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Accepted
Luca Mazzanti
Asked: 2019-11-18 00:30:08 +0800 CST

Raspberry Pi 4 Ubuntu 19.10 cannot enable cgroup memory at boostrap

  • 772

On a Raspberry Pi 4, on a vanilla downloaded 19.10 image of Ubuntu 19 arm64, I failed trying to enable cgroup memory, needed for Kubernetes.

I created (because I don't understand well the real one, I think the 4th)

  • /boot/cmdline.txt
  • /boot/firmware/cmdline.txt
  • /boot/firmware/btcmd.txt (modified)
  • /boot/firmware/usercfg.txt (modified)

to append:

cgroup_enable=cpuset cgroup_enable=memory cgroup_memory=1

but in vain.

If I check cat /proc/cgroups the cgroup memory is disabled.

If I check cat /proc/cmdline there isn't.

How can I fix that?

raspberrypi arm64 19.10

10 Answers

  1. Following @kremerol solution, I was able to get my RPI 4 with Ubuntu 20.04 working.

    1. Run sudo nano /boot/firmware/cmdline.txt

    2. Edit the default file to look like below.

       net.ifnames=0 dwc_otg.lpm_enable=0 console=serial0,115200 cgroup_enable=cpuset cgroup_enable=memory cgroup_memory=1 console=tty1 root=LABEL=writable rootfstype=ext4 elevator=deadline rootwait fixrtc

      NOTE: These are the 3 settings to add:

      • cgroup_enable=cpuset
      • cgroup_enable=memory
      • cgroup_memory=1

    3. Save the file and reboot and the node status will change to ready.

    4. You can check the status by running sudo microk8s.kubectl get nodes

    • 17
  2. Best Answer

    I've just had this exact problem after picking up a new rpi4 on Ubuntu 19.10. After a quick poke...

    The /boot/firmware/README file appears to detail the updated boot process. The second step in the process is to load /boot/firmware/config.txt which specifies /boot/firmware/nobtcmd.txt as the current cmdline.

    So modify /boot/firmware/nobtcmd.txt and append: cgroup_enable=cpuset cgroup_enable=memory cgroup_memory=1. Reboot and cat /proc/cmdline

    I wouldn't be surprised if some magic (maybe enabling BT?) changes the cmdline to /boot/firmware/btcmd.txt so it might be worth adding the change to that file too.

    • 13

  3. On Raspbian I had to add the following in /boot/cmdline.txt

    cgroup_enable=cpuset cgroup_memory=1 cgroup_enable=memory

    You must add this to the end of the existing line; if you add it at the bottom of file in a new line it doesn't work.

    • 4

  4. On my Raspberry Pi 4 (ubuntu-server-20.10/arm64) I had to append the following lines to /boot/firmware/cmdline.txt:

    cgroup_enable=memory cgroup_memory=1

    • 1

  5. Maybe you're using an external USB disk with a microsd as boot device? In that case, the change must be done in the microsd partition and not in the USB.

    • 0

  6. Reading in the boot partition the config.txt the settings of cmdline point to a file nobtcmd.txt, which is exactly what I can see at runtime from /proc/cmdline. Changed inside that and now it works properly.

    • 0

  7. Before I tried these solutions which involve editing /boot/firmware/cmdline.txt or any other mentioned file, I tried first with installing cgroup-lite via apt-get. This seemed to do the trick as well.

    Docker: Version Groovy Gorilla 20.10.6 Ubuntu version 20.10 Pi 4: 8GB ARM64

    • 0

  8. Here is a one-liner to enable cgroup support in Raspberry Pi OS. Remember, you must reboot after running this command.

    sudo sed -i '$ s/$/ cgroup_enable=cpuset cgroup_memory=1 cgroup_enable=memory/' /boot/cmdline.txt
    • 0

  9. If you load up the SD card on a Windows machine, there are a few drives mounted (don't format them again when windows offers to).

    In the drive labelled ubuntu-seed, not ubuntu-boot you will find the cmdline.txt file to append cgroup_enable=cpuset cgroup_memory=1 cgroup_enable=memory

    • 0

  10. If you need to automate it

    sed -e '1s/$/ cgroup_enable=cpuset cgroup_memory=1 cgroup_enable=memory/' -i /boot/cmdline.txt

    This appends cgroup_enable=cpuset cgroup_memory=1 cgroup_enable=memory at the end of the first line of /boot/cmdline.txt

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