LVM returns locking error and all file-systems are read only

Solution Verified - Updated -

Environment

Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6

Issue

  • LVM commands return locking error immediately after boot up
# vgdisplay
  File-based locking initialisation failed.
  • mount command reports that /etc/mtab is not writable
# mount
mount: warning: /etc/mtab is not writable (e.g. read-only filesystem).
       It's possible that information reported by mount(8) is not
       up to date.  For actual information about your system mount points
       check the /proc/mounts file
  • Hostname appears to be set to (none) on the prompt
(none) Login: root
Password:
[root@(none) ~]#

Resolution

Copy a fresh /etc/rc.d/rc.sysinit file from a working machine to this machine

Root Cause

  • The /etc/rc.d/rc.sysinit file is damaged and needs to be replaced
  • Without this file, no file-systems are mounted read-write
  • Without this file, LVM locking will fail

Diagnostic Steps

  • Check to see if your filesystems are read only
# touch /filesystem_mountpoint/test
touch: cannot touch `test': Read-only file system
  • Check to see if rc.sysinit exists and has data
# ls -l /etc/rc.d/rc.sysinit 
-rwxr-xr-x. 1 root root 0 Jan  9 08:38 /etc/rc.d/rc.sysinit
# cat /etc/rc.d/rc.sysinit
#

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