How-to: Install drbd as a kernel module
Installing drbd as a kernel module should (and sometimes does) go smoothly. However, when I tried to get it running on Debian 5.0 (Lenny) using the current Latest 2.6 series kernel (2.6.18-linode16), I ran into considerable difficulty, mostly based on my inexperience with Linux and kernel/module work. We finally identified the issue as a mismatch between the version of gcc (gcc-4.2) when building the linode16 kernel and the version of gcc (gcc-4.3) installed in Debian 5.0.
Standard instructions
(provided by irgeek, and reproduced - hopefully without error - by me.)
First we grab the necessary tools:
apt-get install build-essential flex bison wget unifdef
Then retrieve the kernel sources and build the kernel. Note that at the time of writing, Linode's latest 2.6 kernel is 2.6.18-linode16, but this should match the kernel selected in your configuration profile in the Linode Manager.
cd /usr/src
wget http://www.linode.com/src/2.6.18.8-linode16.tar.bz2
tar -jxf 2.6.18.8-linode16.tar.bz2
cd 2.6.18.8-linode16
make -j4
If all went well, we get a final output like this:
Kernel: arch/i386/boot/vmlinuz is ready (#2)
Next, we need headers and a symlink to /usr/src/linux. Again, make sure you're referencing the kernel source directory you're actually using.
make headers_install
cd ..
ln -s 2.6.18.8-linode16 linux
Now we can get the latest drbd sources (8.3.1 as of this writing, but check for yourself) and build our module:
wget http://oss.linbit.com/drbd/8.3/drbd-8.3.1.tar.gz
tar -zxf drbd-8.3.1.tar.gz
cd drbd-8.3.1
make KDIR=/usr/src/linux/
Assuming that went well, we can install the module, insert the module, and verify it's there.
make install
modprobe drbd
lsmod
Module Size Used by
drbd 257688 0
If everything worked, bravo! But if you end up with this message after your modprobe…
modprobe drbd
FATAL: Error inserting drbd (/lib/modules/2.6.18.8-linode16/kernel/drivers/block/drbd.ko): Invalid module format
… then clearly we need to do something differently. This is where I was when trying this procedure on Debian 5.0 (Lenny) using the 2.6.18-linode16 kernel. The linode16 kernel I was running was compiled with gcc-4.2, and Debian 5.0 has gcc-4.3 installed. Fail.
First, verify the problem by looking at the tail end of your dmesg:
dmesg | tail
(clipped)
drbd: version magic '2.6.18.8-linode16 SMP mod_unload Xen PENTIUM4 REGPARM gcc-4.3' should be '2.6.18.8-linode16 SMP mod_unload Xen PENTIUM4 REGPARM gcc-4.2'
I checked my installed version of gcc (although the dmesg pretty much tells me that it's gcc-4.3):
gcc -v
Using built-in specs.
Target: i486-linux-gnu
Configured with: ../src/configure -v --with-pkgversion='Debian 4.3.2-1.1' --with-bugurl=file:///usr/share/doc/gcc-4.3/README.Bugs --enable-languages=c,c++,fortran,objc,obj-c++ --prefix=/usr --enable-shared --with-system-zlib --libexecdir=/usr/lib --without-included-gettext --enable-threads=posix --enable-nls --with-gxx-include-dir=/usr/include/c++/4.3 --program-suffix=-4.3 --enable-clocale=gnu --enable-libstdcxx-debug --enable-objc-gc --enable-mpfr --enable-targets=all --enable-cld --enable-checking=release --build=i486-linux-gnu --host=i486-linux-gnu --target=i486-linux-gnu
Thread model: posix
gcc version 4.3.2 (Debian 4.3.2-1.1)
Install gcc-4.2, and change over to it so you can recompile:
apt-get install gcc-4.2
rm /usr/bin/gcc
ln -s /usr/bin/gcc-4.2 /usr/bin/gcc
Go back to the procedure above, and recompile drbd:
cd /usr/src/drbd-8.3.1
make KDIR=/usr/src/linux/
make install
Test to see if it worked. If so, modprobe won't return anything, and lsmod will return the module and size:
modprobe drbd
lsmod
Module Size Used by
drbd 257688 0
Return to the correct version of gcc:
rm /usr/bin/gcc
ln -s /usr/bin/gcc-4.3 /usr/bin/gcc
I'm sure there are other interesting problems one can encounter when trying to install drbd, and I've only covered one here. Fortunately, it's the only one I've encountered.
