johnieutah Posted June 7, 2015 Share Posted June 7, 2015 Hi all, currently running the trial version of Unraid 6 RC4. Is it possible within the web UI to simply reformat a disk? I know I can change the file system type when the array is stopped, but if I want to keep the current FS, XFS, but just clear the drive, will this work? Quote Link to comment
itimpi Posted June 7, 2015 Share Posted June 7, 2015 Hi all, currently running the trial version of Unraid 6 RC4. Is it possible within the web UI to simply reformat a disk? I know I can change the file system type when the array is stopped, but if I want to keep the current FS, XFS, but just clear the drive, will this work? Not sure if that is possible in the current GUI. However a simple work-around would be to stop the array; change it some other format; start the array and elect to format it; stop the array and change it back to XFS; start the array and format it again. Quote Link to comment
johnieutah Posted June 8, 2015 Author Share Posted June 8, 2015 Hmm, I tried this and when I tried to start the array it simply rebuilt parity. I will try again tonight. Once I switch out these drives that I've been using to test Unraid 6, Unraid will always try and rebuild parity on to my new drives right? - there's no way to tell it to "start new and forget the old config / data" is there? Thanks. Quote Link to comment
itimpi Posted June 8, 2015 Share Posted June 8, 2015 Hmm, I tried this and when I tried to start the array it simply rebuilt parity. I will try again tonight. That is suspicious. There is no way that stopping and starting the array without a reboot should ever trigger a parity rebuild. This suggests that there might be some sort of corruption on the USB drive that is causing it to be treated as read-only so that changes in the GUI do not get saved. It might be worth putting the USB stick into a Windows PC to see if Windows can detect (and fix) any such errors. Once I switch out these drives that I've been using to test Unraid 6, Unraid will always try and rebuild parity on to my new drives right? - there's no way to tell it to "start new and forget the old config / data" is there? Not quite sure what you are trying to say here? There is always the 'New Config' option under the Tools menu that sets you back to the position of having no drives assigned. From there you can assign the drives, and if you have assigned a parity drive then on starting the array parity will be built from the drives assigned. Thanks. Quote Link to comment
johnieutah Posted June 8, 2015 Author Share Posted June 8, 2015 Ah, I never did a reboot - that's probably it. But I did let it rebuild parity. Which worked fine. As to the 2nd point... I have a test server with some test data. Now I want to migrate my "real" hard drives across. I want to do this in as cleanly as possible and start a fresh, adding the drives one by one, reformatting them to XFS as I go along. So tonight, I will try your suggestion of setting the drive to BTRFS (for example), rebooting the server, then setting it back to XFS and hopefully that will give me the format drive option. Quote Link to comment
johnieutah Posted June 8, 2015 Author Share Posted June 8, 2015 Update: got it working no problem. You know what the problem was? I'd been clicking "Done" on the disk settings page (where you choose the disk format), instead of "Apply". Amateur mistake I know, but I do think these buttons need to better either better distinguished either visually or renamed or something. To me "Done" does not = "cancel" which is what it is doing in affect, i.e. go back without saving. Anyways, its working. What we need next is a nice big "shut down" server button on the main tab ;-) Quote Link to comment
bombz Posted June 10, 2020 Share Posted June 10, 2020 (edited) Is this still the 'proper method' when formatting an existing disk in the array? To format XFS disk: Stop Array Select disk in question > Change XFS to another format > Select Apply Start Array > format disk Stop Array Select disk in question > Change FS back to XFS > Select Apply Start Array > format disk Thanks, Edited June 10, 2020 by bombz Quote Link to comment
JorgeB Posted June 10, 2020 Share Posted June 10, 2020 28 minutes ago, bombz said: Is this still the 'proper method' when formatting an existing disk in the array? It's still the easiest way. Quote Link to comment
bombz Posted June 10, 2020 Share Posted June 10, 2020 10 minutes ago, johnnie.black said: It's still the easiest way. Noted. Thank you. Quote Link to comment
bombz Posted September 20, 2020 Share Posted September 20, 2020 (edited) On 6/10/2020 at 12:08 PM, JorgeB said: It's still the easiest way. Hello again I am finally setup with this spare disk to dump to my array. The current disk in question <disk 8> has data on it. However, I would like to clear the disk so this data is deleted, and not rebuilt. I realize we discussed this in the past and want to be sure. Follow this method: Stop Array Select disk in question > Change XFS to another format > Select Apply Start Array > format disk Stop Array Select disk in question > Change FS back to XFS > Select Apply Start Array > format disk And then hook up the spare disk via UD, start SSH session and transfer data cp -rpv command, and I should be good to go? Thanks again. Edited September 20, 2020 by bombz Quote Link to comment
