How to predict drive number change for 7.3->8.1 upgrade?

[Marat N.Afanasyev]

Michael Sperber wrote:
> "Marat N.Afanasyev"<amarat at ksu.ru>  writes:
>
>> you may try the following commands:
>>
>> sysctl kern.geom.debugflags=16
>>
>> foreach fs (your-filesystems)
>> glabel label your-$fs-label your-$fs-device
>> end
>>
>> echo geom_label_load="YES">>  /boot/loader.conf
>> reboot
>>
>> and see if the labels appear in /dev/label
>
> Is this safe to do?  The man page for glabel seems to imply that glabel
> should be used before newfs, and tunefs after newfs.
>
probably safe, but I didn't try this. there's another option: you may 
consider to create gmirror device that allows you to shoot two ducks 
with one arrow: 1) make your system fail-safe 2) all your devices will 
be in form /dev/mirror/devXsYl regardless of underlying adX-s. to do 
this all you need is a second hard drive large enough to serve as copy 
of your boot drive

-- 
SY, Marat