Workaround to use LVM on iSCSI on SLE 10

This document (7001193) is provided subject to the disclaimer at the end of this document.

Environment

SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10
SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop 10

Situation

If LVM is used on top of iSCSI devices, the system fails to boot or the LVM devices are not initialized properly.

Resolution

Workaround

The workaround is to manually re‑scan the physical volumes after the system has completely booted. This can be done as follows:

Disable boot.lvm and enable the open-iscsi service:

chkconfig boot.lvm off
chkconfig open-iscsi on
Modify the iscsi-initiator to login automatically to a target after boot:

iscsiadm -m node -T <target_name> -o update -n node.conn[0].startup -v automatic
iscsiadm -m node -T <target_name> -o update -n node.startup -v automatic
Create a file /etc/init.d/after.local with the following content

#!/bin/bash
vgscan > /dev/null
vgchange -a y > /dev/null

Additional Information

LVM on iSCSI is not supported since LVM initializes before any network services (iSCSI) and this workaround is applicable only if none of the system partitions are on LVM.

Applications that access the logical volumes during boot time will fail. To avoid this, append the mount and application start commands into /etc/init.d/after.local

Disclaimer

This Support Knowledgebase provides a valuable tool for SUSE customers and parties interested in our products and solutions to acquire information, ideas and learn from one another. Materials are provided for informational, personal or non-commercial use within your organization and are presented "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND.