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On Sun, Apr 8, 2012 at 11:44 AM, <meino.cramer@×××.de> wrote: |
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> Mick <michaelkintzios@×××××.com> [12-04-08 18:40]: |
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>> On Sunday 08 Apr 2012 16:56:23 David W Noon wrote: |
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>> > On Sun, 8 Apr 2012 17:26:03 +0200, meino.cramer@×××.de wrote about |
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>> > |
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>> > [gentoo-user] Extended file attributes: ext4: |
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>> > > is it possible to go from an ext4-filesystem with no extended file |
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>> > > attributes to one with extended file attributes without reformatting |
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>> > > the disk or other very risky low level things just by adding this |
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>> > > feature to the kenrel (?) ? |
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>> > |
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>> > Yes, it's simple. |
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>> > |
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>> > You need to ensure that your kernel configuration has the extended |
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>> > attribute support (ACL is a good idea too) and you have booted with the |
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>> > ext4 driver so configured. |
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>> > |
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>> > You then add the xattr option in /etc/fstab for the filesystem(s) where |
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>> > you want extended attribute support. If you do that before you reboot |
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>> > (as above) then you will have full extended attribute support. |
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>> |
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>> I thought that you are meant to pass such options on the CLI at the time you |
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>> are formatting the partition ... is this incorrect? |
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>> |
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>> Of course if you must format the drive with such options then the data won't |
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>> survive. |
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>> -- |
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>> Regards, |
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>> Mick |
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> |
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> |
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> Hi, |
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> |
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> thank you very much for all the input. |
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> |
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> To clearify things a little: |
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> |
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> Status quo: System with ext4 and no extended attributes. |
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> Where I want to be: The same system with extended attributes. |
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> |
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> Way to go: No reformatting and mkfs and all that things. Only kernel |
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> reconfiguring / recompiling / rebooting and emerging some tools. |
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> |
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> Possible? |
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|
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As others had said, this is possible. I used this guide: |
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http://www.debian-administration.org/articles/643 |
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You need basically to enable the ext4-only features: |
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tune2fs -O extents,uninit_bg,dir_index <partition> |
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Do the fsck: |
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fsck.ext4 -yfD <partition> |
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And (optionally) convert all the files and directories to use extends: |
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find <directory> -xdev -type f -print0 | xargs -0 chattr +e |
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find <directory> -xdev -type d -print0 | xargs -0 chattr +e |
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I did this on my laptop and desktop (including the root filesystem, |
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booting into emergency mode with systemd), and everything worked |
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perfectly. |
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Note, however, that you *need* GRUB2 if your kernel lives in an ext4 |
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partition that it's not longer compatible with ext3. Don't do the |
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change without migrating to GRUB2 before. |
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Regards. |
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-- |
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Canek Peláez Valdés |
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Posgrado en Ciencia e Ingeniería de la Computación |
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Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México |
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