Data Loss Bug in Linux Kernel V2.4.20

Kernel is the central part of most of the computer operating systems. It is responsible for managing the resources of computer system and making communications between software and hardware components. A basic part of a computer OS, a Kernel provides lowest-level generalization layer for the computer resources.

It is commonly used in UNIX based operating systems such as Linux. It is the important part in these OS. The Linux kernel is released under the General Public License version 2 and developed by suppliers worldwide. The new version of Linux kernel is V2.4.20.

Version 2.4.20 of Linux kernel is very advanced and has several extraordinary features related to scalability and stability of the system, data security, easy of use, system performance, application support and many others. Due to these added features, many Linux users like to use this version.

Though, the newer version is more advanced than its earlier versions but there is a massive bug in it. Under some unusual circumstances it can cause system to drop data. The data loss problem is dire and companies devote a large amount of their computing funds for keeping their data and information from diminishing into the ether.

The bug occurs in several situations. In this kernel, the administrator has to opt for an unusual mode for the Ext3 file system of Linux operating system that controls how the data is stored on the hard drive. After that the administrator ought to disconnect the file system where the data is stored. In this situation, all data that should have been saved on hard drive could be lost.

The effect of this bug is different on different flavors of Linux. For example, in Red Hat Linux, it makes its effect when you download updates. After installing the updates, you can’t see and access the data from hard drive. In SUSE Linux, the system suddenly stops responding and you have to hard boot. After rebooting the system, some of the data are missing from the hard drive.

It is a very critical situation for a general computer users or businesses to lose their data. It can cause the disastrous problems and possibly can destroy your business. It becomes very significant to recover the lost data from Linux system to come back in your business. The data recovery in such situation is possible through third party applications known as Linux data recovery software.

Linux Error “Read Only File System”

“Read-only file system”,error message may appear on your screen of Linux based system which has been using dual boot procedure with Windows like OS. Whenever you try to mount the Linux partition, all may set well except the flash of the stated error message at the end of boot. The result of this is that you can’t do any modification or writing to your files and the system may also freeze forcing you to restart the system using hard boot.

This can cause havoc for the users and the most relevant thing which the user thinks about is the data. This may create a thought in the user’s mind that whether he/she would need Linux recovery or not. So for finding out this, you need to know the reason for the same. Well the reason for this error message may be any one like:

• File system corruption

• Incorrect unlock addresses for an LPC flash chip

• Disk failure

In disk failure situation, to prevent the hard disk from further harm, the file system is re-mounted as read only. This is an automatic case. For the detection and solution, you can try out the mentioned things:

• For checking the file system error, you need to unmount the file system first. If it can not be unmounted, being the root file system, then you can force a file system check at the next boot. If any error occurs then you may need to format the disk to rebuild the file system.

• Try using the command ‘fsck’, this may help you as this command checks and repairs most of the problems related to blocks, inode structures, directory structures and so on.

• In case of hard disk failure better contact Linux data recovery services to get your valuable data back.

In situation of formatting the disk, this would create a fresh copy of the file system away from all types of errors but the threat is maintained for your data. Formatting will delete your data and you would need to have a software help particularly called Linux data recovery software while for the disk damage these software are not helpful.

Data recovery Linux is quite an easy task through these software as you need not be too technically advanced with respect to using the software. You will discover that the user interface is interactive. The most effective and reliable Linux recovery software is mandatory as the wrong one can probably damage your data even more.

Library File Errors & Recovery in Linux

Sometimes when you start any application of Linux you can come across error :

“Program name: error in loading shared libraries: lib xxx...so. X: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory.”

After this error message, the application gets terminated unexpectedly and you cannot use it any more.

Problem occurs with the applications which are using shared libraries. This problem occurs if your computer has incompatible libraries to the applications or the applications and system have mismatched file versions of libraries.

Other cause of this problem could be the corruption to system files. The corruption could be the result of virus attack. Due to corruption, the application could not access the required files and fails to start.

Reason for this error message leads to the inaccessibility of your precious data stored on the hard drive and leads to data loss. For saving your business critical data, it is extremely important to solve this issue as soon as possible.

To solve this issue, you can use the following two options:

1. If the problem is due to incompatible application or system libraries, update them.

2. If it does not work, the problem is due to system file corruption and it needs to reinstall the operating system.

Reinstallation of operating system is the ultimate solution of all the system related problems. But it also has a downside which can cause data loss. Reinstallation requires hard drive formatting and formatting wipes all the data stored on the drive.

