Installation Fails on SSD, can't share on RAID

[HarryStottle]

hmm... having read the "Introduction ZFS1"

it looks like all I have to do to set up a basic RAIDZ1 with my 2 drives, is to define each drive as a vdev, then define a pool as consisting of those 2 vdevs. Is that about right?

Presumably, once I've set that pool I can then set up the main shared folders, assign them to groups and set permissions etc.

If that's the basic setup on the Server, whats the work flow for setting up connections from the workstations to the server?

 

[NugentS]

I think you still have something left over.
TrueNAS is not based on OpenSuse - and none of my boxes have ever displayed that screen

 

[HarryStottle]

@ NugentS

if it is "left over" then it must be something buried within the Proliant hardware. No way the software would have left traces on zero wiped drive.

nany case, we've managed to progress beyond that. I've logged in with the web interface and, having read the ZFS intro, I decided to dive in and try to create my Pool

so, I've gone into pool creation, selected my 2 drives as Data VDevs and selected the "Mirror" option, can't see anything else that needs selecting but, as you can see, the "CREATE" button remains stubbornly inactive...

what am I missing?

 

[NugentS]

Have you named your pool?
Thats a mistake I make almost every time although the new Scale interface makes it a bit more obvious

 

[danb35]

I didn't think TrueNAS was based on OpenSuse.

It isn't. It isn't even the same operating system as OpenSuse--that is Linux, while TrueNAS CORE is FreeBSD. Whatever device your system is booting (at least as far as the initial bootloader goes) from isn't the device TrueNAS was installed on.

 

[HarryStottle]

@NugentS "Have you named your pool?"

of course not, why would anyone want to do that? ;-)

sorted. Thanks

@danb35

then we have a genuine mystery! (or poltergeist) (or something built in to the Proliant hardware which holds on to prior installation data)
I cannot believe that any trace of linux remained on the SSD after I deleted ALL partitions and zero wiped it. And it was, during the install, the only drive in the system.

 

[Patrick M. Hausen]

Unplug all SSDs and hard drives, power up the system, if it starts with the SuSE screen, it's built into the firmware or there is a DOM or some other small flash device hidden somewhere in that machine.

 

[HarryStottle]

@Patrick M. Hausen "Unplug all SSDs etc"

may well try that in near future, but, at the moment, it's not causing any problems. i.e. I appear to have full functionality of a TrueNAS Server.

Currently, for example, wrestling with the Sharing and Permissions issues.

(Just discovered how to "Add Datasets")

 

[Patrick M. Hausen]

Storage > Pools > right hand menu in the line of the pool name, create dataset.

 

[HarryStottle]

Clearly not quite understanding the permissions hierarchy. (Thanks Patrick, I discovered that answer - and amended my post accordingly - obviously while you were posting your answer, so I'm explaining that here because otherwise your answer appears to have no question!)

nanycase: I'm missing something important. I've created a couple of datasets below my main pool. And appropriate folders duly appear on my Windows file system. But I can't copy stuff into them, unless I make each one, in turn, my home directory, in which case I have all the rights I can eat. I tried setting my home directory to the main pool, but although it doesn't protest when I save that change, it is ignored and whatever my home directory was before the change remains that unless I change it to one of the other sub folders.

How do either give myself rights to the main pool, or create an admin user with such rights? My naive initial assumption was that I could just login as root and have god level rights to the file system but it didn't even let me log in as root. I had to log in as one of the users I'd created. Which is fine, but how do I give that user the rights to the main pool which is bound to be a level up from the user's home directory?

 

[Patrick M. Hausen]

You need to give that user access rights to the individual datasets you are sharing. You can go from the share menu directly to the dataset ACLs. Don't mess with the top level pool name dataset.

 

[HarryStottle]

thanks again Patrick. First glance suggests that worked. Just copying stuff across to one of the dataset/folders that is not currently my home directory. No protest so far!

 

[gdreade]

Realizing that you moved passed the OpenSUSE conundrum, repartitioning a disk or using dd to zero out the beginning of it is not always sufficient to wipe all signatures and can result in an attempt to boot from a disk that you otherwise think is empty. This is because some schemes make use of signatures at different offsets, including the end of the disk (going by memory, when things like md(4) and lvm get involved). While zeroing out the entire disk should wipe all signatures, doing so is slow. Using the Linux `wipefs -a` command (edit: such as from a suitable rescue disk) is a fast alternative that clears off all known signatures. See https://www.man7.org/linux/man-pages/man8/wipefs.8.html (Do NOT use that command without reading the man page and being sure of what you're doing.)

 

[wsoteros]

There is a support email address, though it really should be visibly posted. @wsoteros, any thoughts on adding this to the login pages?

I added a "Need Help Logging in" section to the top navigation. That gives people a direct link to my email so I can help them with password resets or issues they face!

 

[HarryStottle]

I should close this thread. Things have moved on somewhat.

Got it mostly up and running. Put it on stress test for a few days and it started overheating. After wasting a couple of days trying to troubleshoooth that, the supplier agreed to replace the server and even upgraded us from Gen 8 to Gen 9 Proliant at no extra cost.

Got the system setup and working with 3 workstations in my office and performed the installation yesterday. Now having a couple of problems on site with not all users getting the access I've built in for them but I've raised a new post for that.

Thanks to all those who contributed to getting me to this stage.