Do Proxmox team consider switching to Calamares installer as Debian does?

[doman18]

Proxmox installer is very limiting, especially in terms of partitioning. There is no "advanced" mode where you can choose your own mount points and layout as all popular distros offer. For example things like encrypting drives or moving boot to different drive are are easy on those distros installers but in proxmox not impossible. This is probably convenient for proxmox team because it greatly limits list of "supported" setups. Yet i think opening all possibilities and adding some warnings is enough to make "tinkerers" or "homelabbers" happy and discourage professionals from using those things on production.

Or having at least Calamares as an option in boot menu.

What's your thoughts?

https://calamares.io/

 

[LnxBil]

The official way for anything else besides the standard installer (which is top notch IMHO) is to install Debian and then upgrade to PVE, which is a supported upgrade path. You can do whatever you like in Debian.

 

[doman18]

The official way for anything else besides the standard installer (which is top notch IMHO) is to install Debian and then upgrade to PVE, which is a supported upgrade path. You can do whatever you like in Debian.

Except you cant install Debian on ZFS with it's installer. You have to go through (painfull) debootstrap process.

I mean, whats the point of having installer anyway if "debian install" path is official way of installing proxmox? Aren't installers for making things easier? And if you have one it would be nice to cover as much possibilities as possible.

 

[LnxBil]

Except you cant install Debian on ZFS with it's installer. You have to go through (painfull) debootstrap process.

True, or you just boot a live linux, build your pool and send/receive your PVE onto it. Much easier in ZFS setups.

And if you have one it would be nice to cover as much possibilities as possible.

Yes, but that does not exist and never will. I haven't seen an installer that is able to do what I like. Therefore this is more an advanced topic and do my stuff directly on a live linux distro.

 

[doman18]

True, or you just boot a live linux, build your pool and send/receive your PVE onto it. Much easier in ZFS setups.

Well, i must admit that ive never seen (or even thought about) send/receive as installation tool. I have my doubts but i need to explore this path more to make any statements. Thanks for an idea.

do my stuff directly on a live linux distro.

Which is exactly how many distro installers work, including debian + calamares combo. And it's a shame that proxmox installer doesn't allow to run something similar. We wouldn't need debian then for more advanced stuff. Just prepare what you need in live distro (LUKS, ZFS pools or whatever) and then run installer where you could use those prepared things. I used this way to (re)install my laptops for years (with boot on a usb stick and LUKS for root partition). Its worth implementing even for the sole possibility of decrypting partitions before installing system on them.

 

[LnxBil]

Well, i must admit that ive never seen (or even thought about) send/receive as installation tool. I have my doubts but i need to explore this path more to make any statements. Thanks for an idea.

No problem. Depending on UEFI or legacy, you need some special treatment, yet it works as it should. We use it as a recovery tool. I build my own Debian based live distribution including ZFS for exactly this.

Which is exactly how many distro installers work, including debian + calamares combo. And it's a shame that proxmox installer doesn't allow to run something similar. We wouldn't need debian then for more advanced stuff. Just prepare what we need in live distro (LUKS, ZFS pools or whatever) and then run installer where we could use those prepared things. I used this way to (re)install my laptops for years (with boot on a usb stick and LUKS for root partition). Its worth implementing even for the sole possibility of decrypting partitions before installing system on them.

Oh, I then misunderstood what the calamares installer is about. Sorry, I need to read up on it more thoroughly.

 

[cheiss]

Which is exactly how many distro installers work, including debian + calamares combo. And it's a shame that proxmox installer doesn't allow to run something similar. We wouldn't need debian then for more advanced stuff. Just prepare what you need in live distro (LUKS, ZFS pools or whatever) and then run installer where you could use those prepared things. I used this way to (re)install my laptops for years (with boot on a usb stick and LUKS for root partition). Its worth implementing even for the sole possibility of decrypting partitions before installing system on them.

To mention for completeness: This is actually possible as of now by simply choosing one of the Advanced Options > Install Proxmox VE (*, Debug) options.

They will drop you into a shell (first in a early "stage 1" shell, which you can just exit using Ctrl-D immediately), from which you can do any pre-install stuff you need to do and afterwards press Ctrl-D again (or enter exit as documented) to start the normal installation.

All this is also documented in the Using the Proxmox VE installer section in our admin guide.

 

[esi_y]

This is actually possible as of now by simply choosing one of the Advanced Options > Install Proxmox VE (*, Debug) options.

This must be indeed new, thanks for adding it here - I wished it was announced more prominently somewhere - some of us will not see it in the installer as we abandoned the ISO altogether after previous experience. Thumbs up for adding serial!

All this is also documented in the Using the Proxmox VE installer section in our admin guide.

When this was added, I would have wished it was TOP of release notes - like for unattended.

PS Why there's still no option with nomodeset without having to manually add it for the folks who have limited knowledge and they are most likely to need it?

