Issued:

2012-06-20

Updated:

2012-06-20

RHBA-2012:0839 - dracut bug fix and enhancement update

Synopsis

dracut bug fix and enhancement update

Type/Severity

Bug Fix Advisory

Topic

Updated dracut packages that fix multiple bugs and add two enhancements are now available for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6.

Description

The dracut packages include an event-driven initramfs generator infrastructure based on udev. The virtual file system, initramfs, is loaded together with the kernel at boot time and initializes the system, so it can read and boot from the root partition.

This update fixes the following bugs:

• Previously, if a dracut module did not contain an "install" file, dracut could not execute the "installkernel" command. Consequently, the dracut fips-aesni module could not be included in the initramfs image. Now, "installkernel" can be correctly executed in the described scenario, thus fixing this bug. (BZ#788119)

• Previously, dracut failed to start up a degraded RAID array, resulting in a non-booting system. With this update, dracut uses the rd_retry kernel command-line parameter value and after rd_retry/2 seconds attempts to force the array to start, thus fixing this bug. (BZ#761584)

• During boot-up, dracut called the "udevadm settle" command several times. As a result, inconsequential messages about the command timeout were sometimes returned, creating clutter in the console output. This update fixes the bug and the messages are no longer returned in the described scenario. (BZ#747840)

• Occasionally, dracut attempted to assemble an array before all disks were available. As a result, dracut started the array in degraded mode or failed altogether. This bug has been fixed and dracut now forces degraded arrays to start only after a period of time controlled by the rd_retry kernel command-line parameter. (BZ#735529)

• The dracut package depended on the vconfig package although vconfig is not used by dracut. This update removes the dependency on vconfig. (BZ#714039)

• Previously, if a network interface was brought up, dracut waited for two seconds to detect that the link was up. For certain network cards, two seconds is not long enough. Consequently, the network was not properly set up and the system could not boot. Now, dracut waits for ten seconds, thus fixing this bug. (BZ#794863)

• Dracut did not set the broadcast address for network interfaces it started up, resulting in a 0.0.0.0 broadcast address. This bug has been fixed and the default broadcast address is now set properly on startup. (BZ#752584)

• The FILES section of the dracut man page has been amended to fix inaccurate content. (BZ#703164)

• If the user adds multiple "console=[tty]" parameters on the kernel command line, the last parameter specifies the primary console. Previously, dracut failed to initialize this console and instead initialized /dev/tty0 unconditionally. This bug has been fixed and dracut now initializes the correct console in the described scenario. (BZ#752073)

• When no user name and password were specified in an iSCSI interface, dracut reused the login information from a previous iSCSI parameter. Consequently, the authentication failed and the system did not boot up. This update fixes the bug. (BZ#788618)

This update adds the following enhancements:

• Previously, it was not possible to exclude a kernel driver from the initramfs image to reduce its size. This update introduces the "--omit-driver" option to provide this functionality. (BZ#722879)

• The "lsinitrd" command has been enhanced to support initramfs images compressed by the LZMA algorithm. (BZ#752005)

Users of dracut are advised to upgrade to these updated packages, which fix these bugs and add these enhancements.

Solution

Before applying this update, make sure that all previously-released errata relevant to your system have been applied.

This update is available via Red Hat Network. Details on how to use the Red Hat Network to apply this update are available at https://access.redhat.com/knowledge/articles/11258

Affected Products

Updated Packages

• dracut-caps-004-283.el6.noarch.rpm
• dracut-fips-004-283.el6.noarch.rpm
• dracut-004-283.el6.src.rpm
• dracut-generic-004-283.el6.noarch.rpm
• dracut-tools-004-283.el6.noarch.rpm
• dracut-004-283.el6.noarch.rpm
• dracut-fips-aesni-004-283.el6.noarch.rpm
• dracut-kernel-004-283.el6.noarch.rpm
• dracut-network-004-283.el6.noarch.rpm

Fixes

• This content is not included.BZ - 703164
• This content is not included.BZ - 714039

CVEs

(none)

References

(none)

Additional information

• The Red Hat security contact is This content is not included.secalert@redhat.com. More contact details at https://access.redhat.com/security/team/contact/.
• Offline Security Data data is available for integration with other systems. See Offline Security Data API to get started.