Message-ID: <4A3B9219.3020803@hp.com>
Date: Fri, 19 Jun 2009 09:26:49 -0400
From: jim owens <jowens@hp.com>
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To: Will Newton <will.newton@gmail.com>
CC: Linux Kernel list <linux-kernel@vger.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: Mounting sysfs early
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Will Newton wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I currently have a problem with a driver that loads firmware from
> userland. The boot process happens in this order:
> 
> 1. Extract initramfs
> 2. Load drivers
> 3. Run init
> 
> Unfortunately it appears that step 2 is calling the hotplug helper
> which tries to load firmware via sysfs, but sysfs is not mounted until
> I have run init so the driver fails to initialise. What is the
> recommended way to avoid this situation? Do I have to somehow build
> the firmware into the kernel or can I get sysfs mounted before drivers
> begin loading?

you did not say what distro and kernel, but I would expect
sysfs is mounted before step 2 by the intrd.  this is what I
see in a rhel 4.3 I am testing.

what you might be really seeing is

http://bugzilla.kernel.org/show_bug.cgi?id=13178

which I am currently debugging.

jim
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