[SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

ratcheer · 2012-04-20 13:05:25

I am trying to do a new install of Arch from the Apr-12 iso. My disk drive is gpt partitioned and I have prepartitioned it with two new partitions for Arch / and /home. So, when I am preparing the disk during the installation, I am skipping the partitioning step and going to the filesystems and block devices step. I go through the menu sequence to select one of my partitions, tell it to create an ext4 and use it for /. Then I give it no label and no ext4 options. It fails.

The message flashes very quickly at the bottom of the screen and is immediately covered back up by the blue installer screen. I have tried to stare at it and have caught that it is complaining about some expression not terminated properly. I have done nothing but select a partition from a menu and made other menu selections.

Also, the installer sees every partition on my drive as "raw". Is this normal? All other installers I have run do a better job of showing what kind of filesystem they have (or don't have), etc. Maybe there is something wrong with the way my gpt partitions are being detected by the installer.

Finally, mjheagle8 on freenode was trying to help me with this last night. He suggested I open a new tty and run mkfs.ext4 commands to create the filesystems. That was successful, but I still don't know how to get the installer to take them and use them for / and /home.

Thank you for any advice you can give. I can find nothing in the Wiki docs about what to do if the filesystems step fails. It just says to go back, correct the errors, and redo.

Tim

Last edited by ratcheer (2012-05-01 21:31:18)

alphaniner · 2012-04-20 13:32:30

I (successfully) installed from the Apr 12 netinstall last week, and saw the same error. It's a sed error, "unterminated `s' command". I use LVM which is 'immune' to the bug, so I only had to handle /boot manually.

It should still be possible for you to complete the install if you're willing to work for it. But why not try a more recent snapshot first?

ratcheer · 2012-04-20 13:40:12

alphaniner wrote:

It should still be possible for you to complete the install if you're willing to work for it. But why not try a more recent snapshot first?

When I went to the directory from the Downloads page, yesterday, that was the newest one I saw. I wondered about it. Maybe I was in the wrong directory. I will look for a newer iso and, if I find one, will try it.

Thanks,
Tim

alphaniner · 2012-04-20 13:42:16

That does seem to be the most recent one... hmm.

seveg · 2012-04-20 13:54:00

ratcheer wrote:

Finally, mjheagle8 on freenode was trying to help me with this last night. He suggested I open a new tty and run mkfs.ext4 commands to create the filesystems. That was successful, but I still don't know how to get the installer to take them and use them for / and /home.

You can format with mkfs and then skip formatting with 'Manually configure block devices, filesystems and mountpoints' in installer. But it's really strange that installer can not handle it...

ratcheer · 2012-04-20 14:44:22

@seveg, I have already tried that but I could not figure out how to make it work. When I go to that menu, it still shows the partitions as unformatted raw devices. Something is not being detected, correctly.

I will go try it again, though. Maybe it will see the filesystems after a reboot.

Thank you,
Tim

alphaniner · 2012-04-20 15:02:23

I think if you manually mount all your partitions you should be able to proceed to the next step. The / partition gets mounted at /mnt and you go from there. Your fstab will have to be built manually, but I think that's the only other thing that will change.

Also, I think there was a bug with mkinitcpio too.

ratcheer · 2012-04-20 15:06:55

Thanks, @alphaniner. This is my first fresh Arch install and it is making my head spin. I think I will just wait until a new iso is posted.

Tim

ratcheer · 2012-04-30 14:58:23

A new iso was posted on Apr 27. I had hopes that the problem would be resolved, but it still fails to format the partitions I want to install to.

Tim

ratcheer · 2012-05-01 21:30:55

So, I decided to try the official 08/2011 release iso and it created the filesystems and installed Arch without issues. So, IMHO, there is some kind of bug in the daily images, at least through 04/27/2102.

I am marking this thread as solved, because I have personally gotten past the problem, but as I said, I think something is badly wrong with the daily images.

Tim

Arch Linux

#1 2012-04-20 13:05:25

[SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

#2 2012-04-20 13:32:30

Re: [SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

#3 2012-04-20 13:40:12

Re: [SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

#4 2012-04-20 13:42:16

Re: [SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

#5 2012-04-20 13:54:00

Re: [SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

#6 2012-04-20 14:44:22

Re: [SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

#7 2012-04-20 15:02:23

Re: [SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

#8 2012-04-20 15:06:55

Re: [SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

#9 2012-04-30 14:58:23

Re: [SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

#10 2012-05-01 21:30:55

Re: [SOLVED] Installer cannot create filesystems

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