Ext3 users - Feb 2009 - ext2_check_mount_point: No such file ...

I am trying to shrink an ext3 filesystem mounted on top of software
RAID.  The ultimate goal is to shrink the RAID to make room for a new
installation that will use LVM over RAID.  I get the error in the
subject, and wonder what I need to do to avoid it.  Details follow:

Shrinking needs to be done offline, right?

After being unable to get Knoppix started I used the break=bottom to
stop the boot process while I was still in the initrd.  When I
dismounted the filesystem I discovered my initrd didn't have the ext3
utilities.  I remount the file system and copied /sbin, /lib, and /etc
onto my ramdisk.  Without /etc fsck complained about being unable to
find fstab; afterwords, it ran.

However, both fsck and resize2fs complained
ext2_check_mount_point: No such file or directory while determining
whether /dev/md1 is mounted.

Adding the -f flag did not help.

There is no /etc/mtab file.

I realize this is all pretty dodgy, but is there a way I can deal with
this problem?  What file or directory is it looking for?
-- 
Ross Boylan                                      wk:  (415) 514-8146
185 Berry St #5700                               ross at biostat.ucsf.edu
Dept of Epidemiology and Biostatistics           fax: (415) 514-8150
University of California, San Francisco
San Francisco, CA 94107-1739                     hm:  (415) 550-1062

Ross Boylan wrote:
> I am trying to shrink an ext3 filesystem mounted on top of software
> RAID.  The ultimate goal is to shrink the RAID to make room for a new
> installation that will use LVM over RAID.  I get the error in the
> subject, and wonder what I need to do to avoid it.  Details follow:
> 
> Shrinking needs to be done offline, right?
> 
> After being unable to get Knoppix started I used the break=bottom to
> stop the boot process while I was still in the initrd.  When I
> dismounted the filesystem I discovered my initrd didn't have the ext3
> utilities.  I remount the file system and copied /sbin, /lib, and /etc
> onto my ramdisk.  Without /etc fsck complained about being unable to
> find fstab; afterwords, it ran.
> 
> However, both fsck and resize2fs complained
> ext2_check_mount_point: No such file or directory while determining
> whether /dev/md1 is mounted.
> 
> Adding the -f flag did not help.
> 
> There is no /etc/mtab file.
> 
> I realize this is all pretty dodgy, but is there a way I can deal with
> this problem?  What file or directory is it looking for?
try "cp /proc/mounts to /etc/mtab" perhaps.  Maybe the tools should
check both (if they don't already, I haven't actually checked yet)  :)

-eric