[Solved] Why is a fresh install read-only?

victoroux · 2013-06-06 03:01:30

[Solved] Problem lied in my /etc/fstab, which I mounted from an Archboot, and edited out the "writeback" option from all lines (for me it was only the root / line). I rebooted and my problem was fixed. Thanks to Stebalien for teaching me the journalctl command and Thanks to Trilby for pointing out what the problem was in /etc/fstab!

Hi,

I finally got into my arch installation from both the native Mac efi loader as well as rEFInd and I can log in as root. But when trying to activate the internet (which was working fine in archboot), I get:

failed to issue method call: read-only file system

So that is kinda holding me back now xP

I checked my etc/fstab and the root directory is listed under it. If I

ls /

everything looks as I would've imagined it would. But I can't seem to make any changes :-/

EDIT:

[root@myhostname ~]# pacman -Syuu
:: Synchronizing package databases...
error: failed to update core (unable to lock database)
error: failed to update extra (unable to lock database)
error: failed to update community (unable to lock database)
error: failed to synchronize any databases
error: failed to update  (unable to lock database)
error: could not lock database: Read-only file system

The first three to five I understand, I have no internet. But what about sixth?

EDIT2: I also noticed that while booting up during the verbose that there is a passage where it says "Fault" over and over. Could this be a segment fault issue? If so, I could use help figuring out how to check

Last edited by victoroux (2013-06-06 18:22:45)

Stebalien · 2013-06-06 05:48:51

Post your journal logs (journalctl -b) and your actual /etc/fstab (just in case).

Chazza · 2013-06-06 09:44:37

As I understand it a filesystem becomes read-only when it becomes corrupted or something. You can make a usb stick become read-only if you remove it while copying files to it or something like that. Were there any errors or abnormailities when you issued the mkfs.ext(x) /dev/sd(x) command during the install?

victoroux · 2013-06-06 13:37:14

Stebalien wrote:

Post your journal logs (journalctl -b) and your actual /etc/fstab (just in case).

Sorry, I am not sure how to output that file to a USB drive or anything since it's a read-only system. Is there a way to do that?

The actual /etc/fstab is

UUID=XXX-XXX-XXX-XXX-XXX /     ext4 defaults,noatime,discard,data=writeback 0 1
UUID=XXX-XXX-XXX-XXX-XXX /boot ext4 defaults,relatime,stripe=4 0 2

Will try to find some way of getting journal log written and saved and will check here for suggestions as well. The red text is summarized as the following:

kernel: i8042: No controller found
kernel: EXT4-fs (sda5): Cannot change data mode on remount
systemd-random-seed[111]: Failed to open random seed: No such file or directory
systemd-remount-fs[97]: /bin/mount for / exited with exit status 32
systemd-tmpfiles[140]: Failed to create file /var/log/lastlog: Read-only file system
systemd-tmpfiles[140]: Failed to create file /var/log/wtmp: Read-only file system
systemd-tmpfiles[140]: Failed to create file /var/log/btmp: Read-only file system
chmod(/var/tmp) failed: Read-only file system
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0002002 FAULT at 0x100220
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0002002 FAULT at 0x100223
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0000008 FAULT at 0x100228
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0000008 FAULT at 0x10022c
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0000008 FAULT at 0x100230
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0000008 FAULT at 0x100234
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0000008 FAULT at 0x100238
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0000008 FAULT at 0x10023c
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0000008 FAULT at 0x100228
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0000008 FAULT at 0x1002c0
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0000008 FAULT at 0x1002e0
nouveau E[   PBUS][0000:02:00.0] MMIO read of 0x0000001 FAULT at 0x1002e4
pam_tally(login:auth): Couldn't create /var/log/faillog
pam_tally(login:auth): Couldn't stat /var/log/faillog
pam_tally(login:setcred): Couldn't create /var/log/faillog
pam_tally(login:setcred): Couldn't create /var/log/faillog

Root login on tty 1 // woo!

Timed out waiting for device ....
Dependency failed for... // I'm positive I know these errors, for not plugging in my ethernet, they're irrelevant

Chazza wrote:

As I understand it a filesystem becomes read-only when it becomes corrupted or something. You can make a usb stick become read-only if you remove it while copying files to it or something like that. Were there any errors or abnormailities when you issued the mkfs.ext(x) /dev/sd(x) command during the install?

Not that I know of. I know that I tried to mount to different directories than archboot in the bash console prior to it doing it's magic. I figured I would try to install grub/efi manually. However, that ended up not working and archboot re-formatted those partitions prior to itself installing the bootloader. Neither time did I get an error message that I can recall.

I *did* pull out the usb archboot after shutting down, not sure if that matters on linux systems. But I wouldn't imagine it affects the installed files on my hard drive. So let me know if I'm incorrect about this.

Trilby · 2013-06-06 13:41:25

kernel: EXT4-fs (sda5): Cannot change data mode on remount

I'm guessing you'll need the data=writeback on the kernel line as well, as "rootflags=data=writeback". Either that or remove it from fstab.

victoroux · 2013-06-06 18:20:35

Trilby wrote:

kernel: EXT4-fs (sda5): Cannot change data mode on remount
I'm guessing you'll need the data=writeback on the kernel line as well, as "rootflags=data=writeback". Either that or remove it from fstab.

I assumed you meant to add "rootflags=data=writeback" to the /boot line, but I figured what the heck and deleted the "data=writeback" off the first / line and it works now. Thank you very, very much, Stablien & Trilby! I can attend to fixing my other problems now lol ^_^

The speed is basically the same for me, so I don't feel any performance issues. I believe that's the only reason I ever put it in there in the first place. I might muck around with it later. I really appreciate learning the journalctl command, I've already used it three times to figure some issues out -- Thanks again!

PS -- for the noobs out there that might come across this, to edit a "read-only" file system that isn't accessed by your other os, you can boot into your live USB / archboot (I'm using archboot) and

mount /dev/sdX /root

(I just used X where my normal root device is) then

ls /root

to find your file again (which in my case was "nano /root/etc/fstab". Was a bit frustrating figuring out how to edit read only files, haha

Arch Linux

#1 2013-06-06 03:01:30

[Solved] Why is a fresh install read-only?

#2 2013-06-06 05:48:51

Re: [Solved] Why is a fresh install read-only?

#3 2013-06-06 09:44:37

Re: [Solved] Why is a fresh install read-only?

#4 2013-06-06 13:37:14

Re: [Solved] Why is a fresh install read-only?

#5 2013-06-06 13:41:25

Re: [Solved] Why is a fresh install read-only?

#6 2013-06-06 18:20:35

Re: [Solved] Why is a fresh install read-only?

Board footer