mklivecd not working (SOLVED)

[z3r0_k00l75]

  I'm not sure what is going on but lately mklivecd has been making remasters that wont boot. I've tried it on everything. Tinyme, Core, Gnome,it just doesn't work. Build_unity still works and leaves me scratching my head as to why, since the only difference I can find is the compression (gzip vs. LZMA). I can only guess that might be it. Since using mklivecd was always a big selling point for me, I would hope someone is looking into this. Build_unity is great, but takes forever (2 hrs. on my ancient P3) where mklivecd did the job in 20-30 minutes.

[Yogibaer]

Which mklivecd version and which kernel are you using? I know issues that both has to fit together. Gettinther, any comment on that?

[gettinther]

I'm going to work on this one

The squashfs module in the kernel is too recent and isn't supported by our version of squashfs-tools.  As such we can't use it unless we drop lzma altogether.

As an alternative, I'm going to look into creating a mklivecd-lzma and mklivecd-gzip, each with their appropriate squashfs-tools

[Yogibaer]

I have created yesterday a new iso with the kernel 31.12 from testing and the latest mklivecd version from the repo. I did not do any special thing but my iso is running well. I am just writing from that iso-unity. So here is no problem with mklivecd. I use the lzma compression. One other point. I am using unetbootin 2.99 on a windows-comp to create a live-usb from that iso. Perhaps this does the change.

[gettinther]

only gzip is a problem.  lzma works fine

[Yogibaer]

ok, that is good to know. So we can go on with the SAM-activities.

[z3r0_k00l75]

  Well, its been a week and I was just wondering if anyone has any progress on this problem or what. I'd hate to see this get forgotten about. There will be alot of new users that will toss RC1 aside and go right back to PCLOS or Ubuntu and remastersys  if mklivecd wont work for them.

[David]

mklivecd actually work fine, you just have to use lzma compression, which is much more effective than gzip anyway.
Maybe mklivecd should use lzma by default to avoid confusion.

[z3r0_k00l75]

  No, mklivecd + lzma = build_unity. That is fine for those  that are making distro iso's. I want mklivecd back for those of us that liked being able to quickly make a backup if we screw something up or would like to take "our" operating system with us. Those of us still using older hardware ei. pentium 3's and the like don't want our computers down for 2 hrs. to make a backup. Maybe lzma is more efficent in size, but the added compression isn't worth the wait to most of us. 20 minutes for gzip vs. 2 hours for lzma, which would most of us say is more efficient? Hardly efficient time-wise.

[gettinther]

Sorry about the delay in fixing gzip compression.  I've had a series of "unfortunate" event with the last one Monday ending up with me temporarily loosing my sight.  I'm better now and will resume coding this evening.

[z3r0_k00l75]

  Sorry to hear about your misfortune lately gettinther, and I know you and the rest of the gang are working your butts off on RC1. I just don't want mklivecd to be forgotten about because most of the devs use and/or prefer the build_unity script instead. I will always be a fan of mklivecd, you enter in a couple options, go grab a coffee, take a shower, walk the dog or whatever and when you get back you have a nice tidy little iso ready to burn. It beats everything else I've tried so far. There has to be a reason why remastersys was modeled after mklivecd and enjoys the success it has received  with the debian crowd.

[gettinther]

OK, the fix happened to be a lot easier than anticipated.

There were 2 errors I was confronted with (I used an old install I have at work).

The first item was to install dkms-aufs-standalone (which you must have installed since you were able to use build_unity).

The second item was the mount command failing.  I found that the livecd preferred the inbuilt kernel module to the one we added as a dkms module.  Removing the kernel inbuilt module was sufficient to fix the issue.

Remove the module /lib/modules/name_of_your_kernel_version/fs/squashfs/squashfs.ko.gz (or put it out of the kernel tree at least)

Once that's done, build your iso using the normal mklivecd.  The squashfs-lzma module supports both gzip and lzma so it'll work in either case.

We will have to rebuild our kernels without the squashfs module but I might force the removal as part of the mklivecd package for the short time.

Can you test to confirm?  It works here now but I'd prefer to hear from someone else on this.

[z3r0_k00l75]

  Will definitely test it. I could re-shingle my house from the amount of cd's I have lying around from making backups using mklivecd.

[gettinther]

I've given up on CDRs a long time ago and only use RW.  I had way too many coasters.

[z3r0_k00l75]

  My beloved mklivecd is back! Made the mistake of ticking the unionfs option the first time which isn't a good idea, but the second time around everything is back to the way it should be. Thanks gettinther for taking the time to fix this. I'll let you get on with the important work now and stop bugging you with the little things,...... at least until the next little bug that I find that really annoys me.