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Date: Fri, 19 Nov 2004 12:11:59 -0500
From: Duane Winner <duanewinner@att.net>
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Subject: GEOM: create disk during runtime? (security run output)
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Hello,

I'm hoping somebody on this list can shed some light on this.

My boss sent me a copy of his daily cron security run output, which 
contained this:

    localhost.local kernel log messages:
      GEOM: create disk ad0 dp=0xc6b77d60
      GEOM: create disk cd0 dp=0xc69a8600


We're all running FreeBSD 5.2.1-p12. I've seen the "GEOM: create disk" 
messages plenty of times on boot and in my dmesg's, but never really 
paid much attention to them, since I don't really understand how GEOM 
works or how to interpret these kinds of messages.

But I don't recall ever seeing it in a security run cronjob.

My first question is "why is this happening during a security run 
cronjob? If this system is already booted and running, why is GEOM 
creating disks?"

My second question is "is this something bad? Is it a red flag?"

The only reasonable (and non-threatening) answer I could come up with is 
maybe it's because the machine went into or came out of suspend mode 
near the time the cronjob ran. (APM)

The bottom line is I don't really know anything about GEOM, and would 
like to know what this means so preventative action can be taken if 
necessary.

Thanks for any info,

Duane