extremely odd FS decay in 2.0.32

Brian H. Trammell (brian@altara.org)
Tue, 14 Apr 1998 10:13:47 -0400 (EDT)


I'm seeing some very, very odd behavior in an e2fs under RedHat's 2.0.32
kernel (stock 2.0.32 +teardrop +f00f, I believe). For a while, I've
watched inodes just disappear from underneath me, giving me errors such as

EXT2-fs warning (device 03:02): ext2_free_inode: bit already cleared for
inode 41131

Listing the file (ls -li) gives the following:

41131 ?--------- 0 root root 0 Dec 31 1969 downtown-freedom-640.jpg

The data in the file is, of course, gone. Attempts to edit with vi return
"downtown-freedom-640 is not a file".

I have heard theories relating this to flaky hardware (the same sort of
memory insanity that makes the happy sig11 possible), and am running
kernel compiles nonstop to see if I can get a sig11 to show up (nothing
after three compiles, will keep trying.)

A few files in /usr/lib/terminfo/o were exhibiting the same behavior
(EXT2-fs warnings whenever open() or stat() called on them), but were
listed normally in ls -ali

146313 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 752 Dec 31 09:41 oblit

I was able to read data out of the file (vi oblit), but when I exited vi
(:q!), the file changed to

146313 -rw------- 0 root root 4096 Apr 14 10:30 oblit

ls five seconds later returned the original

146313 -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 752 Dec 31 09:41 oblit

In addition (and this is where it gets really weird) several files in
/usr/lib/terminfo/o have become _symbolic_ links that look like they
belong in the /etc/rc.d/rc?.d directories:

146314 lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Apr 9 18:30 oldibmpc3 -> ../init.d/httpd
146314 lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 15 Apr 9 18:30 oldpc3 -> ../init.d/httpd
146315 lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 13 Apr 9 18:30 oldsun -> ../init.d/atd

Note the duplicate 146314 inode (indicating a hard link) with a link count
of 1 (that should be 2, shouldn't it? and is it kosher to hard link to a
symlink?)

If anyone has any insight as to what is going on, I'd really appreciate
it. I'll do anything I can to assist.

Thank you,

brian

brian h. trammell <brian@altara.org> http://www.altara.org/~brian
http://www.altara.org/~brian/key.asc for PGP public key
director - the altara project and altara open network
communicate without gates - http://www.linux.org

Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons,
for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup.

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