ZFS setup

[lraymond]

Reading the manual is a bear, but still trying to understand, but have freenas running, booting from a USB, now I want to setup ZFS raidz2 as from my readings, this will give me the best performance/storage. I have (4) 2T disks and need around 3T of storage, so I have booted and went to volumes, selected all 4 disks, selected zfs and raidz2.

I now see under Volumes [+] /mnt/wf-zfs1 (which is my new volume) but one of the options is Create ZFS Volume, so a little confused, is what I created a ZFS volume? I see;

wf-zfs1 /mnt/wf-zfs1 209.0 KiB (0%) 3.5 TiB 3.5 TiB HEALTH

I will be moving the server to the colo tomorrow, so would like any last minute things I need to do and test while I have the device in house. I did play a bit, was able to make an NFS share, export and mount, but the 1st time, I had the above, clicked create ZFS volume, which gave a 2nd volume of only 3T so I think that part was wrong which is why I removed it and only have that one volume now.

 

[gpsguy]

Do a "zpool status -v" from the shell and post the output in

Code:

 tags.

I'm surprised that, given your inexperience level with FN, that you'd be moving the server to a colo tomorrow.

 

[cyberjock]

I'm surprised that, given your inexperience level with FN, that you'd be moving the server to a colo tomorrow.

That was my thought exactly. You really shouldn't be doing that until you know all the ins and outs of FreeNAS.

 

[lraymond]

HA HA HA .. shocker, are you too guys like a couple or something?

So since we already have a relationship, I will start ...
<sarcasm> Waiting long enough, I hit the IRC and </sarcasm> had some great talks, etc. and actually did the above on my own before that. The four disks (and the raidz2) showed an "ONLINE" status as well as all 4 disks showed "ONLINE" even though 2 were physically removed. As I said in the other, I did have it mounted via NFS and things were fine until I started to write to the disk (which worked) but did flip the switch to say hey there offline (again just no email). So this is not a duplicate thread, but migrating to one. The only other issue I found was once I re-inserted the disks, they would not come up, which is why those should be taken [offline] then removed, so even in the event of a fail, still take it offline and swap. Playing in the IRC was told to reboot, so on shutdown I got a kernel panic, most likely due to a dirty raid, so I do have remote PDU's so on a power cycle, things came up fine, I forced a scrub and things were smooth.

Anyway, trust me, I didn't want to go and just spin up a linux server, move 2T of data only to move again once I was more familiar with FN (look I used the acronym), but really concerned with that EMC in degraded mode, but still, I have 2 great friends on the forum who may take a day or 2, but hey will come through for me :)

I honestly looked for maybe some "consulting" time, something like a few hours of 1 on 1 with remote access, but didn't see anything like that from the site. So I do have a full backup of that drive, and tomorrow's plan is to get that box in, get the network setup, and then move a few items over to that new share and babysit. I do want to understand things more, and actually going to be getting a 2nd identical box and doing a replication back and forth, not sure if over rsync, or if FN has a failover, but yes, I will read up on that which will be sooner than later.

So to close, I have 4 disks in the raidz2, going to put a few things there tomorrow, 32G of RAM and watching the swap use and other stats, but really want to get some traffic on the disks so I can see how it's doing!

Again ... thanks guys!

 

[gpsguy]

Perhaps you should have posted the actual condition of the array and what you'd already tried in the first message in this thread.

My response was based on what you "said". I assumed that you'd just setup the server, with 4 disks and was "confused" as to whether it was configured for RAIDz2 or not.

How the f*** would we know you removed 2 disks from the pool?

For paid support, you could have contacted iXsystems

I have (4) 2T disks and need around 3T of storage, so I have booted and went to volumes, selected all 4 disks, selected zfs and raidz2.

... so a little confused, is what I created a ZFS volume?

 

[lraymond]

How the f*** would we know you removed 2 disks from the pool?

So, this is how it is on the forums, how many posts do I need to be a senior! Gonna have to master this quick and start trolling for posts.

Now, when that question was asked, it was 9am. From my initial posts/responses, I didn't expect that long a wait for a response for such a quick answer. Note I am not complaining, just surprised! So after waiting 6 or so hours, I went back to the device and the IRC. My initial question was simply at the GUI, I knew I created the raidz2, but looking at the volume (again from the GUI) I didn't see anywhere to confirm it was actually setup that way.

Honestly, I should have updated / edited the post, as I figured that out along with creating a volume/dataset inside the existing for more granular security/control.

Also,

For paid support, you could have contacted iXsystems

Thanks, didn't anything like that, but after breakfast, will contact them for some basic pricing on some consulting.

 

[jgreco]

So, this is how it is on the forums, how many posts do I need to be a senior! Gonna have to master this quick and start trolling for posts.

Now, when that question was asked, it was 9am. From my initial posts/responses, I didn't expect that long a wait for a response for such a quick answer. Note I am not complaining, just surprised! So after waiting 6 or so hours, I went back to the device and the IRC. My initial question was simply at the GUI, I knew I created the raidz2, but looking at the volume (again from the GUI) I didn't see anywhere to confirm it was actually setup that way.

Most of the people here in the forums are happy to help, but generally speaking, the ones who will offer the most helpful help will expect that you've tried to help yourself first, by reading, then help them help you, by providing the information that they'd need in order to make an intelligent and useful response. The forum isn't the best place for "instant" help. Some of us have real jobs and might check in on the forums every day or two. I tend to troll around on the forums looking for interesting unanswered things while I'm waiting for some maintenance task or install to finish, since I'm sitting in front of the screens anyways.