In such situations, you need for something which can perform data recovery Linux to recover your lost Linux data. The data recovery Linux is feasible with the application of Linux recovery software.

Not Accessible Linux Partitions after Using Mksf.ext3

Mksf.ext3 is Linux command that allow you to make a Linux file system (ext3), generally in a hard disk partition. When implementing the command, you have to mention the device name the file system should reside on. The command creates the file system with ext3 journal. If you run this command on a system attached with multiple hard drives (for example, in RAID), it is recommended to mention the device name carefully. Failing to do so can result into data loss instances, such as inaccessible partitions. However to resolve with such conditions, you generally require restoring lost data from backup or using Linux file recovery applications that could effectively scan your drive and restore lost data at a safe location.

As an instance, you use a RAID 1 system with many drives (for say, /dev/sdb1 and /dev/sdc1) . Then, you use MDADM to create RAID 1 device (for say, /dev/md0 )and apply mkfs.ext3 command on individual drives. After this, when you try to mount the system, the partitions appears to be inaccessible and you cannot access the data furthermore.

MDAM is the utility that could manage, create, monitor and delete MD devices (Linux software RAID)

A Linux system exhibit the similar situation as above, if running mkfs.ext3 command has overwritten the superblock information. This results into inaccessible partitions. Thus, if you require to use this command, it is recommended to run it on RAID device (/dev/md0 in this case) itself and not on other drives.

To resolve such problems, you should perform these methods:

Try running the following command:

e2fsck -f /dev/md0

If problem persists, restore from backup

If no valid and clean data backup is available, you should scan your hard drive and recover your lost data by using Linux recovery tools.

Linux recovery software are powerful data recovery tools that use effective scanning algorithms to recover lost data. These utilities are competent to examine a logically crashed drive and to perform safe recovery.

Linux Error and Recovery-The Partition table on device was unreadable

Partition type code used by a Linux hard drive is 0x83 irrespective of the file system . Whenever you partitioned your hard drive using fdisk or any other utility, it generally consists of two partitions: a root directory partition (denoted as '/') and a swap partition. A partition table is the index table that refers all Linux hard drive partitions. So, if this table gets corrupted, the system couldn't locate and thus access the partitions. In such conditions, you need to use your recent data backup and restore lost information from it. However, if data backup is non-existent, invalid or not updated, Linux data recovery tools can be used to scan the affected hard drive.

Consider a situation, you start your Linux system and it displays the following error message:

"The partition table on device was unreadable"

The partition table is corrupted or damaged. It can get corrupted due to unexpected shutdown, incorrect installation of updates, improper use of terminal commands, erroneous use of disk partitioning utilities, partition resizing and other similar causes.

Carry out the fallowing steps to resolve this issue

You need to ensure that at least one of the partitions has been marked as Active

If you can boot the operating system, you should immediately backup all the important data

Next, you required to delete all the existing partitions and then recreate them. To complete the same, you can use fdisk or any other disk partitioning utility

Repartitioning the hard disk erases all the previously stored data. You need to use your recent data backup to restore it. If the data backup is not present or up to the mark, you need to scan your hard drive using Linux recovery tools to extract the lost data.

Linux Data Recovery applications incorporate advanced scanning procedures to recover and restore the lost data. With self-explanatory interface, these utilities provide easy recovery. In addition, these recovery software are read-only tools and hence they don't perform any write operation. You can use these tools in any logical data loss case.

Reiserfs Partition Corruption & Linux Recovery

ReiserFS is a new and journaled file system used in Linux. When ReiserFS was first come , it provides major capabilities that were not present in existing Linux file system and its later developments grows its popularity. Where things like Tail packing and journaling somehow contributes to avoid linux data recovery issues, they also make it a good file system. So, ReiserFS partitions offer maximum performance in data recovery by offering for fast and safe data access.

When on one side ReiserFS partitions are chosen for secure data storage, they can also become corrupt mostly due to logical reasons. Users report that these partitions can become corrupt in cases like Superblock corruption, fstab file errors, partition table issues, partition resizing errors, incompatible software and virus infection. Unsupported hardware can also cause partition corruption.

