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Description of problem: RHEL5 Installation Guide indicates incorrect installation tree preparation for FTP install. Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/enterprise/RHEL-5-manual/Installation_Guide-en-US/ How reproducible: Browse to http://www.redhat.com/docs/manuals/enterprise/RHEL-5-manual/Installation_Guide-en-US/s1-steps-network-installs-x86.html and try to use instructions for preparing for FTP installation. Steps to Reproduce: 1. Follow instructions in "2.5.1. Preparing for FTP and HTTP installation" 2. Attempt FTP installation 3. Actual results: Error: unable to read package metadata....Please ensure that your install tree has been correctly generated. Expected results: Successful installation. Additional info: The README-en file on disk1 appears to have the correct instructions, i.e. to unpack the disks into a single install tree, as with previous versions. The loop-mount of the isos without unpacking as indicated in the manual would be a nice thing, but it doesn't work.
Created attachment 154936 [details] PDF of Installation Manual Section 2.5
Related: http://kbase.redhat.com/faq/FAQ_105_9588.shtm Why does Anaconda output an "Unable to read package metadata..." error when I attempt to install Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 Beta from an NFS server containing the installation ISO images? Resolution: This is a known issue currently being investigated for resolution by General Availability (GA). The problem occurs if the directory containing the ISO images also contains a partial unpacked installation tree; for example, the /images directory from the first ISO. The presence of such directories results in the error stated above. To work around this, unpack trees only to directories other than the one containing the installation ISO images.
I don't get how that relates to loop-mounted images being used for ftp install.
(In reply to comment #4) > I don't get how that relates to loop-mounted images being used for ftp install. And in fact, the ftp install is perfectly happy with monolithic install tree that also contains the iso images. It just won't work with loop-mounted disk images as stated in the doc. The FAQ cited is for EL5 beta NFS install. This bug is for FTP install of final release containing redhat-release-5Server-5.0.0.9.x86_64.rpm
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corrected in source; removed erroneous instructions for network install preparation (using CDROMs), added reference to README-en file instead. setting bug as MODIFIED.
Instructions are still in Red_Hat_Enterprise_Linux-Installation_Guide-5-en-US-3.1-7 2.5.1. Preparing for FTP and HTTP installation
I've located the instructions referred to in Comment 0 in the latest version of the README file and replaced the 2.5.1 procedure with them.