Bug 681569 - anaconda stage1 loader does not pass essential "layer2" network option
Summary: anaconda stage1 loader does not pass essential "layer2" network option
Keywords:
Status: CLOSED DUPLICATE of bug 649301
Alias: None
Product: Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5
Classification: Red Hat
Component: anaconda
Version: 5.6
Hardware: s390x
OS: Linux
unspecified
high
Target Milestone: rc
: ---
Assignee: David Cantrell
QA Contact: Release Test Team
URL:
Whiteboard:
Depends On:
Blocks:
TreeView+ depends on / blocked
 
Reported: 2011-03-02 15:41 UTC by Philip Rowlands
Modified: 2012-03-22 13:00 UTC (History)
1 user (show)

Fixed In Version:
Doc Type: Bug Fix
Doc Text:
Clone Of:
Environment:
Last Closed: 2012-03-22 13:00:16 UTC
Target Upstream Version:


Attachments (Terms of Use)

Description Philip Rowlands 2011-03-02 15:41:11 UTC
Steps to reproduce:
- Buy IBM s390x mainframe
- Configure VSWITCH in "ETHERNET" mode (layer2)
- Punch kernel, parm and initrd files to the reader and IPL
- Continue through linuxrc.s390 to provide basic network and hostname info, including LAYER2=1
- SSH when prompted, to launch stage 1 loader
- Proceed through language selection to "Installation Method".

At this point we choose the installation media; either network-based (NFS, HTTP, FTP) or let's call it block-device based (CDROM, Hard drive).

If we choose network-based, loader performs an extra config step:

14:22:02 INFO    : need to set up networking
14:22:02 INFO    : going to pick interface
14:22:02 INFO    : only have one network device: eth0
14:22:02 INFO    : going to do getNetConfig

If we choose "Hard drive", this "set up networking" stage is skipped.

- Continue through the installation, including eth0 network details, and reboot
- Notice that eth0 will not come up


Problem:

anaconda doesn't carry through the LAYER2 config setting when using Hard drive media. For network installs, /tmp/netinfo is rewritten in or around getNetConfig to change LAYER2=1 into OPTIONS="layer2=1", among other edits. It's possible that other network-related parameters from CMSCONFFILE are affected; I only checked LAYER2.

This /tmp/netinfo rewrite is essential to allow later stages of anaconda to write a correct ifcfg-eth0, but the step is skipped.

There is no way to have anaconda correctly configure the network device for layer2 when installing from Hard drive media.

Comment 1 Philip Rowlands 2011-03-15 15:34:11 UTC
Testing in an environment where layer2=0 is used, "ARP=no" is omitted from ifcfg-eth0 when installing from Hard drive. (This doesn't seem as critical to network operation, compared to the layer2=1 scenario above.)

Comment 2 Philip Rowlands 2011-08-11 09:26:11 UTC
Was this fixed in RHBA-2011:0984?

 * The hard drive installation method and layer2 VSWITCH caused non-functional networking on the IBM System z. Now, anaconda writes out the LAYER2 and PORTNO options into ifcfg files also on non-network install methods. (BZ#649301)

As with so many of the bugs linked from RHBA notices, I can't view bug 649301 (not authorised).

Comment 3 David Cantrell 2012-03-22 13:00:16 UTC
Yes, it was.  Sorry this bug was not picked up as a dupe.  While I cannot make the bug visible to you, you can look at the git commit that fixed the issue:

59992e95263dfe13d5284ab44deb9e22f0f98deb

Information on getting the source for anaconda via git is at http://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Anaconda

*** This bug has been marked as a duplicate of bug 649301 ***


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