Partition may fail to boot or mount. ReiserFS follows B+ tree structure with leaf nodes as the building components. So, general rule to solve partition corruption issues is to use rebuild-tree with reiserfsck command.

Note: Reiserfsck rebuild-tree is not safe. It can cause further damage to ReiserFS structure if finds internal tree unusable, so it is recommended to backup all information before using the command. The backup must be checked. Incomplete or damaged backup will lead to Linux recovery help.

When the computer is booting, fsck starts automatically if system finds errors related to partition . However we need to run fsck rebuild-tree command, if initial repair is unsuccessful. The command rebuilds whole tree from scratch. Though it may damage the file system, if it finds leafs unreadable. In such conditions we can just format the partition and restore the data from an updated backup.

Linux Data Recovery

Linux Recovery is required if user has lost data with no recent backup. Data recovery industry offers a powerful solution to solve such problems. Linux Recovery software can scan and recover lost information in any logical data loss issue. These applications use powerful scanning algorithms which enable them to safely recover all lost data

Error in Linux Bad File Descriptor

In a Linux system, files, blocks, directories, sockets and other items are referred by corresponding file descriptors. If your system have errors like file descriptor is bad, one of possible causes is that file system is corrupt and thus you required restoring from backup. If backup is not valid enough to restore complete information, you need to use advanced data recovery Linux applications.

You might encounter the below error message with your Linux based system:

“Bad file descriptor”

You might receive this error while trying to access a file or while trying to boot the system.

Possible reasons for the ‘Bad file descriptor’ error to occur are:

Linux systems use a special file, called /dev/null (also called the null device). This file removes all the data that is written to it after reporting that the write process has successfully succeeded. You might receive the above error message if /dev/null has been deleted or overwritten. You can infer this cause when file system is reported as read-only at the time of booting through error messages, such as“/dev/null: Read-only filesystem” and “dup2: bad file descriptor”

If you get this error message while trying to access a file, the main causes are file system corruption or damaged disk block(s). In such conditions , you also get write errors.


To resolve deleted or overwritten /dev/null file issues, you need to replace it with the suitable inode. To do so, follow these steps:

Boot the system in single-user mode

Mount the /proc file system as:

mount -o ro /proc

/proc is the dynamically generated file system while boot process

Mount the file system in read-write mode as:

mount -o remount,rw /

Delete the /dev/null file:

m -f /dev/null

Use correct inode to replace it as:

mknod -m 666 /dev/null c 1 3

Remount the file system in read-only mode and restart your system

To correct file system and disk block problem, execute fsck command. You should run the command when the file system is not mounted. If problem persists, reformat the volume and restore from backup. In case of backup problems, you will need to use Linux recovery tools. Such utilities perform data recovery Linux using powerful scanning algorithms and provide graphically rich user interface.

Data Loss Error in Linux While Corruption Occurs

In linux File system occupies the information about the files located on the hard disk. your operating system would not be able to locate the data as then no memory pointer would be there. So for any operating system, including Linux, this is the top priority task that file system should remain free from corruption, else to fall for Linux recovery.

But while dealing with Linux systems, having Ext2 file system being uses, the following error message may push you in a real critical situation:“EXT2-fs error (device 09:00): ext2_check_descriptors: Block bitmap fo
not in group (block 3670099)!
EXT2-fs: group descriptors corrupted”

The Block Group are the components which commutatively create the file system and they create a block group descriptor which is responsible for managing and controlling the file creation and accessing acts.

This data structure possesses the Block Bitmap, Super Block, Inode Bitmap and Inode Table like information, which plays the significant role in Linux file systems.Now as the use of this data structure becomes more, its components drift towards corruption and hence giving rise to file system corruption too.

In this specific error message, Block bitmap has got corrupted, which acts as the map of the entire blocks in the group. If you will run fsck in this case, perhaps the error messages, stating the corruption in superblock may also be found, firming your belief that EXT2 has got corrupted harshly.

If you can locate and then run fsck with the alternate data structures, then you have a chance of Linux data recovery without any pain or else refresh the copy of the file system.
But With the second option, be ready to lose all your data. Fortunately, third party data recovery Linux can help you in this regard.

These are the software which are designed to run a through scanning mechanism over the hard drive to offer the best Linux recovery results.Through their interactive interface, these will help you use the Linux data recovery utilities without any problem. for avoiding any flaw in Linux recovery, this would be better if you make a good research prior.

