Automated PXE-installations -- problems with timezone and keyboard layout
Hi!
I'm trying to automate the installation of Debian using Debian-installer
booted from network via PXE. PXE-booting and preseeding d-i seems to
work and unattended, fully automated installation of Debian seems to be
finally possible.
I however have a few problems with configuring proper keyboard- and
timezone-settings automatically.
For some reason the number of kernel parameters (in pxelinux.cfg/default
on the TFTP-server) is limited to 8, and for some even more odd reason
d-i wants those parameters from kernel. BUT, PXE-stuff etc. eat all the
available kernel parameter space and I cannot pass
"countrychooser/shortlist=FI console-keymaps-at/keymap=fi" to the kernel
which means that keyboard layout and timezone are wrong after
installation.
Because it seems that I cannot configure the timezone and keyboard
layout through kernel parameters or d-i's preseed.cfg, I guess I must do
it with a script that is run after the installation.
I have installed a system and then debconf-get-selections'ed everything
related to timezone or keyboard to a file that I'm trying to read in a
script located in d-i's base-config/late_command (debconf-set-selections
< correct_settings.txt && dpkg-reconfigure -pcritical base-config &&
dpkg-reconfigure -pcritical console-data).
This doesn't work, both keyboard layout and timezone are wrong after the
installation. BUT: if I run "dpkg-reconfigure -pcritical console-data"
after the installation, the keyboard layout gets fixed. Why doesn't it
work in base-config's late-script?
Also I haven't found a solution to fixing timezone with a script; should
I just do "echo 'Europe/Helsinki' > /etc/timezone" or is there a
debconf-variable for timezone, and what package should be
dpkg-reconfigured after setting it?
Help appreciated!
BR,
Mika
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