[19:56] <mathiaz> Hi. In the minimal iso install, is it possible to put a preseed file on the minimal iso ?
[20:06] <cjwatson> mathiaz: yes, but it's fiddly; wouldn't it be easier to fetch it from the network?
[20:06] <cjwatson> BTW, "minimal iso" isn't a good description. Do you mean "netboot mini.iso"?
[20:07] <mathiaz> cjwatson: yes - I refered to netboot.
[20:07] <mathiaz> cjwatson: it's another option. I was just wondering if that could be possible.
[20:07] <cjwatson> you can do it and then use file=/cdrom/path/to/file, sure
[20:07] <mathiaz> cjwatson: I'm already using fuseiso to setup a preseed on the ubuntu-server cd for automatic installation.
[20:07] <cjwatson> just if you're netbooting it's normally less hassle just to put it on the network and use url=
[20:08] <cjwatson> (that's what I do)
[20:08] <mathiaz> cjwatson: I was wondering I could do the same with the netboot min.iso
[20:08] <cjwatson> oh, let me just double-check that file-preseed is available there
[20:09] <cjwatson> mathiaz: ah, no, sorry, you can't do it in the usual way. The netboot installation method doesn't actually mount the CD from Linux at any point
[20:10] <cjwatson> mathiaz: you can, however, unpack the initrd and add /preseed.cfg to it, then repack it
[20:10] <mathiaz> cjwatson: ok. Thanks.
[20:11] <cjwatson> '(cd /path/to/unpacked/initrd && find . | cpio --quiet -o -H newc) | gzip -9 > /path/to/new/initrd.gz' does the repacking
[20:11] <cjwatson> any file called /preseed.cfg in the initrd will automatically be read as a preseed file
[20:11] <mathiaz> cjwatson: It may be interesting to add cd mounting in the netboot mini.iso also.
[20:12] <cjwatson> not a good idea IMO, netboot is used by people who have trouble mounting CDs
[20:12] <cjwatson> (among others)
[20:12] <cjwatson> I don't want to complicate the netboot path for the very rare cases where mounting the CD is useful
[20:12] <mathiaz> cjwatson: good point. But they're able to boot from their cd drive
[20:13] <cjwatson> that's not the same as Linux being able to read from it, though
[20:13] <cjwatson> I have a lot of bugs that say that
[20:13] <mathiaz> cjwatson: ok.
[20:13] <mathiaz> cjwatson: so if you fetch the seed from the network, you need to specify on the command line every time ?
[20:14] <mathiaz> cjwatson: or do you modify the isolinux.cfg on the mini.iso so that it fetches from the preseed from the network ?
[20:15] <cjwatson> the former for testing, the latter in production
[20:16] <cjwatson> the only reasons anyone uses netboot mini.iso seriously anyway are (a) testing (b) Linux can't cope with their CD drive ;-)