[arch-releng] [arch-install-scripts] [PATCH] common: mount efivarfs if possible, but don't bail out if it fails

[Dave Reisner]

On Fri, Nov 15, 2013 at 04:52:12PM +0100, Thomas Bächler wrote:
> Am 15.11.2013 16:31, schrieb Dave Reisner:
> > What makes this mount so special that we should avoid failing if it doesn't
> > mount? Why would it be any more or less prone to failure if it was
> > successfully mounted in the host?
> 
> Nobody says that it was mounted on the host.
> 
> When a recent kernel boots in EFI mode, it always creates the directory
> /sys/firmware/efi/efivars/, regardless whether support for efivarfs was
> configured in the kernel (see drivers/firmware/efi/efi.c).

Sounds like the trigger should be /sys/firmware/efi/efivars being a
mountpoint, then. Our live media, booted in EFI mode, will automatically
mount efivars thanks to systemd:

http://cgit.freedesktop.org/systemd/systemd/tree/src/core/mount-setup.c#n107

> That means that we might have the directory and the mount will still
> always fail. Anyway, failing to mount efivarfs should not prevent you
> from using arch-chroot, as it only prevents you from manipulating efi
> variables, but not from performing other important tasks.

If you boot the install media in EFI mode and plan to install the target
with an EFI bootloader, is this possible without efivarsfs mounted in
the chroot?

I'm still curious what would cause an API filesystem to fail to mount
aside from a bad option or complete lack of support (which shouldn't be
encountered here).