[Bug 1843768] Re: [FFe] Ubiquity with zsys install option

[Iain Lane]

Thanks for working on this. I think feature-freeze wise this is
something that we should get in. It's cool work and it'd be something
neat to have in 19.10.

I've got some questions first though. (If the MIR is firmly taken off
the table for 19.10, then these questions can be skipped since you will
have to positively opt in in that case.)

Is the design of the option something that has been presented to the
design team? While not a particular issue as long as the feature is opt-
in, as soon as it is this option will be presented to everybody - I'd
like to know that it's been reviewed design-wise and signed off.

What guarantees are you looking to make on stability / data-loss? Let's
say we discover a crash in the installer in some circumstances with this
option enabled in the week before release - is this something we would
be fixing urgently or do we say that 'anything goes' if you have picked
the option? Same question if something turns out to be wrong post-
install for a number of people.

Probably goes without saying, but the MR to ubiquity itself will need to
be reviewed too. :-)

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1843768

Title:
  [FFe] Ubiquity with zsys install option

Status in ubiquity package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  Part of the 19.10 feature announcement is zfs experimental support in
  the installer (https://ubuntu.com/blog/enhancing-our-zfs-support-on-
  ubuntu-19-10-an-introduction). We modified ubiquity to present an
  “EXPERIMENTAL” (with warning) ZSYS install option. This option is only
  visible is zfsutils-linux is installed on the system. So, it won't be
  available for derivatives that use ubiquity but do not seed zfsutils-
  linux.

  This option takes an entire disk and have a fix set of dataset
  installed. There is no support but we need this to make an official
  install option for the next LTS.

  The patch has been created to be as minimal as possible. Partman does
  a full disk partitioning, and then the script zsys-setup the first
  non-ESP partition and replaces with zfs pools.

  4 partitions are created:
  1. if GPT partitioning: ESP partition. This one is done by partman directly.
  2. bpool (for boot), pool with older zfs compatible version to be readable by grub)
  3. rpool (for / and userdataset)
  4. /boot/grub (ext4) to contain a single grub (NOTE: this could be later on moved to the ESP)

  Additionaly if a swap file has been created by ubiquity, it is
  recreated as a ZFS volume. If the script fails to execute, the final
  installation is an ext4 installation on entire disk.

  The script is doing the post-install of zsys (currently in universe,
  but a MIR is opened:
  https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/zsys/+bug/1839271 and it’s
  pending security review).

  Note that the implementation is slightly different from the
  specification due to a difficult cohabitation with partman in the
  custom partitioning page.

  Consequently, in case the MIR doesn’t make the release, we still have
  an “easy way” (once this code merged) for people to try zsys in the
  release (apt install zfslinux-utils in live session and then start
  ubiquity). We don’t install universe components by default unless
  requested/prompted by this option (which is thus hidden by default
  until the MIR is acked).

  Please find attached the MP on ubiquity as well as the package build
  log.

  https://launchpadlibrarian.net/442036321/buildlog_ubuntu-eoan-
  amd64.ubiquity_19.10.10~ppa1_BUILDING.txt.gz

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