[09:09] <borco> hi
[09:09] <borco> i try to customize the ubiquity for a custom installer
[09:10] <borco> is it possible to test something without actually creating an iso?
[09:10] <borco> i want to add some new pages to ubiquity and now i have to create an iso and then test it in VB
[09:11] <borco> it would be nice if its possible to launch the ubiquity just to see it displays my pages correctly...
[09:12] <cjwatson> You could add stuff to the test suite, though it's not necessarily *desperately* easy
[09:13] <cjwatson> If UBIQUITY_TEST_SHOW_ALL_PAGES is set to something non-empty in the environment, the test suite will run through all pages showing each for a few seconds
[09:13] <borco> so there's no magic like chrooting and then "ubiquity --dry-run" :-)
[09:13] <cjwatson> Well, it won't install anything until it gets past partitioning, but your page might be after that
[09:13] <cjwatson> And in that case no
[09:14] <borco> yep, my page is later in the process :(
[09:14] <borco> ok. i'll stick with the VM.
[09:14] <borco> thanx
[09:15] <soren> Are values from preseed files supposed to take precedence over kernel parameters?
[09:15] <borco> it would be nice to be possible to mock somehow the installation process
[09:15] <borco> i need to configure a custom package
[09:15] <borco> a local server
[09:15] <borco> some users, ports, etc
[09:16] <borco> that kind of things
[09:16] <borco> it probably doesn't matter
[09:16] <borco> i mean - the order shouldn't matter
[09:18] <soren> Specifically, I just had a problem with partman getting stuck waiting for me to confirm the partitioning. A kernel parameter said to use /dev/sda (partman-auto/disk=/dev/sda) while the preseed said to use /dev/sdc. There was no /dev/sdc, so I'm assuming it got stuck because it took the answer from the preseed rather than from the cmdline.
[09:19] <soren> ...which may be entirely intentional. When the preseed is imported, does it just get to override whatever debconf had cached (thus overwriting what was passed on the cmdline)?
[09:21] <cjwatson> soren: file/url preseeds are processed after the kernel command line and therefore override it
[09:22]  * Daviey ponders what soren is working on.
[09:23] <soren> Daviey: cobbler doesn't have a field for "install disk" in its data model, so I had to move it to the kernel commandline
[09:23] <soren> cjwatson: Makes sense. Thanks.
[09:24] <soren> Daviey: ...because the preseed templating can only grab stuff from cobbler internal data model, afaict.
[09:24] <soren> Daviey: ...but I can set a per-system kernel command option.
[09:25] <Daviey> soren: ah ok.. i think it can be done per-system.. but sure, that approach seems viable.
[09:25] <soren> Daviey: Sure, i can set a per-system preseed, but that kind of defeats the purpose of the templating coolness.
[09:27] <cjwatson> you can always use preseed/early_command, check whether stuff is already preseeded, and use debconf-set conditionally
[09:27] <cjwatson> (or debconf-set-selections)
[09:27] <cjwatson> you can possibly even write out a preseed/include or something dynamically, I forget
[09:30] <soren> cjwatson: I'll keep that in mind. Thanks.
[10:59] <jodh> I'm seeing essentially bug 527848 on the latest desktop CD.
[10:59] <ubot2> Launchpad bug 527848 in ubiquity "[Lucid] ubi-partman failed with exit code 141 during manual partitioning" [Undecided,Fix released] https://launchpad.net/bugs/527848
[11:01] <jodh> message appears before manual partitioning though - when I click continue on the "Preparing to install Ubuntu" screen.
[12:43] <yfaykya> This the right place to ask about raid/preseed questions?