> > interested in
> > the speed of the media:
> >
> > /dev/hdc1:
> >  Timing cached reads:   1032 MB in  2.01 seconds = 514.53 MB/sec
> >  Timing buffered disk reads:    8 MB in  3.01 seconds =
> 2.66 MB/sec
> >
> > We can simply hack gnap_overlay ourselves for now.  But I
> > wonder if others
> > have experienced this, and if so, perhaps there should be a
> > config option to
> > the effect of "DIRT_SLOW_DISK" that toggles some sleep
> > statements for those
> > of us writing to disk on speed-challenged boxen.
> >
> > Thanks for the help, Koon and Sune!
> >
> > Ross Carlson
> > Ian Ennis
> > Corvus Technologies
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Ross Carlson [mailto:rcarlson@××××××.com]
> > Sent: Friday, August 19, 2005 8:57 AM
> > To: gentoo-embedded@l.g.o
> > Subject: RE: [gentoo-embedded] GNAP Media Formatting Error?
> >
> > Koon, Thanks for the suggestion.
> >
> > Unfortunately, it seems not to be the formatting process (as
> > seen below) but
> > perhaps the mounting of the disk.  I will dig around some
> > more in the source
> > and see if I can find something.
> >
> > # mkfs.msdos /dev/hdc1
> > mkfs.msdos 2.11 (12 Mar 2005)
> >
> > Successful format!
> >
> > # gnap_overlay -c overlays/project/etc/overlay.conf -d
> > /dev/hdc1 -r hda1 -o
> > overlays/project/ -n -m -s 9600
> >
> > GNAP overlay tool gnap_overlay 1.8
> >  * Checking parameters...
> > [ ok ]
> >  * Warning : you have selected disk install
> >  * Make sure you are root or have full access to /dev/hdc1
> >  * /dev/hdc must have an MBR installed, run:
> >  * dd if=/usr/lib/gnap/mbr/mbr.bin of=/dev/hdc bs=512 count=1
> > if needed
> >  * /dev/hdc1 must contain an active partition:
> >  *  use fdisk /dev/hdc if needed
> >  * Current data on /dev/hdc1 will be destroyed !
> >  * Are your sure you want to continue [N]: Y
> >  * Expanding /usr/lib/gnap/gnap-core.tar core...
> > [ ok ]
> >  * Preparing overlay...
> > [ ok ]
> >  * Adding baudrate for serial console...
> > [ ok ]
> >  * Adding overlays/project/ (directory overlay)...
> > [ ok ]
> >  * Adding overlays/project/etc/overlay.conf (overlay.conf file)...
> > [ ok ]
> >  * Creating overlay tarball...
> > [ ok ]
> >  * Formatting /dev/hdc1...
> > [ !! ]
> >  * Cleaning temporary directories...
> > [ ok ]
> > Overlay failed, try gnap_overlay -h for more help
> >
> > Here's the output of mount, so it doesn't appear to be related to an
> > automounting issue (suggested by Sune):
> >
> > # mount
> > /dev/hda3 on / type ext3 (rw,noatime)
> > proc on /proc type proc (rw)
> > sysfs on /sys type sysfs (rw)
> > udev on /dev type tmpfs (rw,nosuid)
> > devpts on /dev/pts type devpts (rw)
> > shm on /dev/shm type tmpfs (rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev) usbfs on
> > /proc/bus/usb
> > type usbfs (rw)
> >
> >
> >
> > Thanks for the help.  I'll keep poking at it.
> >
> >
> > Ross Carlson
> > Corvus Technologies
> >
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Thierry Carrez [mailto:koon@g.o]
> > Sent: Friday, August 19, 2005 5:08 AM
> > To: gentoo-embedded@l.g.o
> > Subject: Re: [gentoo-embedded] GNAP Media Formatting Error?
> >
> > Ross Carlson wrote:
> >
> > >  * Creating overlay tarball...
> > > [ ok ]
> > >  * Formatting /dev/hdc1...
> > > [ !! ]
> > >
> > > I had GNAP running on 1.7.1 (syslinux 2.13) but can't seem
> > to get it
> > > running now with 1.8.  The box that I'm using to build on
> has been
> > > reloaded in the past few days.  Perhaps I am missing
> > something in the
> > > kernel (2.6.12-gentoo-r9)?  The target disk (SanDisk Compact Flash
> > > 256MB) has been re-partitioned with a single, bootable
> > partition.  The
> > > gnap MBR has been copied using dd.  And then gnap_overlay
> as shown
> > > above.  Can't seem to figure this out.  Thierry?  Anyone?
> >
> > Here is the code snippet that gnap_overlay runs on the
> "Formatting..."
> > part :
> >
> > 	gbegin "Formatting ${OUTPUT}"
> > 	mkfs.msdos "${OUTPUT}" > /dev/null 2>&1
> > 	gtest $?
> >
> > The [ !! ] is written by gtest if an error code is set by
> the previous
> > command. So it's the mkfs.msdos that failed. I suppressed the
> > output (might
> > not be a good idea) so you obviously miss the message. Try
> "mkfs.msdos
> > /dev/hdc1" directly and see what happens.
> >
> > My wild guess : a required msdos/fat/vfat module is missing in your
> > brand-new kernel.
> >
> > --
> > Koon
> > --
> > gentoo-embedded@g.o mailing list
> >
> >
> > --
> > gentoo-embedded@g.o mailing list
> >
> >
> > --
> > gentoo-embedded@g.o mailing list
> >
> >
> >
>
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