What is this "root=LABEL=/" stuff?

[Peter Smith]

Roger wrote:

> Harry Hoffman wrote:
>
>> Hi Doug,
>>
>> The LABEL is referring to a filesystem label introduced some time ago.
>> Essentially it allows you to label a disk parition. This is useful 
>> because once
>> labeled you don't need to refer to the partition by diskname[part#] 
>> (ie. hda5).
>>
>> That way if you add more disks and the device names switch it won't 
>> screw you up.
>>  
>>
>
> I'll add the following - if you take another disk w/ a label marked 
> '/' you'll run into problems.
>
> I took a disk from a RH8 system to a RH9 - some emergency disk 
> operations on another parition- and it mounted the wrong partition 
> because hdb had a partition marked as '/'
> The problem was corrected by just explicitly specifiing /dev/hda5 as 
> the mount point for / as opposed to the label.
>
> Sorry - to comment so late on this thread.
>
I had this problem too, and found that even though the disks were 
mounted as /dev/sdxn there was still confusion with two partitions 
labelled "/".  Easy to change them with e2label.

Regards,
Peter