Bug#645765: please consider allowing to load installer components from a different mirror
Package: debian-installer
Severity: wishlist
Tags: d-i
Hi,
when entities deploy Debian via network install, point releases can
pose challenges. For example, a site I consult for has a mirror which
is rsynced daily, but the installation server is not updated
automatically with the latest initrd and kernel files.
After the last point release[1], installation was broken since the
kernel from 6.0.2 wasn't willing to load the kernel modules loaded
from the 6.0.3 mirror. Disk not found, game over.
To get around this, I think that it would be desireable to be able to
load installer components from a different source than the repository
that the actual system that is being installed. That way, one would be
able to dump the contents of a (probably older) netinstall CD to a web
server, and point the installer to that web server while still
doing the actual install from ftp.de.d.o.
This could be accomplished, for example, with the following algorithm:
(1) Run through the normal mirror selection process. Take answer as
d-i mirror/installer/hostname
(2) Check whether d-i mirror/installer/hostname is a full mirror or a
installation image only
(2a) if full mirror, set d-i mirror/http/hostname to d-i
mirror/installer/hostname's value
(3) Expert: Ask "Use the same mirror to for the installation?"
(3a) if no, ask for d-i mirror/http/hostname
(4) load installer components from d-i mirror/installer/hostname
(5) install actual system from d-i mirror/http/hostname
both mirror/installer/hostname and mirror/http/hostname should be
preseedable. Same algorithm for other parameters such as
mirror/*/directory et al.
That way, one could make sure to always have an installer repository
consistent with the kernel/initrd pair offered by the PXE server, and
keep the triple kernel/initrd/repository stable and verified, while
still installing the current point release from the actual mirror.
Please consider adding this functionality to the installer; it would
have saved us (and probably other installations) a lot of grief.
Currently, we have a safety latch active which stops all archive
updates once
/debian/dists/*/main/debian-installer/*/Packages.gz
changes from the file we're familiar with. This is kind of an ugly
workaround, and a nicer solution would be to have the installer load
its components from a dedicated URL that could be forced into sync.
Greetings
Marc
[1] I don't have the slightest idea why this issue has only surfaced
after 6.0.3
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