Bug#664088: mdadm fails to initialize components for bitmap

[karme at karme.de]

Markus Hochholdinger <Markus at hochholdinger.net> writes:

>> > PPS: would really help me if this gets fixed as i rely on the bitmap
>> > feature to sync my laptop to an external usb disk before leaving home
>> If you use a older version of mdadm, it shouldn't crash the kernel.
>
> I just compiled mdadm from squeeze and linked it static (on a squeeze system):

[...]

> With the resulting binary I have successful removed and added a raid1 bitmap 
> within a wheezy system without kernel crash or reboot.

Thanks, for your quick help / that tip. Today a new kernel version
entered testing and I thought i could give it a try first and it worked
:-)

=> the update of linux-image-3.2.0-2-amd64:amd64 from 3.2.12-1 to
3.2.14-1 fixed at least my problem.

some details:
- adding external disk while having internal bitmap still silently fails
  (only hint is mdadm exit status=1)

this works:
- remove internal bitmap
- add disk and wait for sync
- add internal bitmap
  (no kernel panic anymore)
- fail/remove/re-add works again

greetings
karme