Re: mkfs.xfs says "can't determine device size"

[Nathan Scott <nathans@xxxxxxx>]

On Thu, Feb 28, 2002 at 12:26:32PM -0600, Alvaro Figueroa wrote:
> mkfs -t xfs -f /dev/scsi/host1/bus0/target8/lun0/part1 
> 
> mkfs.xfs: warning - cannot set blocksize on block device
> /dev/scsi/host1/bus0/target8/lun0/part1: Invalid argument
> ...
> Any ideas?
> 

The device driver you're using doesn't support the BLKBSZSET ioctl.
It should also be returning ENOTTY (rather than EINVAL) according
to a recent discussion on linux-kernel for ioctl commands which it
doesn't recognise.

[ Is there a FAQ entry for this one, Seth? ]

> mkfs.xfs: can't determine device size

I assume you're using mkfs from xfsprogs-2.0.0 -- in which case,
your device driver also doesn't support the BLKGETSIZE64 ioctl.

This second one is fatal because mkfs needs to know how big your
device is.  You should be able to make some more progress using
a filesystem in a regular file - from a quick look in the code,
that short-circuits out before issuing the ioctl.  Otherwise, you
will need to contact the author for your device driver I think,
and see if they have fixed this.

[ Eric, I wonder if we should issue a warning here and fall back
to the old BLKGETSIZE ioctl if BLKGETSIZE64 fails? ]

cheers.

-- 
Nathan