Ubuntu On a ZFS Root File System for Ubuntu 15.04

Start Update 03.18.15:
This is untested but I suspect if you are upgrading the kernel to 3.19.0 and you have issues you may need to change to the daily Vivid ppa. In my initial post I used stable and Utopic since Vivid was very new.
End Update 03.18.15:

This is what I did to make an Ubuntu 15.04 virtualbox guest (works for Ubuntu 14.10 also) boot with the ZFS file system.

Ubuntu On a ZFS Root File System for Ubuntu 14.04

Booting Ubuntu on a ZFS Root File System

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS
64-bit Ubuntu Live CD. (Not the alternate or 32-bit installer)
AMD64 or EM64T compatible computer. (ie: x86-64)
15GB disk, 2GB memory minimum, Virtualbox
Create new VM. I use bridged networking in case I want to use ssh during the setup.
Start the Ubuntu LiveCD and open a terminal at the desktop. I used the 15.04 64-bit alpha CD.
Control-F1 to first text terminal.

1. Setup repo.

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$ sudo -i
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# /etc/init.d/lightdm stop
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# apt-add-repository --yes ppa:zfs-native/stable

** Change /etc/apt/sources.list.d/… down to trusty. Or utopic possibly. I did not test.

2. Install zfs.

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# apt-get update
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# apt-get install debootstrap ubuntu-zfs
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# dmesg | grep ZFS:
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[ 3900.114234] ZFS: Loaded module v0.6.3-4~trusty, ZFS pool version 5000, ZFS filesystem version 5

** takes a long time to compile initial module for 3.16.0-28-generic

3. Install ssh.

Using a ssh terminal makes it easier to copy and paste for both command execution and documentation. However with this bare bones environment at this point openssh might not install very clean. I played with it a little to get at least sshd to run.

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# apt-get install ssh
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# /etc/init.d/ssh start

** check with ps if ssh process is running
** edit sshd_config and allow root login
** set root passwd

4. Setup disk partitions.

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# fdisk -l
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Disk /dev/loop0: 1 GiB, 1103351808 bytes, 2154984 sectors
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Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
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Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
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I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
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Disk /dev/sda: 15 GiB, 16106127360 bytes, 31457280 sectors
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Units: sectors of 1 * 512 = 512 bytes
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Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
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I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes
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Disklabel type: dos
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Disk identifier: 0xc2c7def9
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Device Boot Start End Sectors Size Id Type
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/dev/sda1 2048 411647 409600 200M be Solaris boot
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/dev/sda2 411648 31457279 31045632 14.8G bf Solaris

5. Format partitions.

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# mke2fs -m 0 -L /boot/grub -j /dev/disk/by-id/ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VBf3c0d5ba-e6881c52-part1
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# zpool create -o ashift=9 rpool /dev/disk/by-id/ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VBf3c0d5ba-e6881c52-part2

6. ZFS Setup and Mountpoints.

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# zpool create -o ashift=9 rpool /dev/disk/by-id/ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VBf3c0d5ba-e6881c52-part2
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# zfs create rpool/ROOT
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# zfs create rpool/ROOT/ubuntu-1
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# zfs umount -a
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# zfs set mountpoint=/ rpool/ROOT/ubuntu-1
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# zpool set bootfs=rpool/ROOT/ubuntu-1 rpool
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# zpool export rpool
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# zpool import -d /dev/disk/by-id -R /mnt rpool
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# mkdir -p /mnt/boot/grub
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# mount /dev/disk/by-id/ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VBf3c0d5ba-e6881c52-part1 /mnt/boot/grub

7. Install Ubuntu 15.04 on /mnt

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# debootstrap vivid /mnt
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I: Retrieving Release
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...
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I: Base system installed successfully.
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# cp /etc/hostname /mnt/etc/
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# cp /etc/hosts /mnt/etc/
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# vi /mnt/etc/fstab
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# cat /mnt/etc/fstab
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/dev/disk/by-id/ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VBf3c0d5ba-e6881c52-part1 /boot/grub auto defaults 0 1
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# cat /mnt/etc/network/interfaces
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# interfaces(5) file used by ifup(8) and ifdown(8)
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# Include files from /etc/network/interfaces.d:
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source-directory /etc/network/interfaces.d
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auto lo
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iface lo inet loopback
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auto eth0
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iface eth0 inet dhcp

