Bug 100902

Summary:	kickstart mode for package selection only
Product:	[Retired] Red Hat Linux Beta	Reporter:	Jay Berkenbilt <ejb>
Component:	anaconda	Assignee:	Michael Fulbright <msf>
Status:	CLOSED DEFERRED	QA Contact:	Mike McLean <mikem>
Severity:	medium	Docs Contact:
Priority:	medium
Version:	beta1	Keywords:	FutureFeature
Target Milestone:	---
Target Release:	---
Hardware:	i386
OS:	Linux
Whiteboard:
Fixed In Version:		Doc Type:	Enhancement
Doc Text:		Story Points:	---
Clone Of:		Environment:
Last Closed:	2003-07-28 15:58:56 UTC	Type:	---
Regression:	---	Mount Type:	---
Documentation:	---	CRM:
Verified Versions:		Category:	---
oVirt Team:	---	RHEL 7.3 requirements from Atomic Host:
Cloudforms Team:	---	Target Upstream Version:
Embargoed:

Description Jay Berkenbilt 2003-07-26 22:17:34 UTC

I wish there were a way in Kickstart to specify only package selection (along
with "upgrade" or "install" probably) and to have everything else be interactive
as if there were no kickstart configuration file.  This is almost achieved by
removing everything but "install" and "%packages" from the ks.cfg file, but
there are a few exceptions.  For example, if there are no "network" statements
in the ks.cfg file, the install assumes that there are no network interfaces
instead of bringing the user to the screen that allows configuration of detected
network interfaces.

I never really considered this to be much of an issue before, but since the
ability to select individual packages has now disappeared, this has become a
fairly significant issue for me.  For example, my login shell is zsh, and I use
sawfish as my window manager.  (I used sawfish since before it was RedHat's
default and continue to use it now that it is no longer RedHat's default.)  I
also use pcre-devel a lot in my work.  Without either the package selection
option or this request, it is no longer possible for me to have a machine that I
can log into without having to do a lot of manual configuration.  This is not
really a big deal, but I make this suggestion just in case it ends up being easy
to implement.

An executive summary, I suppose, would be that the ks.cfg file should
distinguish between having none of something and selecting something interactively.

Comment 1 Jeremy Katz 2003-07-27 03:13:17 UTC

Unfortunately, doing this would break behavior for legacy kickstart configs :/

Deferring until the day I completely change the ks.cfg syntax (but will keep it
in mind as directives get changed in incompatible ways for other reasons)

Comment 2 Jay Berkenbilt 2003-07-27 15:16:10 UTC

Deferring seems quite appropriate, but I'd point out that it could be done in a
backward-compatible fashion by having a new syntax for interactive rather than
interpreting missing this way, for example: network interactive....

Comment 3 Jay Berkenbilt 2003-07-27 15:17:02 UTC

Reopening so I know this is seen.  Actually, I hit commit by mistake.  Anyway,
reclose when you've seen my additional comment.....

Comment 4 Jeremy Katz 2003-07-28 15:58:56 UTC

Which then adds more crufty junk, which I'd rather avoid (kickstart is already
fragile enough internally).