Edit: PS2 What's the point of (default) Graphical installer? What target audience of PVE does need it, what practical purpose does it serve?

 

[cheiss]

This must be indeed new, thanks for adding it here - I wished it was announced more prominently somewhere - some of us will not see it in the installer as we abandoned the ISO altogether after previous experience.

This isn't new tho. If I see correctly, this has been present (in this grade) since at least Proxmox VE 6.0(!). And even earlier than that in a bit different form. And 6.0 was released in 2019.

 

[esi_y]

This isn't new tho. If I see correctly, this has been present (in this grade) since at least Proxmox VE 6.0(!). And even earlier than that in a bit different form. And 6.0 was released in 2019.

I have no idea at this point, I first tested v8.0 and did not find it (maybe it was there), didn't know about it (obviously not my fault, but discoverability is poor ). But on a serious note, some things were there and are no longer (e.g. the nomodeset - I found this in past threads, the option is no longer available without manually adding kernel param).

 

[esi_y]

They will drop you into a shell (first in a early "stage 1" shell, which you can just exit using Ctrl-D immediately), from which you can do any pre-install stuff you need to do and afterwards press Ctrl-D again (or enter exit as documented) to start the normal installation.

Ok, my bad, this is BusyBox! So no, it's not what the OP asked for...

 

[cheiss]

Ok, my bad, this is BusyBox! So no, it's not what the OP asked for...

To quote myself:

They will drop you into a shell (first in a early "stage 1" shell, which you can just exit using Ctrl-D immediately)

If you actually go further than stage 1 as described, then you will get to the actual installation shell - which is a proper shell, not busybox. And again, also documented as such in our admin guide.

 

[esi_y]

To quote myself:

If you actually go further than stage 1 as described, then you will get to the actual installation shell - which is a proper shell, not busybox. And again, also documented as such in our admin guide.

Oh my! You are right!

Well, for what it's worth, I never discovered this before. I am not ashamed to admit I did not get it from your first note here, the only giveaway sentence in the docs is "A console will be opened at several installation steps" - I have not seen this done before, I thought it was like a Rescue shell.

The other thing is, as Graphical anything is useless to me, I would have skipped straight to "Terminal UI, Debug Mode" which says "Same as the graphical debug mode, but preparing the system to run the terminal-based installer instead." Shame on me, I did not read the referenced item, but the "preparing the system" did not nudge me either.

For me this option remained hidden till now.

 

[esi_y]

Now wait a minute, this is useless for someone wanting to just tweak something and continue as usual.

Because you can create e.g. own zpool, but then installer just asks for which raw disk to install on. So no, you can't set custom mountpoints. So it's not for the OP's requested case.

 

[esi_y]

besides the standard installer (which is top notch IMHO)

What do you mean top-notch? There was no unattended install till recently (that one I know for sure) - this for the famous "cattle" approach to the cluster nodes ... was weird.

EDIT: The installer just lets you choose a drive (and is quite picky at e.g. equal sized ZFS mirror) and that's it. Language and keyboard layout (for a hypervisor, really)? And then it just dumps it all the same onto there (BIOS boot & EFI all the same no matter what kind of system it is, while at that, let's abuse the ESP to shove /boot there), one has to be a wizard to figure out if it will be GRUB or systemd-boot combined with ZFS on root (ZFSBootMenu anyone?). It's a spaghetti western.

And on top, every week someone with (not only) NVIDIA struggling with getting nomodeset manually added to the kernel params.

 

[doman18]

No problem. Depending on UEFI or legacy, you need some special treatment, yet it works as it should. We use it as a recovery tool. I build my own Debian based live distribution including ZFS for exactly this.

Awesome idea! Thanks!

Oh, I then misunderstood what the calamares installer is about. Sorry, I need to read up on it more thoroughly.

And i messed this topic a bit. Now after your inputs i know i should have named it more towards "live environment" than calamares itself.

@esi_y Hahaha you have gone through exactly the same concerns i had reading @cheiss responses. Awesome! Thanks for your input!

 

[esi_y]

Awesome idea! Thanks!

And i messed this topic a bit. Now after your inputs i know i should have named it more towards "live environment" than calamares itself.

@esi_y Hahaha you have gone through exactly the same concerns i had reading @cheiss responses. Awesome! Thanks for your input!

Yeah so being terse, the takeout of today is: The installer is top-notch, so top-notch you best build your own. Everyone who does something real does. After all you need a recovery tool and LIVE Debian has no zfs out of the box, so you build your own too.

And the Debug is after all, just for the Debug of the limited installer (so the name is correct). Yes, your question is valid, but there's no answer anymore. I am glad you as the OP added it here, otherwise it's like "well the OP is happy with our you-are-doing-it-wrong gaslighting"...

PS If someone thinks my comment above is somehow harsh, it's just after months seeing this forum dynamics, you don't have time for more of the same.