Linux Data Loss Due to Pmove

Operating system commands are commonly made and designed to ease the user with respect to some tasks. But due to insufficient knowledge and little reckless conduct of user, harsh data loss like problems may arise. Linux also consists of a set of such commands. One of them is pmove.

This is the command which interacts with the physical volumes of the system. pmove moves the allocated physical extents on SourcePhysicalVolume to other physical volumes. The physical volumes can be more than one in number. This works by first creating the temporary logical volume so as to store all the details of the data to be tackled.

Now the data is searched for contiguous nature and for each such found, an entry of new segment at the end of pmove LV is made. This acts like a mirror and the original LV is updated so as to use the new temporary segment.After this the metadata of the volume group is updated and then the mirroring of the first part of the data is done.

If the process moves in sync, the mirror is broken and into the metadata, a checkpoint is written and then the process for the next moves on. After the completion of the process, the temporary volume is removed and metadata is updated.But this whole process comes with a flaw that whenever any interruption is encountered during this, the weird data loss situation arise, forcing you to look for Linux recovery.

So this is always recommended to maintain a backup while performing the operation with this command.Some of the users also mistakenly mix LVM and LVM2 and then fall in undesirable conditions.

However, for all the users facing data loss due to such issues, data recovery industry offers a solution.This data recovery field says that data can be recovered if no overwriting has not been performed and for Linux operating systems, Linux data recovery software is the way.

These software are intended to scan the hard drive with the effective scanning algorithms and retrieve the inaccessible data.Data recovery can be performed through the interactive interface of these software. The process is safe as these Linux data recovery utilities are designed with read-only nature.

Unmounting Linux Partition and Loss

Many of the Linux system users have faced a situation when the particular mounted partition may refuse to unmount, when they try to do so. The error messages which state that the device is busy may pop up, perhaps this is being accessed by other users at that time. But with Linux, you can make use of certain commands to forcedly unmount the partition.

These restrictions are necessary when any other user is accessing it. However, the critical conditions may arise when this is not accepted, so you can make use of these commands. On the other hand, the incorrect use or the mere mistake can again make you feel need of Linux data recovery.

At first, find out which processes are moving with the device/partition, through the command like:# lsof grep '/dev/sda1',Where /dev/sdb1 is the device name.
You will get an output of the command which will show the process using the device. Just stop the process and then try to unmount using # unmount /dev/sda1 command. –l option can also be used with for lazy unmount. This will cleanup all refrences to the file system

Now suppose that it is mounted on /mnt directory, then you can forcefully have the desired process through the following command:

# fuser -km /mnt

Here –k is the file accessing process and –m is the file on a mounted file system or a block device. As has been stated earlier too, these can affect your data, so better be prepared for any such mishappening. Be sure to run the commands if you are sure of, else to fall for data recovery Linux.

The open files may get lost and the programs, which access the files after all has been done, can get error.If you are an unfortunate user to lose data as such, make use of Linux data recovery software as no other option will do.

Linux recovery software scan the drive and recover each bit of the information.You can get Linux recovery for all the files, even system files. The supported file systems include Ext2, Ext3 and ReiserFS file systems.

Data Loss in Linux By SCM

ServiceControl Manager serves the purpose of creating, deleting, starting and stopping the services in Linux supported servers. This acts as the single administration point for Linux managed nodes. The CMS or Central Manager Server looks for the entry of local host and the system name in the /etc/hosts file and some relevant functions.But in few of the cases, the SCM doesn’t respond at all and fails to function.

None of the corresponding error message gets appeared in the log file and hence you don’t have any clue of the problem.But the problem can be detected for cause in the system viz. /var/log/messages log file by typing grep mx messages command. You may face the following problems:

I/O Exception: If the mx.properties file is not readable then the I/O exception may be encountered. So the required permissions of the file are needed to be checked if the file exists and if the file doesn’t exists, then perhaps this has been deleted or moved. So look for it and move to the correct directory and if you can’t then probably it’s deleted and for curing the situation, CMS is needed to be reconfigured.

But this is the weird situation for the data which may need Linux recovery.Distorted URL or Remote Exception: If RMI registry is not properly bounded, then this may occur. So for the fix, the proper functioning of mxagnet daemon is required.Vulnerabilities in mx.properties file: This file is relevant and if not found at the exact location or has been deleted then the corrective measures are needed to be taken.

