bogus debconf question "mdadm/boot_degraded"

Bug #539597 reported by ceg
28
This bug affects 5 people
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
mdadm (Ubuntu)
Confirmed
Wishlist
Unassigned

Bug Description

Binary package hint: mdadm

Raid is designed to provide redundancy and failure tolerance. If a raid member fails and redundancy allows it, system operation is not compromised. Upon failure of components the raid array is properly degraded on the fly, and the system *will happily boot* anytime with that degraded array afterwards (without nonsense console droping).

The boot_degraded=NO option (or even default) is therefore an unreliable, disrupting, improper and misleading way to notify an admin about a failed raid member. (It is triggered only by raid members disconnected/failing when the system was powered down and compromises operation. It provides by no means a way to prevent the system from running without redundancy and notifying someone about it.)

A better way to notify admins (about all kinds of raid events) is to make the mdadm package depend on a local mail transport agent or wall/notify-send mechanism and stop suppressing the debconf questions for the monitoring deamon.

Please
- Remove the bogus boot_degraded debconf option and question.
- Rely on (don't suppress but depend and inform about) proper means to notify admins about raid events.

/var/log/installer/cdebconf/questions.dat
Name: mdadm/boot_degraded

ceg (ceg)
description: updated
Revision history for this message
ceg (ceg) wrote :

Defaulting to boot_degraded=false is bad replacement for buggy handling of raid degradation. (not a valid fix) https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ReliableRaid

Revision history for this message
Clint Byrum (clint-fewbar) wrote :

Affects 2, and will require a lot of work to solve correctly. marking as Confirmed/Wishlist.

Changed in mdadm (Ubuntu):
importance: Undecided → Wishlist
status: New → Confirmed
To post a comment you must log in.
This report contains Public information  
Everyone can see this information.

Other bug subscribers

Remote bug watches

Bug watches keep track of this bug in other bug trackers.