SvenHz

You could do a clean install.

Hi all, just a quick note here that I am running 23.05 Bookworm successfully on Helios4 with ZFS. I did a clean install with a self-built image. Why the self-build? For two reasons: I wanted to have working fancontrol and that required the recent patch of @Heisath - https://github.com/armbian/build/pull/5392 I ran into an issue with not being able to install kernel headers (see below) so I needed to build an image with kernel headers built-in Build steps I wanted the release version so I did this in a clean build environment (WSL2 Ubuntu): git clone --depth=1 --branch=v23.05.2 https://github.com/armbian/build And then manually place this file in your local tree https://github.com/armbian/build/blob/main/patch/kernel/archive/mvebu-6.1/92-mvebu-gpio-remove-hardcoded-timer-assignment.patch. You need to touch .ignore_changes. Then run compile.sh INSTALL_HEADERS=yes. Testing After booting the image, I only did the following steps: systemctl disable helios4-wol # not sure why this service is failing but I do not use this anyway apt update apt upgrade reboot apt install zfs-dkms apt install zfsutils-linux Kernel header issue This is after apt update / apt upgrade / reboot. The repo seems to be out of sync. Also armbian-config fails altogether with a grep error (something with maximum count). root@helios4:~# apt search linux-headers|grep mvebu WARNING: apt does not have a stable CLI interface. Use with caution in scripts. linux-headers-current-mvebu/bookworm 23.02.2 armhf Linux kernel headers for 5.15.93-mvebu on armhf current linux-headers-edge-mvebu/bookworm 23.02.2 armhf Linux kernel headers for 6.1.11-mvebu on armhf edge root@helios4:~# uname -a Linux helios4 6.1.36-mvebu #2 SMP Wed Jun 28 11:12:41 CEST 2023 armv7l GNU/Linux root@helios4:~# cat /etc/armbian-release # PLEASE DO NOT EDIT THIS FILE BOARD=helios4 BOARD_NAME="Helios4" BOARDFAMILY=mvebu BUILD_REPOSITORY_URL=https://github.com/armbian/build BUILD_REPOSITORY_COMMIT=961a103 VERSION=23.05.1 LINUXFAMILY=mvebu ARCH=arm IMAGE_TYPE=user-built BOARD_TYPE=conf INITRD_ARCH=arm KERNEL_IMAGE_TYPE=zImage FORCE_BOOTSCRIPT_UPDATE=yes VENDOR=Armbian REVISION=23.05.1 BOOTSCRIPT_FORCE_UPDATE="yes" BOOTSCRIPT_DST="boot.cmd" root@helios4:~#

Many thanks @Heisath...!! I am now trying to figure out how to get an image that includes this patch. Was this PR merged only with master or will it also trickle down to the support branch? Reason behind my question is that I'd like to stick to the latest formal release. Now that I am reading this a bit, I will probably go for a custom build of the most recent release with your patch applied locally...

Much appreciated. I am happy to test. I found this, seems that your patch had to be disabled to fix the build. https://github.com/armbian/build/blob/main/patch/kernel/archive/mvebu-6.1/92-mvebu-gpio-remove-hardcoded-timer-assignment.patch.disabled

Same here using image the regular Bookworm CLI image and kernel version 6.1.30-mvebu. I am happy to help with tests/debugging. @Heisath do you perhaps know more already?

Here is an update. TL;DR: happy to report that zfs 2.0.2 seems to work fine on Armbian Hirsute. I am planning a reinstall of our "family production NAS" with the aim to do as little hacking/customization as possible to get ZFS to work. First I tried both the current (Mar 2021) Buster and Focal images but failed at the 'apt install zfs-dkms' step due to "exec format error" and basically failing to produce a working kernel module for ZFS. I suspect this is caused by the older binutils on both images. So then I downloaded the Ubuntu Hirsute unstable image with kernel 5.10.23 of 13 Mar 2021. Supplied binutils is 2.36 I believe. After the clean install, these are the steps I took: # apt update # apt upgrade Use armbian-config to install kernel headers (turns out to be 5.10.17) Use armbian-config to downgrade kernel 5.10.23 to 5.10.17 to match old headers... # apt install zfs-dkms apt install zfsutils-linux After this and a reboot, I successfully imported an existing (zfs 0.7.x) pool. So far so good. I will wait until we are stable with Hirsute.

