RPM

Bug #633686
Comment #9

Comment 9 for bug 633686

Revision history for this message

In Red Hat Bugzilla #529948, Alice (alice-redhat-bugs) wrote on 2010-06-20:

I totally agree that finding the exact root cause is the only way to resolve the problem.

What is needed is to identify, isolate and determine the root cause. Maybe a new idea to find the problem is needed.

1. Injecting a code segment to test the read/write cycle.

2. An established bug trace platform like backtrace or abrt.

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I have read from somewhere in wiki that the USB Flash Drive functions, especially the read/write, is slow because the Linux kernel did not reclaim the redundant disk/storage space.

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Fedora on USB-Flash Drive is an extremely useful feature.

1. Anyone can boot up Fedora on most machine (i386, x86_64, PowerPC) located anywhere in the world by just carrying USB-Flash Drives.

2. USB-Flash Drives are useful for testing as any Fedora version can be installed and updated and can be booted up on most machine without disturbing the original OS like Windows Vista or Unix.

3. USB-Flash Drives are useful to prepare Fedora to run on the up and coming Solid-state drives.

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The following has been observed for USB-Flash Drives.

1. Installing Fedora 11, Fedora 12 and Fedora 13 took more than five hours.

2. Updating Fedora 11 and Fedora 12 is very very very slow. Updating 100 packages many take more than 12 hours. There is an improvement in Fedora 13. It is still slow and it takes three times longer compare to updating onto Hard Disk.

3. Opening a File Browser, entering a command line, scrolling up and down a Firefox web page, and others were very slow. The operations may not response or may freeze for more than one minute to the point that it is not usable. There is a slight improvement in Fedora 13.

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The slow response on USB-Flash Drives may be all interconnected. Could it be the display drivers, the buses, the interfaces (USB 2.0), unclaimed resources during the read/write cycles, etc? Perhaps, a global effort of the whole Fedora/Linux team is need to get to the root cause.

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A very specific testing procedure is helpful. The following is an example of the specific instructions from a Red Hat developer.

"Can you try Fedora 12 yum --enablerepo=updates-testing upgrade xorg-x11-drv-ati plymouth libdrm mesa-libGL xorg-x11-server-Xorg?"

@Jeff Johnson,

I will execute the test procedures, even if it takes more than 12 hours, after you give the specific instructions.

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I totally agree that finding the exact root cause is the only way to resolve the problem.

What is needed is to identify, isolate and determine the root cause.  Maybe a new idea to find the problem is needed.

1.  Injecting a code segment to test the read/write cycle.

2.  An established bug trace platform like backtrace or abrt.

------------------------------

I have read from somewhere in wiki that the USB Flash Drive functions, especially the read/write, is slow because the Linux kernel did not reclaim the redundant disk/storage space.

------------------------------

Fedora on USB-Flash Drive is an extremely useful feature.

1.  Anyone can boot up Fedora on most machine (i386, x86_64, PowerPC) located anywhere in the world by just carrying USB-Flash Drives.

2.  USB-Flash Drives are useful for testing as any Fedora version can be installed and updated and can be booted up on most machine without disturbing the original OS like Windows Vista or Unix.

3.  USB-Flash Drives are useful to prepare Fedora to run on the up and coming Solid-state drives.

------------------------------

The following has been observed for USB-Flash Drives.

1.  Installing Fedora 11, Fedora 12 and Fedora 13 took more than five hours.

2.  Updating Fedora 11 and Fedora 12 is very very very slow.  Updating 100 packages many take more than 12 hours.  There is an improvement in Fedora 13.  It is still slow and it takes three times longer compare to updating onto Hard Disk.

3.  Opening a File Browser, entering a command line, scrolling up and down a Firefox web page, and others were very slow.  The operations may not response or may freeze for more than one minute to the point that it is not usable.  There is a slight improvement in Fedora 13.

------------------------------

The slow response on USB-Flash Drives may be all interconnected.  Could it be the display drivers, the buses, the interfaces (USB 2.0), unclaimed resources during the read/write cycles, etc?  Perhaps, a global effort of the whole Fedora/Linux team is need to get to the root cause.

------------------------------

A very specific testing procedure is helpful.  The following is an example of the specific instructions from a Red Hat developer.

"Can you try Fedora 12 yum --enablerepo=updates-testing upgrade xorg-x11-drv-ati plymouth libdrm mesa-libGL xorg-x11-server-Xorg?"

@Jeff Johnson,

I will execute the test procedures, even if it takes more than 12 hours, after you give the specific instructions.

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