trurl Posted September 20, 2020 Share Posted September 20, 2020 You have added some things to your question that seem out of context, so maybe you could explain in greater detail what you are trying to accomplish. What do these things have to do with formatting an array disk? 17 minutes ago, bombz said: spare disk to dump to my array. 17 minutes ago, bombz said: clear the disk so this data is deleted, and not rebuilt. 17 minutes ago, bombz said: hook up the spare disk via UD Your use of the word "clear" in that 2nd quote also makes me wonder what you are doing, especially when mentioned in the same sentence as "not rebuilt". "Clear" usually means write all zeros to the disk, a very different thing than formatting, but something you might do if you were planning to shrink the array. Are you trying to remove disk8 from the array? What does the spare disk have to do with anything? Quote Link to comment
bombz Posted September 20, 2020 Share Posted September 20, 2020 19 minutes ago, trurl said: You have added some things to your question that seem out of context, so maybe you could explain in greater detail what you are trying to accomplish. What do these things have to do with formatting an array disk? Your use of the word "clear" in that 2nd quote also makes me wonder what you are doing, especially when mentioned in the same sentence as "not rebuilt". "Clear" usually means write all zeros to the disk, a very different thing than formatting, but something you might do if you were planning to shrink the array. Are you trying to remove disk8 from the array? What does the spare disk have to do with anything? Sure can. I will give you an overview of what has been done Disk 8 has data on it currently I used UD and copied disk 8 data to a spare disk. This was so I could take this spare disk to my windows system and re-organize the data locally on this disk. Once organized my plan is to copy this back to disk 8 Disk 8 & spare disk = duplicate copies However, the spare disk is now organized and I want to push this data (from the spare disk) back to disk 8. Disk 8 currently is online, and I would like to format it, making it a blank disk. Once it is formatted based on the process above (provided that is the correct process)... I would like to attach the spare disk (with the organized data) via UD to the array, and use cp -rpv command via SSH to push the organized data back to disk 8. Hope I cleared up any concerns with this explanation 😕 Quote Link to comment
trurl Posted September 20, 2020 Share Posted September 20, 2020 10 minutes ago, bombz said: Once it is formatted based on the process above (provided that is the correct process)... I would like to attach the spare disk (with the organized data) via UD to the array, and use cp -rpv command via SSH to push the organized data back to disk 8. That will work, but 11 minutes ago, bombz said: re-organize the data locally on this disk. Once organized my plan is to copy this back to disk 8 this brings up more questions. The main thing I want to make sure you understand is how the disk folders correspond to user shares. The user shares are simply the combined top level folders on cache and array. Any top level folder on cache or array is part of a user share with the same name as that top level folder. If your reorganization created, deleted, or renamed top level folders on the disk, then those changes will be reflected in your user shares. Quote Link to comment
bombz Posted September 20, 2020 Share Posted September 20, 2020 14 minutes ago, trurl said: That will work, but this brings up more questions. The main thing I want to make sure you understand is how the disk folders correspond to user shares. The user shares are simply the combined top level folders on cache and array. Any top level folder on cache or array is part of a user share with the same name as that top level folder. If your reorganization created, deleted, or renamed top level folders on the disk, then those changes will be reflected in your user shares. I appreciate you looking out for me on the users shares. I am aware of this and the changes will not be affected. I would be able to make these adjustments if they were. However this share is not a concern in this scenario. You're very kind to bring that up. Now that you have an overview of my plan, am I on the right path, am I overlooking anything with my plan moving forward? Quote Link to comment
trurl Posted September 20, 2020 Share Posted September 20, 2020 21 minutes ago, bombz said: am I on the right path yes Quote Link to comment
bombz Posted September 20, 2020 Share Posted September 20, 2020 Just now, trurl said: yes Thank you so much! Going to format the disk now and attempt this. Really appreciate your time discussing this 🙂 Quote Link to comment
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