[geeks] Pure ZFS machine - possible?

[Mark Benson]

On 9 Nov 2006, at 22:04, Bill Bradford wrote:

> On Thu, Nov 09, 2006 at 08:11:20PM +0000, Mark Benson wrote:
>> I am experimenting with ZFS and Solaris 10 06/06 on UltraSPARC
>> machines (all pure sun4u architecture) and I want to know if, with
>> the existing installer for Solaris 10, it is possible to build a ZFS
>> Zpool during the install had have it use that in preference to the
>> conventional partitioned file system. This would result in
>> essentially creating a machine with a near infinite root storage
>> system, as well as all the plusses of using ZFS.
>
> I would wait until zfs-boot is an official feature.  "they're  
> working on
> it".

So we have established that the ZFS is not bootable in Solaris 10 as  
yet. I kinda suspected that was the case as ZFS is still in it's  
early stages. Does anyone know if my other suggestion, of a partially  
ZFS enabled install, is possible?

Maybe if you use a small, say 9GB, disk as your swap and '/' and only  
partitioned those during the install, then directly after that stage  
in the installer (trying to remember the sequence here) dropped to a  
console and setup your zpool and filesystems, and mounted them to the  
required directory (which I can't remember off the top of my head, is  
it '/a' ?)so the installer assumes them to be subdirs of the created  
root filesystem. This would possibly require a boot to single user  
*before* you actually booted solaris proper to reassign the zfs  
mountpoint variables for each filesystem to their correct locations  
('/<dir>' rather than '/a/<dir>').

What I don't know is if you would have to export the filesystems  
after the install (booted from the DVD) and then import them in  
single user mode before booting Solaris off the hard disk.

Requires experimentation methinks :o)

*Laughs maniacally and returns to his lab to the sound of thunder and  
lightning*

-- 
Mark Benson

My Blog:
<http://mdblog.68kmac.org>
68kMac.org:
<http://www.68kmac.org>

"Introducing Macintosh Classic II - pick one out on your way past the  
trash!"