fstab-sync wipes out /etc/fstab

[Bill Perkins]

Dan wrote:
> Hi
> 
> Im running FC4 on my PC - well, i was until i rebooted today.
> 
> On reboot i had a plethora of errors.
> 
> On booting in rescue mode it appears fstab-sync has wiped anything
> *except* removable devices from /etc/fstab.
> 
> No root. No swap. No /proc. No /dev/pts. Nothing.
> 
> I am also using LVM.
> 
> Hence I cannot get into my system.
> 
> Now for my question. How can i rebuild my /etc/fstab without reinstalling?
> 
> I have had a lot of success with Fedora - have been running it on my PC
> since FC1 without major problems, until now.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Dan
> 

I've had to rebuild my /etc/fstab files a few times during the last 10 
years or so... I've learned to take a snapshot of /etc on a fresh 
install and every now and again, just in case.

In the mean time, you could try booting into rescue mode (saw something 
about that a few days ago on this list) using either the ISO image from 
the Fedora website, or you can get there with the first disk of the 
distro's set. If you can get that far, write down the /etc/fstab file 
that is (hopefully) generated when booting into rescue mode (I haven't 
tried this as yet, although I may give it a shot just to see what we 
wind up with). If that doesn't work, I'd try running fdisk -l to get a 
list of the disks and partitions, and work from memory and poking around 
(mount the partitions one at a time and examine them) to build a new 
fstab. FWIW, here is what mine looks like:

~$ cat /etc/fstab
# This file is edited by fstab-sync - see 'man fstab-sync' for details
LABEL=/             /                       ext3    defaults        1 1
/dev/devpts         /dev/pts                devpts  gid=5,mode=620  0 0
/dev/shm            /dev/shm                tmpfs   defaults        0 0
/dev/proc           /proc                   proc    defaults        0 0
/dev/sys            /sys                    sysfs   defaults        0 0
LABEL=<strange chars here> swap             swap    defaults        0 0
/dev/hda1           /slack                  ext3    defaults        1 2
/dev/hdb1           /z                      ext3    defaults        1 2
/dev/hdc      /media/cdrecorder auto pamconsole,exec,noauto,managed 0 0

Two IDE disks and a CDRW as the master on hdc; your system will probably 
be different (SCSI, RAID, anything like that?)

HTH

-- 
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"The two most common things in the	| Bill Perkins
  universe are Hydrogen and Stupidity."	| perk at iag.net
					| programmer-at-large
		F. Zappa		| ALL assembly languages done here.
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