I rebooted my unRaid and upon reboot, all drives had the green go ahead, and unRAID said it was ok to start the array. After I started it, a message popped up that there was no file system on one HDD and it told me it needed formatting. I clicked where it said format and now everything on the disk is GONE!  Is there a utility I can run to try to get the data back? I have ubuntu on another box where I can install the drive if that helps.

 

Any help is MUCH MUCH MUCH appreciated!!

 

ps. Can I throw up now?

Do you know what filesystem it was?

6 hours ago, johnnie.black said:

Do you know what filesystem it was?

It was originally formatted as xfs and my guess is that's how unRAID formatted it again today.

 

fwiw, currently I have the drive pulled from the system.

Edited December 2, 20178 yr by Joseph
details

You can try UFS explorer, there's a trial and it's been used successfully by other users in similar situations:

 

http://www.ufsexplorer.com/download_stdr.php

9 hours ago, johnnie.black said:

You can try UFS explorer, there's a trial and it's been used successfully by other users in similar situations:

 

http://www.ufsexplorer.com/download_stdr.php

Ok, I'll give that a shot, thanks...

 

You don't suppose there's a way to tell the parity disks to go back 1 or 2 commands and forget the format and emulate the drive contents instead?

1 minute ago, Joseph said:

You don't suppose there's a way to tell the parity disks to go back 1 or 2 commands and forget the format and emulate the drive contents instead?

Not possible.

I didn't think there was... thanks again, johnnie.black.

 

fwiw, since unRAID is tracking drives by serial number, It would be great if a safety feature was included so that once a drive has been added to the array and formatted the first time, unRIAD makes note of that so it won't give the option to format it until it is removed from the array.

unRIAD makes note of that so it won't give the option to format it until it is removed from the array.

Sometimes formatting is what the user wants, e.g., like when converting filesystems, but there is a stronger warning on v6.4 that formatting will delete all data and is irreversible.

 

Not directed at you since this is a somewhat common occurrence, hence the new warning, but always surprised at the amount of users that think formatting will do anything other than delete all data, that's what format always meant for me, maybe younger users are not so familiar with it, you probably never formatted even a floppy disk:

 

format a:

 

[emoji4]

 

 

50 minutes ago, johnnie.black said:

Sometimes formatting is what the user wants, e.g., like when converting filesystems, but there is a stronger warning on v6.4 that formatting will delete all data and is irreversible.

 

Not directed at you since this is a somewhat common occurrence, hence the new warning, but always surprised at the amount of users that think formatting will do anything else than delete all data, that's what format always meant for me, maybe younger users are not so familiar with it, you probably never formatted even a floppy disk:

 

format a:

 

I hear you!

 

What made it confusing to me is unRAID gave green lights on all drives and said it was ok to start the array. No flags or any indication something was out of sorts. Only after it was started it said the disk needed to be formatted. Therein lied the confusion...its a protected array.

 

If unRAID knows a disk has been previously added to the array and has been in use (based on serial number), then format should not be an option until its removed from the array. Doesn't seem like it would be impossible to implement and it seems to me it would clear up the confusion.

 

Maybe I'm not thinking it through, but I just can't see any reason for someone to want to change the file system on a disk via format after it has been added to the protected array.

 

Edited December 2, 20178 yr by Joseph

I hear you!
 
Maybe I'm not thinking it through, but I just can't see any reason for someone to want to change the file system on a disk via format after it has been added to the protected array.
 

Add a new drive? In order to not change parity, it has to be all zeroes, so format had to happen after addition to the array?

6 hours ago, Joseph said:

Maybe I'm not thinking it through, but I just can't see any reason for someone to want to change the file system on a disk via format after it has been added to the protected array.

 

Formatting all drives (one at a time) is for example part of the procedure for all the users converting from reiser to xfs, I think the new warning in v6.4 will be enough to avoid this, at least it should.

On 12/2/2017 at 5:25 PM, tstor said:

 

Add a new drive? In order to not change parity, it has to be all zeroes, so format had to happen after addition to the array?

true...but in this case, it wasn't a new drive. it was an existing member of the array and unRAID knew that because it populated it in the proper disk ID prior to starting the array. Additionally, the start button area said everything was good to go. Only after starting the array did it say this disk needed to be formatted and it was confusing to me what was going on. I still hold fast that formatting should be done prior to starting the array to avoid confusion. Nevertheless, I have a post it note taped to the monitor that FORMAT means FORMAT--inside the protected array too.

 

2 minutes ago, Joseph said:

I still hold fast that formatting should be done prior to starting the array to avoid confusion. Nevertheless, I have a post it note taped to the monitor that FORMAT means FORMAT--inside the protected array too.

 

You can't format before the array is started as then the parity would be invalid.   To be honest, not sure you need the post it note, I highly doubt you'd make this error of judgement again.

 

On 02/12/2017 at 4:58 PM, johnnie.black said:

maybe younger users are not so familiar with it, you probably never formatted even a floppy disk:

 

format a:

 

I remember that all too well damn you!  Even on 5.25"

The good ole days were the best...  Never had to format when using one of these.  We've definitely gone backwards in terms of ease-to-use

 

16 minutes ago, Squid said:

The good ole days were the best...  Never had to format when using one of these.  We've definitely gone backwards in terms of ease-to-use

 

Damn, I had one of them too, forgot the pleasure of loading one of them up to listen to this.....

6 minutes ago, CHBMB said:

 

Damn, I had one of them too, forgot the pleasure of loading one of them up to listen to this.....

 

lol, haven't heard that in years, and when you waited 10 minutes for it to load and in the end got "tape loading error", that was nice.