Bug 2383279

Summary: Compress the initrd with zstd by default
Product: [Fedora] Fedora Reporter: Aoife Moloney <amoloney>
Component: Changes TrackingAssignee: Hristo Marinov <hricky>
Status: CLOSED CURRENTRELEASE QA Contact:
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Version: rawhideCC: h.reindl, teohhanhui, travier
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Last Closed: 2025-12-16 14:01:31 UTC Type: ---
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Description Aoife Moloney 2025-07-24 18:36:16 UTC
This is a tracking bug for Change: Compress the initrd with zstd by default
For more details, see: https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/InitrdZstdDefault

Use zstd to compress the initrd for all Fedora variants by default when built with dracut.

If you encounter a bug related to this Change, please do not comment here. Instead create a new bug and set it to block this bug.

Comment 1 Aoife Moloney 2025-08-19 21:12:23 UTC
Dear change owner, this is a reminder that your change is required to be 100% code complete by August 26, which is the start of beta freeze. Please provide a status update on your change in the Incomplete Changes Report if you are not able to move your change to 'ON_QA' before this date. If you need to defer your change to the next Fedora release, please let me know and I will reassign this bug and the change page. Thank you kindly.

Comment 2 Aoife Moloney 2025-08-19 22:24:17 UTC
Hi @hricky and @travier, apologies - this bug autoassigned to me. Can you provide a status update on this change please? If its done, please update the status to ON_QA or CLOSED. Changes need to be 100% complete before we enter Beta freeze on August 26. Let me know if you need to defer to F44 and I can make those changes too. Thanks!

Comment 3 Hristo Marinov 2025-08-20 14:26:16 UTC
We opened a PR to implement the change:
https://src.fedoraproject.org/rpms/dracut/pull-request/85

Then we test as many deliverables as possible with the RPMs from the x86_64 build of the PR. All images built with these RPMs that we tested booted successfully, and the initramfs image was compressed using Zstandard.

We await a review of the PR.

Comment 4 Hristo Marinov 2025-08-25 16:01:01 UTC
https://src.fedoraproject.org/rpms/dracut/pull-request/85 was merged.

Comment 5 Hristo Marinov 2025-08-28 11:34:22 UTC
The following Fedora 43 nightly compose artifacts we tested include `dracut-107-6.fc43.x86_64`, and the initramfs is compressed using Zstandard.

- Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop – `Fedora-KDE-Desktop-Live-43-20250828.n.0.x86_64.iso`, bare metal machine.
- Fedora Server – `Fedora-Server-dvd-x86_64-43-20250828.n.0.iso`, bare metal machine.
- Fedora IoT – `quay.io/fedora/fedora-iot:43-x86_64 (quay.io/fedora/fedora-iot@sha256:a5413e0d47b442ebd1c72ff7d4a172aa558f72151ae0013c1f4e915c7af0c325)`, bootable container, virtual machine.
- Fedora Cloud – `Fedora-Cloud-Base-Generic-43-20250828.n.0.x86_64.qcow2`, virtual machine.
- Fedora Silverblue – `quay.io/fedora-ostree-desktops/silverblue:43.20250828.0-x86_64`, bootable container, bare metal machine.
- Fedora Kinoite – `Fedora-Kinoite-ostree-x86_64-43-20250828.n.0.iso`, classic OSTree, bare metal machine.

Note that the initramfs on Fedora Workstation 42 and Fedora CoreOS 42 is compressed using Zstandard.

The change is now ready in all Fedora 43 nightly compose artifacts.

Comment 6 Hristo Marinov 2025-08-29 17:43:11 UTC
We have performed checks to confirm that the `zstd` package is included in the nightly compose artifacts.

Fedora Workstation 42 bare metal installation:
```
hricky@fedora-worstation:~$ rpm --query --whatrequires pigz
no package requires pigz
hricky@fedora-worstation:~$ rpm --query --whatrecommends pigz
dracut-107-2.fc42.x86_64
hricky@fedora-worstation:~$ rpm --query pigz
pigz-2.8-6.fc42.x86_64
hricky@fedora-worstation:~$ rpm --query --whatrecommends zstd
no package recommends zstd
hricky@fedora-worstation:~$ rpm --query --whatrequires zstd
libvirt-daemon-driver-qemu-11.0.0-3.fc42.x86_64
hricky@fedora-worstation:~$ rpm --query --whatrequires libvirt-daemon-driver-qemu
libvirt-daemon-kvm-11.0.0-3.fc42.x86_64
hricky@fedora-worstation:~$ rpm --query --whatrequires libvirt-daemon-kvm
gnome-boxes-48.0-1.fc42.x86_64
```
Fedora-Workstation-Live-43-20250828.n.0.x86_64.iso:
```
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query --whatrequires pigz
no package requires pigz
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query --whatrecommends pigz
no package recommends pigz
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query pigz
package pigz is not installed
```

Fedora-KDE-Desktop-Live-42-1.1.x86_64.iso:
```
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query --whatrequires pigz
no package requires pigz
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query --whatrecommends pigz
dracut-105-2.fc42.x86_64
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query pigz
pigz-2.8-6.fc42.x86_64
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query --whatrequires zstd
no package requires zstd
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query --whatrecommends zstd
no package recommends zstd
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query zstd
package zstd is not installed
```
Fedora-KDE-Desktop-Live-43-20250828.n.0.x86_64.iso:
```
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query --whatrequires pigz
no package requires pigz
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query --whatrecommends pigz
no package recommends pigz
hricky@localhost-live:~$ rpm --query pigz
package pigz is not installed

Please note that as a consequence of this change, the `pigz` package is no longer available in Fedora Workstation 43, Fedora KDE Plasma Desktop 43, and Atomic Desktops 43 nightly compose artifacts.

Comment 7 Timothée Ravier 2025-10-04 17:14:57 UTC
*** Bug 1554931 has been marked as a duplicate of this bug. ***

Comment 8 Timothée Ravier 2025-12-16 14:01:31 UTC
We released that change as part of Fedora 43.