I count more than a handful of major issues that I suspect or guess at based on your messages to this point that all point to "this is a quagmire/insufficient time to impart clues." gpsguy's response in #2 would have been mine, had I thought otherwise. Cyberjock agrees. So then you come up with

HA HA HA .. shocker, are you too guys like a couple or something?

No. They have a fscking clue (actually they each have a pretty decent supply of clues). Kinda looking like you don't.

 

[lraymond]

Most of the people here in the forums are happy to help, but generally speaking, the ones who will offer the most helpful help will expect that you've tried to help yourself first, by reading, then help them help you, by providing the information that they'd need in order to make an intelligent and useful response. The forum isn't the best place for "instant" help. Some of us have real jobs and might check in on the forums every day or two. I tend to troll around on the forums looking for interesting unanswered things while I'm waiting for some maintenance task or install to finish, since I'm sitting in front of the screens anyways.

I count more than a handful of major issues that I suspect or guess at based on your messages to this point that all point to "this is a quagmire/insufficient time to impart clues." gpsguy's response in #2 would have been mine, had I thought otherwise. Cyberjock agrees. So then you come up with

No. They have a fscking clue (actually they each have a pretty decent supply of clues). Kinda looking like you don't.

Thanks Joe, you were actually the one who did help in the hardware layout, and don't except instant help, but with that said, I did provide plenty of information and yes I did read (no I didn't read the 258 page manual) BUT did read the things I wanted to understand but after that, did post.

Basically there are a few things that don't do what I expected but it seems would have if the the disk was in utilization (which is not noted anywhere) but directed to via the ICQ. Since the disks were idle, removing didn't trip any errors, warnings, etc. so that may want to be added as a *note.

I also didn't find any list of companies that would do some initial support to take my years of knowing what I know and convert it to how freenas does it in a timely manner, so I would have the benefit of experience behind me, while training for future things which is exactly what ixsystems seems to do so I have a call into them already and we will be discussion some support options later today.

As I said, I didn't mind jumping in due to time but also did some reading, testing, and posted what I thought was enough information for a response. This is by no way flaming anyone, just the opposite, I am horrible when it comes to sarcasm, but love the product and although I am learning quickly and already re-testing with the device in the co-lo already, I didn't want to get 2 or 3 replies and go live moving everything over vs just moving the backups to write there, and then adding while watching how things go.

So by all means I can close this thread out and each post as I said will have more intelligent questions, so thanks again.

Last one, one of the doc's has an incorrect item (proves I read some) :)


Table 7.2a: NFS Share Options
Authorized networks string comma delimited list of allowed network addresses in the form 1.2.3.0/24 where the number after the slash is a CIDR mask

When I enter a comma separated, I am greeted with:
This is not a valid network: 10.10.5.0/24,192.168.2.0/24,192.168.50.0/24


Then I put 10.10.5.0/24 192.168.2.0 and it worked fine so the doc should be updated to say space NOT comma.

Tnx again.

 

[cyberjock]

Table 7.2a: NFS Share Options
Authorized networks string comma delimited list of allowed network addresses in the form 1.2.3.0/24 where the number after the slash is a CIDR mask

When I enter a comma separated, I am greeted with:
This is not a valid network: 10.10.5.0/24,192.168.2.0/24,192.168.50.0/24


Then I put 10.10.5.0/24 192.168.2.0 and it worked fine so the doc should be updated to say space NOT comma.

Tnx again.

Freakin' noobs! How dare you criticize the manual! Blasphemer! It's gospel, don't question it! Actually.. you are 100% correct. I'll add it to the list of things that I've found that are either in error or badly explained in the manual. I wouldn't expect this to be fixed until 9.1 though. So stay tuned.

 

[jgreco]

Instead of making a list, file documentation bug reports, and/or let me know. You can also make changes yourself if you're sufficiently confident in not needing a second pair of eyes for a change. Where I can reasonably do so, I actually spin up a VM to test "the little details" where they might be uncertain, look at source, look at the results in /etc, etc. My theory is that nobody is helped by poor documentation.

 

[cyberjock]

I've asked several times for how to file documentation bug reports, and nobody has provided any link on how to or anything that will get the ball rolling. Feel free to PM me the link or whatever.

 

[jgreco]

documentation bug reports: https://support.freenas.org/newticket ... suggest being real specific about the issue though.

edit documentation directly: http://doc.freenas.org then go to link in the corner, "log in/create account" (If you find yourself with insufficient privs, talk to Dru).

private message: to me if you wish, though I will only make edits that I feel make sense and add to or correct the documentation - if I don't understand and/or agree with it, I probably won't touch it.

Writing documentation requires certain qualities not everyone has, such as being a certain kind of dry, matter-of-fact, and easy to follow. I do it badly, or so I think, but I also think I'm successful because I try to see it from a user's point of view, and tell them what they really need to know. You'll note that I viciously edited the hardware recommendations for memory recently because it was CONFUSING and unhelpful; I think the new version is substantially better and clearer, even if maybe erring a little on the side of recommending more memory than strictly necessary.

 

[lraymond]

Freakin' noobs! How dare you criticize the manual! Blasphemer! It's gospel, don't question it!

Simply classic! I will take the ball and edit that page (hey I'm junior member status now!) if I see it's not done later today. About to do a little tech call with iXsystems to make sure things are setup right, and look at getting our 2nd redundant server but as we all said, don't want to just jump in without some guidance, so this call should prove helpful, not to say better questions won't come up however....

Thanks again for all being so welcoming and cool about this new path I'm on!