The reconfiguration of CMS is the threat to the data, which may get lost during the process. In case you don’t have proper backup to restore the lost data, the situation can be devastating but fortunately this has a cure in terms of Linux recovery.Data recovery Linux is workable through Linux data recovery software which have the capability to restore the data after this has been deleted due to any cause.

Offering intuitive user interface, these Linux data recovery products have the power to scan the hard drive systematically.Empowered with the intuitive user interface, this data recovery Linux software doesn’t make any alteration to the data. Live Update, File Filter and File Mask are few of the options which make the working of the software more worth.

Error in Linux “No such file or directory”

Whenever you attempt to install device driver on your Linux system, you may fail to do it. It might be due to inappropriateness of the operating system Kernel with your device driver or device.

To solve this problem, you need to install the latest version of Linux kernel. It may contain ‘forcedeth’ patch, which is able of resolving most of the incompatibility issues. In some cases, after installing the latest version of Kernel, when you reboot the Linux system, you might face the following error message:“fsck.ext2: No such file or directory while trying to open /dev/hda8.

The super block could not be read or does not describe a correct ext2 file system. If the device is valid and it really contains an ext2 file system (and not swap or ufs or something else) then the super block is corrupt, and you might try running e2fsck with an alternate super block: e2fsck -b 8193 fsck failed.”After this error message, neither the system boots nor any file can be accessed.

Grounds of the issues stated in the error message this problem generally occurs due to super block corruption or file system corruption. è Super block and file system are two important data structure of Linux system. Proper functioning of both these is required for ensuring effective working of the system. After corruption, the operating system could not locate the file and thus cannot retrieve it.

Resolution to this problem, you need to install a fresh copy of super block and file system. It is feasible through formatting of the hard drive and re-installation of OS. Though, it will remove the errors but will also erase all the data stored on your hard drive. It is the most awful scenario of data loss and needs Linux data recovery to get it fixed.

Linux recovery software is very easy to use and thus allow you to have simple and fast data recovery Linux. Stellar Phoenix Linux Data Recovery is the most advanced Linux recovery software offered by the data recovery giant- Stellar. This data recovery Linux software works well in all data loss cases and allows Linux data recovery for all sorts of files.

Stellar Phoenix Linux Data Recovery software is powerful enough to carry out efficient scanning of entire hard drive and extract all lost data from it. GUI interface of this Linux recovery software is interactive and thus does not require any sound technical knowledge from users’ side.

Disable Timed Boot Checks in Ext3 & ReiserFS

Ext2, ext3 and ReiserFS file are important file system of Linux. Ext3 and ReiserFS are journaling file systems and ext2 doesn’t support it. Thus for ext2, there is no automatic method that it may recover after power failure. With the help of Linux data recovery tools you can recover ext2 files.

Ext3 and ReiserFS run fsck after they have been mounted a certain number of times, which is restricted to 20-30 mount counts by default. In some cases, user may not wish to continue with the process because of the time it takes. Thus in such situations, the fsck check can be turned off. However the same method is not recommended for ReiserFS. For journaling file systems such as ext3, disabling long boot time checks are tested and are considered safe. On the other hand, disabling it for ReiserFS may harm it. Ext3 and ReiserFS can easily return to the consistent state by replaying journaled transactions. But disabling these time dependent checks of fsck is only age in ext3.

On the other hand to disable the check, we need to make sure that ext3 entry in /etc/fstab possesses positive integer in 6th field. This is necessary for automatic boot time check. We can make use of tune2fs command to disable the check by setting its maximum count to 0 and using it with –c options as:

# tune2fs -c 0 -i 0 /dev/hdXY

After this manual checks are necessary to retain fie system consistency. File system corruption eventually results as data inaccessibility. So, format operations are generally required if we don’t have any bootable media with which we can recover data. The data backup is vital to restore lost information. But, if no valid backup exists Linux recovery application can be used to recover and restore lost information. So if it’s not possible, we can opt for simply limiting the checks through count or time frame. But if user is attempting similar process for ReiserFS, file system can simply get damaged.

Linux recovery software can be used in any case of file system corruption. These graphically rich applications are easily available as data recovery Linux tools. The software can recover data in all logical data loss situation .Stellar Phoenix Linux data recovery software demo version is free in which you can see the preview of your recoverable file.