Description of problem: I realize there was a design decision made to support only graphical installs (via VNC) for Fully-virtualized guests. That is not the point of this defect. The defect that needs a fix is that virt-install SHOULD NOT prompt the user for enabling graphics when the answer to the first question ("install fully-virtualized guest?") is yes", because you can get yourself into a state where a new guest is created but it is inaccessible. Witness: [root@wheel1 ~]# virt-install Would you like a fully virtualized guest (yes or no)? This will allow you to run unmodified operating systems. yes What is the name of your virtual machine? fv01 How much RAM should be allocated (in megabytes)? 8192 What would you like to use as the disk (path)? /dev/sdc1 Would you like to enable graphics support? (yes or no) no What is the virtual CD image, CD device or install location? http://md2020.nashua/insta ll/ia64/rhel5.1 Starting install... Retrieving Server... 482 kB 00:00 Retrieving boot.iso... 100% |=========================| 26 MB 00:01 Creating domain... 0 B 00:03 Domain installation still in progress. You can reconnect to the console to complete the installation process. [root@wheel1 ~]# xm list Name ID Mem(MiB) VCPUs State Time(s) Domain-0 0 98208 32 r----- 520.6 fv01 1 8207 1 ------ 0.1 [root@wheel1 ~]# xm console fv01 xenconsole: Could not read tty from store: No such file or directory Version-Release number of selected component (if applicable): python-virtinst-0.103.x How reproducible: 100% Steps to Reproduce: 1. virt-install 2. type 'yes' for hvm install 3. prompts for graphics Actual results: [root@wheel1 ~]# xm console fv01 xenconsole: Could not read tty from store: No such file or directory Expected results: allow console connection via vnc Additional info:
Created attachment 297661 [details] define default vnc values if hvm is used in virt-install
Please re-run passing --debug to virt-install and attach the output to this bug. Also provide /var/log/xen/xend.log and output of 'xenstore-ls' once the VM is running.
Created attachment 297748 [details] log file
This request was evaluated by Red Hat Product Management for inclusion in a Red Hat Enterprise Linux maintenance release. Product Management has requested further review of this request by Red Hat Engineering, for potential inclusion in a Red Hat Enterprise Linux Update release for currently deployed products. This request is not yet committed for inclusion in an Update release.
I laid out the particular nographics issues bz 230841. Its actually a xen bug as far as I can tell, since it doesn't truly honor a nographics request. We can use this bug to track the original proposed change, which I'm fine with: if selecting hvm just default to vnc with no prompt since current other options are broken.
Hmm, looks like 230841 is going to be fixed, so if any action should be taken for this bug it's probably to disable sdl.
I don't see why any action needs to be taken - both paravirt and fullyvirt support install via text console, VNC and SDL. Sometimes one or more of those options is not available, due to specifics of the guest OS being installed, or the way the admin has configure the host, but its not virt-install's job to define that policy
Okay, per dan's comment and the fact that nographics should work for hvm guests in 5.3, i'm just going to close this NOTABUG.