So I'm just curious, what's the status of this fix? Do we need to wait till 5.11 lands in Armbian or has it been fixed (temporarily) downstream in Armbian's 5.10.x code? Great find by the way, thanks.

Wow thanks Igor. Clear. I will wait a bit to see if the cross-compilation issue is fixed soon. Otherwise I'll stick with the out-of-tree module build that I had done last year.

So, reporting in here after over a year of smooth operations on the Helios4 with zfs 0.7.x. Soon I'd like to upgrade (clean install) and I see a lot of things happening with ZFS 2.0.x on Helios64 with Armbian. I am a bit lost, so: what is the current best/easiest way to install ZFS 2.0.x on Helios4? I'd like to move to an LTS kernel if possible (not a hard requirement). Ideally future upgrades are 'easy' but again not a hard feature, I can live with a reinstall once a year. edit: please move this topic to the Helios4 section, thanks :-)

And I'm back, and back to square one. After 3 months of enjoying ZFS 0.7.13 on Helios4, I noticed that 0.8.2 was available in the backports. So, after doing apt-get update, I did apt-get upgrade and lost my ZFS. Basically I have spent the whole afternoon on this and I am fully stuck. If I use apt-get to try and reinstall ZFS, I end up with the "configure: error: *** Unable to build an empty module." If I manually use dkms to build the ZFS 0.8.2 from the sources left around by apt-get, I get a successful build, however "mobprobe zfs" gives me a Exec Format Error. dmesg shows: zlua: section 4 reloc 44 sym 'longjmp': unsupported interworking call (Thumb -> ARM) Does anyone have 0.8.2 succesfully running on Helios4? Update. If I remove the 90_zfs apt preference file, I can try to install 0.7.12. However that also breaks (luckily a lot faster so I can debug). The problem seems to be that my dkms is now broken. # more /var/lib/dkms/spl/0.7.12/build/make.log DKMS make.log for spl-0.7.12 for kernel 4.19.63-mvebu (armv7l) Sun Dec 22 22:32:42 CET 2019 make: *** No targets specified and no makefile found. Stop. Relevant bits from /var/lib/dkms/spl/0.7.12/build/config.log: configure:9294: cp conftest.c build && make modules -C /lib/modules/4.19.63-mvebu/build EXTRA_CFLAGS=-Werror-implicit-function-declaration M=/var/lib/dkms/spl/0.7.12/build/build Makefile:613: arch//Makefile: No such file or directory make: *** No rule to make target 'arch//Makefile'. Stop. I found https://forum.armbian.com/topic/10344-postinst-of-dkms-package-is-broken-on-armbian/ and patched my common.postinst file. I have now been successful with 0.7.12 and have re-imported my pool. All seems fine. I would love to try 0.8.2 as soon as someone confirms that it works :-)

@gprovost many thanks for sharing your full log. I have it working!!! I kept not doing an "apt-get upgrade" before doing the "apt-get update". On a clean image (dated 2 Aug 2019 on Kobol website) I can confirm I have successfully built the ZFS stuff, taking the above steps into account.

Exactly the same issue with the image from Armbian (https://dl.armbian.com/helios4/Debian_buster_next.7z downloaded yesterday) which was a few MBs different from the Kobol image. The problem is in the configure step of spl-dkms.

@gprovost what image are you using exactly? I am using the ones from kobol.io and still have the same issue, see transcript below. This is Armbian_5.91_Helios4_Debian_buster_next_4.19.63.7z from kobol.io dated Aug 2, 2019.

Unfortunately, on the Kobol supplied image Armbian_5.91_Helios4_Debian_stretch_default_4.14.135.7z, I get exactly the same problem: (clean install) root@helios4:~# apt-get install linux-headers-mvebu > works, headers for 4.14 root@helios4:~# apt-get install spl-dkms [...snip...] Loading new spl-0.7.12 DKMS files... Building for 4.14.135-mvebu Building initial module for 4.14.135-mvebu configure: error: *** Unable to build an empty module. Error! Bad return status for module build on kernel: 4.14.135-mvebu (armv7l) Consult /var/lib/dkms/spl/0.7.12/build/make.log for more information. root@helios4:~# I will try @gprovost 's steps now, just missed it, many thanks for sharing!

@qstaq wow. I will try the Debian 9 Stretch 4.14 image (from kobol.io) tomorrow in the mean time (with backports) and will report here.