Cloud-init for Fedora based distros doesn't work

[SebDanielsson]

Hi!

I successfully ran this script to create a template for a Ubuntu 22.04 template. I then proceeded to to create a CentOS Stream 9 and Alma Linux 9 template.

After making a full clone of the template. Adding a password, ssh-keyand setting IPV4 and IPV6 networking to use DHCP and then booting the VM the CPU basically stays at 50% and I'm unable to open the console to view the output.

Here's the script I ran to create my template. Shouldn't be anything weird in it as far as I can tell..

# Set script variables
IMAGE_FILE='AlmaLinux-9-GenericCloud-latest.x86_64.qcow2'
TEMPLATE_ID='3000'
TEMPLATE_NAME='almalinux-template'

# Create VM
qm create $TEMPLATE_ID --name $TEMPLATE_NAME --net0 virtio,bridge=vmbr0 --memory 2048 --core 2

# Import image
qm importdisk $TEMPLATE_ID $IMAGE_FILE local-lvm

# Attach image as storage device
qm set $TEMPLATE_ID --scsihw virtio-scsi-pci --scsi0 local-lvm:vm-$TEMPLATE_ID-disk-0

# Attach a drive for cloud-init
qm set $TEMPLATE_ID --ide2 local-lvm:cloudinit

# Configure VM to boot from our image
qm set $TEMPLATE_ID --boot c --bootdisk scsi0

# Add a serial console
qm set $TEMPLATE_ID --serial0 socket --vga serial0

# Convert VM to template
qm template $TEMPLATE_ID

 

[mira]

Try it with the default display instead of `serial`.
If your image doesn't provide a serial device, it won't work and it seems some of the newer cloud images don't do that by default.

 

[SebDanielsson]

Try it with the default display instead of `serial`.
If your image doesn't provide a serial device, it won't work and it seems some of the newer cloud images don't do that by default.

Thanks for that! I started with the default display and now got access through noVNC. I can't scroll but it seems like a kernel panic. Are there any way to extract the logs from the VM? Not sure why it panics..

 

[SebDanielsson]

Here's a video of the whole boot process:
https://a.tmp.ninja/JJGVsEJf.mp4

 

[SebDanielsson]

Interesting. I changed the processor from default (kvm64) to SandyBridge since my test server is a 2600K system. Now Alma Linux boots up properly. However Ubuntu boots up fine with the proessor set to kvm64. Wonder why this could be.. I also tested to set the CPU to "host" and this is booting fine as well!

 

[mira]

Did you download an image that requires certain features to be available?
kvm64 is a CPU model that doesn't provide lots of features. It is there for compatibility. So a mismatch between what the kernel expected and what the CPU provided could be the issue.

 

[SebDanielsson]

I downloaded AlmaLinux 9 from https://repo.almalinux.org/almalinux/9/cloud/x86_64/images/:
AlmaLinux-9-GenericCloud-9.0-20220527.x86_64.qcow2

I suspect this will be a problem for RockyLinux 9, Oracle Linux 9 and RHEL 9 aswell.

My problem starting Fedora was not due to using kvm64 but because I checked the DHCP option inside Proxmox. If setting a static IP or not touching the option at all I could boot Fedora without the following errors:
Failed Units: 2
cloud-final.service
NetworkManager-wait-online.service

Not sure why checking the DHCP options broke cloud-init. Seems to only be a problem with Fedora.

 

[mira]

That's a common issue when setting to use DHCP without having a DHCP provider.
The network service will try to get an IP via DHCP and waits until the timeout, which is typically 5 minutes.