Bug#697442: better experience with wheezy installer

2013-01-05 Thread Dick Middleton
On 01/05/13 19:02, Brian Potkin wrote:

> Thank you for following up on your experience.

>> The only issue is the font on the console is set to 600x480 and not 1024x768
>> or even 1280x1024.

I usually put this in /etc/default/grub:

GRUB_GFXMODE=1280x1024
GRUB_GFXPAYLOAD_LINUX=1280x1024

It seems to be the neatest way.

> TAB at the boot menu and vga=791 or vga=794 on the kernel command line.

I thought vga was deprecated.

What I do notice is things like systemrescuecd and parted-magic manage to get
the console fonts right.   Debian doesn't seem to try.  I like to have a
really small font at boot time - it gives a chance to read the messages before
they disappear off the top.

>> Before I reinstalled with the net-dist CD I wiped partition table and
>> reinstalled with netboot PXE.  I missed out the keyboard section again.  It
>> all installed OK but didn't boot - no grub.  In rescue system iniramfs
> 
> Where did GRUB install to? Or did you specify where it was to go? I
> generally do the latter.

MBR of the hdd I hope.  Nowhere else for it to go.

>> complained about no kbd.  I went back to keyboard section and it immediately
>> hung-up. I think there's a problem there.
> 
> Not for much longer. Please see bug #697449.

Oh good!  At least I've not gone completely mad :-)

Dick


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Bug#697442: better experience with wheezy installer

2013-01-05 Thread Dick Middleton
Following my rant I zeroed the partition table and started over.

It all went swimmingly well.  Using the net-dist CD.

No problems with xfs or crypto and errors.  Also no finger trouble.

The only issue is the font on the console is set to 600x480 and not 1024x768
or even 1280x1024.

So I don't know what was wrong last night.

Before I reinstalled with the net-dist CD I wiped partition table and
reinstalled with netboot PXE.  I missed out the keyboard section again.  It
all installed OK but didn't boot - no grub.  In rescue system iniramfs
complained about no kbd.  I went back to keyboard section and it immediately
hung-up. I think there's a problem there.

http://d-i.debian.org/daily-images/amd64/daily/netboot/netboot.tar.gz

Thanks

Dick


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Bug#697442: Bad experiences with wheezy installer

2013-01-05 Thread Dick Middleton
Package: installation-reports

Boot method: CD

Image version:
http://cdimage.debian.org/cdimage/wheezy_di_beta4/amd64/iso-cd/debian-wheezy-DI-b4-amd64-netinst.iso

Date: 2013-01-04 22:00 UTC

Machine: HP Proliant Microserver
Processor: amd64 Turion
Memory: 2G
Partitions: there's the problem :-)

Output of lspci -knn (or lspci -nn):

Base System Installation Checklist:
[O] = OK, [E] = Error (please elaborate below), [ ] = didn't try it

Initial boot:   [o]
Detect network card:[o]
Configure network:  [o ]
Detect CD:  [o ]
Load installer modules: [o ]
Detect hard drives: [o ]
Partition hard drives:  [E ]
Install base system:[E ]
Clock/timezone setup:   [ ]
User/password setup:[ ]
Install tasks:  [ ]
Install boot loader:[ ]
Overall install:[ ]

Comments/Problems:  *** rant warning ***

  I'm trying to setup partitions like
1: sda1 /boot ext4 250MB
2: sda2 250G encrypted
 lvm vg00
 lv 10MB root
xfs to be mounted as root file system

It doesn't work.  It seems to do the right thing but cannot create xfs fs.
  It will create an ext4 fs but can't use that either!
  In install phase it thinks all debs are corrupted. Very
  difficult to stop the install phase when it errors.

If you revert to shell you can create luks partitition, create lvm pv, create
vg and lv.  In that lv mkfs.xfs fails - wrong tag size or something.  It seems
to know nothing about the partition. You can create an ext4 fs in the lv,
mount it and read it.  If you mount it on /target/root and select 'install
base system' it insists on returning to partitioner but that fails to use
mounted root fs and kindly umounts it.

It behaves the same with graphical and dialog installer.

It's not a nice tool to use especially the partitioner.  Half the menu goes
off the bottom of the screen, you don't know whether to choose 'done' or
'continue' or 'go back', there's no abort to main process menu and 'go back
shouldn't mean restart.  Really, you need just one menu and it needs to be
consistent and it needs to do as it's told. But most of all, it needs to
handle errors properly.

I gave up - I couldn't figure what was wrong.  I then tried netinst using PXE.
 That hangs (needs power cycle) when you do 'configure keyboard'. Skipped that
phase and it went better. I managed to complete installation but it won't
boot.  Initramfs issues the cryptsetup password prompt and then hangs (needs
power cycle).  I wonder if the problem with kbd config and cannot read
keyboard at boot are related. But I can't puzzle it out.

I've spent hours on it now and I'm giving up.  I've got another system,
identical h/w and config, which I just dist-upgraded to wheezy with just a few
minor problems so I think I'll copy that.

Finally a WIBNI.  It would save a lot of hassle if it was possible to save
initial, network and the partition configs to, say, a usb stick, so one
doesn't have to go round and round that loop when things don't work. I must
have done it all >20 times.

All the best

Dick

BTW if you enter a partition size of 20G it will will give you 8.4G.  You have
to specify 20GB.  It's just a little thing but it is so annoying.


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