Comment 10 for bug 1105900

Hello, Luis Henriques.

This seems to be good news indeed.

Started with my 32-bit Ubuntu 12.10 running on kernel 3.5.0-22, added quantal-proposed to the /etc/apt/sources.list file, updated to kernel 3.5.0-23 and rebooted in order to activate the new kernel.

---Synaptic history entry logging installation of kernel 3.5.0-23---
Commit Log for Sun Jan 27 15:18:30 2013

Die folgenden Pakete wurden aktualisiert:
linux-generic (3.5.0.22.28) to 3.5.0.23.29
linux-headers-generic (3.5.0.22.28) to 3.5.0.23.29
linux-headers-generic-pae (3.5.0.22.28) to 3.5.0.23.29
linux-image-generic (3.5.0.22.28) to 3.5.0.23.29
linux-libc-dev (3.5.0-22.34) to 3.5.0-23.35

Die folgenden Pakete wurden installiert:
linux-headers-3.5.0-23 (3.5.0-23.35)
linux-headers-3.5.0-23-generic (3.5.0-23.35)
linux-image-3.5.0-23-generic (3.5.0-23.35)
linux-image-extra-3.5.0-23-generic (3.5.0-23.35)
---Synaptic end

---uname -a output---
Linux unimatrix0 3.5.0-23-generic #35-Ubuntu SMP Thu Jan 24 13:05:29 UTC 2013 i686 i686 i686 GNU/Linux
---uname end

Used the system for a while an rebooted it, because the problem becomes visible only after rebooting.

---grep "EXT4-fs" /var/log/syslog output---
syslog:Jan 27 16:26:05 unimatrix0 kernel: [ 1.642452] EXT4-fs (sda6): INFO: recovery required on readonly filesystem
syslog:Jan 27 16:26:05 unimatrix0 kernel: [ 1.642461] EXT4-fs (sda6): write access will be enabled during recovery
syslog:Jan 27 16:26:05 unimatrix0 kernel: [ 3.993863] EXT4-fs (sda6): recovery complete
syslog:Jan 27 16:26:05 unimatrix0 kernel: [ 4.003148] EXT4-fs (sda6): mounted filesystem with ordered data mode. Opts: (null)
syslog:Jan 27 16:26:05 unimatrix0 kernel: [ 24.559045] EXT4-fs (sda6): re-mounted. Opts: errors=remount-ro
---grep end---

This seemed to look better. No complaint about orphaned inodes. But the first line telling that "INFO: recovery required on readonly filesystem" made me suspicious. This "INFO" line does not appear in the syslog file under Ubuntu 12.04.1 K3.2.0-35.
But K3.5.0-23 might just be more verbose.

Rebooted again and this time did not select to launch Ubuntu 12.10 K3.5.0-23, but Ubuntu 12.04.1 K3.2.0-35 and run an fsck against the Ubuntu 12.10 partition which is /dev/sda6.

So the commandline run was: fsck -v -f /dev/fsck.
(Sorry, forgot to switch my terminal language to English. So the output is in German. Yet, it may be understandable nonetheless, I hope.)

---fsck -v -f /dev/sda6 output---
sudo fsck -v -f /dev/sda6
fsck von util-linux 2.20.1
e2fsck 1.42 (29-Nov-2011)
ubu1210: stelle das Journal wieder her <========== ubu1210 (partition name): recovering the journal
Durchgang 1: Prüfe Inodes, Blocks, und Größen
Durchgang 2: Prüfe Verzeichnis Struktur
Durchgang 3: Prüfe Verzeichnis Verknüpfungen
Durchgang 4: Überprüfe die Referenzzähler
Durchgang 5: Überprüfe Gruppe Zusammenfassung
Die Anzahl freier Blöcke ist falsch (10905020, gezählt=10904942). <=== free block count incorrect
Repariere<j>? ja

Die Anzahl freier Inodes ist falsch (2864274, gezählt=2864270). <== free inode count incorrect
Repariere<j>? ja

ubu1210: ***** DATEISYSTEM WURDE VERÄNDERT *****

281458 Inodes sind in Benutzung (8.95%)
     155 nicht zusammenhängende Dateien (0.1%)
     178 nicht zusammenhängende Verzeichnisse (0.1%)
         # von Inodes mit ind/dind/tind Blöcken: 0/0/0
         Erweiterungstiefe Histogramm: 246374/41
 1677970 Blöcke werden benutzt (13.34%)
0 ungültige Blöcke
       1 große Datei

  207356 reguläre Dateien
   36374 Verzeichnisse
      58 zeichenorientierte Gerätedateien
      25 Blockgerätedateien
       2 Fifos
      20 Verknüpfungen
   37605 symbolische Verknüpfungen (34921 schnelle symbolische Verknüpfungen)
      29 Sockets
--------
  281469 Dateien
---fsck end ---

This situation can be reproduced at will.
Run Ubuntu 12.10 K3.5.0-23 for a while. Reboot to Ubuntu 12.04.1 and run "fsck -v -f /dev/sda6". It will yield a similar result. The first complaint is always that the journal, EXT4 journal needs recovery. This does not sound reassuring.

Conclusion:
----------------
As far as Ubuntu 12.10 32-bit is concerned on my machine at least, kernel 3.5.0-23 does not seem to fix the root cause of the EXT4-fs problem, yet.

Next steps:
---------------

As my initial report was about the same problem experienced on Ubuntu 12.04.1 x64 K3.2.0-36, on that system K.3.2.0-37 will be installed. Will come back as soon as this has been done and as soon as sufficient data have been gathered to draw a conclusion whether K3.2.0-37 will make my Ubuntu 12.04.1 x64 run happily again.

Cheers,
Karl