Fixing broken Xen PV

Discussion in 'Site & Server Administration' started by wormy, Nov 9, 2010.

  1. #1
    I have a Xen server running currently on Centos where all the Linux PV domU containers will no longer boot. It was set up about 2 years ago entirely using hyperVM as the control panel and it also used to have the gitco repository enabled. A couple of months ago I removed the gitco repo and the lxlabs repo and converted to stock centos. Suddenly one day the domU containers were not booting. I looked closer and the kernels were gone!

    It appeared that hyperVM had set the kernels up to live outside the domU inside the config file by adding kernel= and ramdisk= lines to the config. Anyway I tried to substitute various kernels but the containers still would not boot.

    Here is a sample config file:
    
    kernel = '/boot/hypervm-xen-vmlinuz'
    ramdisk = '/boot/hypervm-xen-initrd.img'
    memory = 256
    cpu_weight = 1000
    name = 'example.vm'
    vif = ['ip=a.b.c.d, vifname=vifexample0,
    mac=aa:00:d0:5b:aa:aa,bridge=xenbr0']
    vnc = 0
    vcpus = 4
    vncviewer = 0
    serial = 'pty'
    disk = ['phy:/dev/VolGroup00/example_rootimg,sda1,w', 'phy:/dev/VolGroup00/example_vmswap,sda2,w']
    root = '/dev/sda1 ro'
    Code (markup):
    I've tried substituting various kernels and inits but they always seem to error out. I tried converting to an HVM and chrooting and installing a new kernel but then the initial configuration was broken. For example the mysql failed. I even substituted a few files such as /etc/shadow and copied over the entire /var and /etc directories to the new hvm install but came across unexpected problems such as a missing /etc/modules.conf file among others. My conclusion was the best way to fix these domU containers is to somehow locate the old kernels and inits but I have no idea where to find the exact same kernels and especially the inits that are missing.
     
    wormy, Nov 9, 2010 IP
  2. darvil

    darvil Active Member

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    #2
    have you tried installing hypervm on another server and then moving that kernel over to test out?
     
    darvil, Nov 11, 2010 IP
  3. Cheapvpsoffers

    Cheapvpsoffers Member

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    #3
    You can try to fsck private area of VM
     
    Cheapvpsoffers, Nov 13, 2010 IP
  4. wormy

    wormy Active Member

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    #4
    Problem with installing hyperVM now would be that it will never self-install itself with the old old kernel that the VPS was originally provisioned with darvil.
     
    wormy, Nov 19, 2010 IP
  5. darvil

    darvil Active Member

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    #5
    Have you tried it yet?

    Also if I recall correctly, it started on centos4. Is that what you used then? Because if its centos5 then the kernel should be close enough.

    I don't know. I feel like it would work and I would try it.
     
    darvil, Nov 19, 2010 IP