8. Setup chroot to update and install ubuntu-minimal

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# mount --bind /dev /mnt/dev
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# mount --bind /proc /mnt/proc
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# mount --bind /sys /mnt/sys
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# chroot /mnt /bin/bash --login
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# locale-gen en_US.UTF-8
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# apt-get update
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# apt-get install ubuntu-minimal software-properties-common

9. Setup ZOL repo

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# apt-add-repository --yes ppa:zfs-native/stable

** leave grub repo off for now.

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# cat /etc/apt/sources.list.d/zfs-native-ubuntu-stable-vivid.list
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deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/zfs-native/stable/ubuntu trusty main
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# deb-src http://ppa.launchpad.net/zfs-native/stable/ubuntu vivid main
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# apt-get update
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# apt-get install --no-install-recommends linux-image-generic linux-headers-generic
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# apt-get install ubuntu-zfs

** skipped grub stuff for this pass

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# apt-get install zfs-initramfs
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# apt-get dist-upgrade

10. Make sure root has access

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# passwd root

11. Test grub

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# grub-probe /
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bash: grub-probe: command not found

12. Use older patched grub from ZOL project

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# apt-add-repository --yes ppa:zfs-native/grub
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gpg: keyring `/tmp/tmp5urr4u7g/secring.gpg' created
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gpg: keyring `/tmp/tmp5urr4u7g/pubring.gpg' created
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gpg: requesting key F6B0FC61 from hkp server keyserver.ubuntu.com
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gpg: /tmp/tmp5urr4u7g/trustdb.gpg: trustdb created
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gpg: key F6B0FC61: public key "Launchpad PPA for Native ZFS for Linux" imported
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gpg: Total number processed: 1
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gpg: imported: 1 (RSA: 1)
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OK
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# cat /etc/apt/sources.list.d/zfs-native-ubuntu-grub-vivid.list
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deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/zfs-native/grub/ubuntu raring main
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# apt-get install grub2-common grub-pc
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Installation finished. No error reported.
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/usr/sbin/grub-probe: error: failed to get canonical path of `/dev/ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VBf3c0d5ba-e6881c52-part2'.

** As you can see grub has issues with dev path.

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# ln -s /dev/disk/by-id/ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VBf3c0d5ba-e6881c52-part2 /dev/ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VBf3c0d5ba-e6881c52-part2
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# apt-get install grub2-common grub-pc
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# grub-probe /
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zfs
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# ls /boot/grub/i386-pc/zfs*
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/boot/grub/i386-pc/zfscrypt.mod /boot/grub/i386-pc/zfsinfo.mod /boot/grub/i386-pc/zfs.mod

** Note at the end I show a udev rule that can help work around this path issue.

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# update-initramfs -c -k all
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# grep "boot=zfs" /boot/grub/grub.cfg
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linux /ROOT/ubuntu-1@/boot/vmlinuz-3.16.0-28-generic root=ZFS=rpool/ROOT/ubuntu-1 ro boot=zfs quiet splash $vt_handoff
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# grep "boot=zfs" /etc/default/grub
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GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX_DEFAULT="quiet splash boot=zfs"
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# update-grub
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Generating grub configuration file ...
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Warning: Setting GRUB_TIMEOUT to a non-zero value when GRUB_HIDDEN_TIMEOUT is set is no longer supported.
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Found linux image: /boot/vmlinuz-3.16.0-28-generic
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Found initrd image: /boot/initrd.img-3.16.0-28-generic
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done
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# grub-install $(readlink -f /dev/disk/by-id/ata-VBOX_HARDDISK_VBf3c0d5ba-e6881c52)
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Installing for i386-pc platform.
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Installation finished. No error reported.
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# exit
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logout

13. unmount chroot and shutdown

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# umount /mnt/boot/grub
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# umount /mnt/dev
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# umount /mnt/proc
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# umount /mnt/sys
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# zfs umount -a
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# zpool export rpool
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# init 0

14. Cleanup and finish
** Create snapshot
** bootup
** install ssh and configure root to login in sshd_config, restart ssh

15. udev rule for grub bug

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# cat /etc/udev/rules.d/70-zfs-grub-fix.rules
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ENV{DEVTYPE}=="partition", IMPORT{parent}="ID_*", ENV{ID_FS_TYPE}=="zfs_member", SYMLINK+="$env{ID_BUS}-$env{ID_SERIAL} $env{ID_BUS}-$env{ID_SERIAL}-part%n"
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# /etc/init.d/udev restart

16. install desktop software

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# apt-get install ubuntu-desktop