> > I don't know if this is a bug in the kernel or mke2fs, but ever since
> > about 2.0.2x (my first kernels), mke2fs (v1.10) reports that it can't get
> > a free page while writing inode tables, stops for a while (10-70 secs)
> > then keeps going, or most of the time I have to start a new program on
> > another VC to get it going again. /proc/meminfo reports 10Mb in buffers
> > and 384k free memory. I am currently running 2.0.31-pre6. This, 90% of
> > the time, happens with partitions > ~200Mb.
> >
> > I have a iP166, 24Mb RAM, 2 EIDE & 1 SCSI-1 HDD's
>
> Stupid question: Do you have add swap space before running mke2fs?
> I've never seen such a massage with 2.0.29 or pre-2.0.31-2 and
> more than 4Mb RAM.
I saw a similar thing: while running mke2fs 1.06 on a 4 GB partition on
an IDE hard drive, without the -c option, and with 16 MB RAM (no swap, as
I recall), it would stop, but switching consoles and doing something in
the other console would cause it to start again. This was under either
2.0.29 or Dave Miller's pre-2.0.31-2. I didn't report it at the time
because I assumed it was just another manifestation of the problems with
the buffer cache. I don't remember getting a "Couldn't get a free
page....." message, but have since lost the log file for that day. Sorry.
___
Trevor Johnson