[Bug 1877088] Comment bridged from LTC Bugzilla

bugproxy 1877088 at bugs.launchpad.net
Mon Jul 20 16:59:49 UTC 2020 

------- Comment From Niklas.Schnelle at ibm.com 2020-07-20 12:57 EDT-------
(In reply to comment #19)
> On Fri, 26 Jun 2020 at 15:01, bugproxy <1877088 at bugs.launchpad.net> wrote:
> >
> > (In reply to comment #17)
> > > Eoan and later d-i, new installer, curtin do not install
> > > /etc/kernel-img.conf.
> > > Upgraded systems keep having it (ie. installed with bionic or xenial, and
> > > upgraded).
> > >
> > > Can you please let me know if _removing_ /etc/kernel-img.conf breaks $ sudo
> > > make install, and if adding /etc/kernel-img.conf back fixes $ sudo make
> > > install?
> > >
> > > Cause the expectation is that `/etc/kernel-img.conf` should not be there,
> > > yet everything should still work correctly.
> > >
> > > I think somewhere something is reading "link_in_boot=yes" and was not
> > > updated with the new implicit default to always assume that on recent ubuntu.
> >
> > For me the installkernel script (including in the current case "sudo
> > make install" from a mainline Linux tree) doesn't update the
> > /boot/initrd.img symlink.
> >
> > Interestingly a package upgrade for linux-generic does overwrite this
> > symlink.
>
> .deb package uses very different maintainer scripts / codepath, and is
> not the same operation as "sudo make install".
>
> I personally always build my kernels as debs, and install debs, rather
> than doing "sudo make install". But I am a distribution developer, and
> I care for .debs to work right. Kernel developers, I guess, are
> inverse, and care for "upstream" $ sudo make install to work.
>
> >
> > Not with the /etc/kernel-img.conf[0] and not without it either.
> > As before the /boot/vmlinuz link is always updated.
> >
>
> That is slightly concerning, as to how $ sudo make install, ever
> worked before..... Or what has changed since.
>
> Normally, $ sudo make install, should lookup if /sbin/installkernel is
> available, and call that to "do what it has to do, on a given
> distribution", and that script is shipped by the debianutils package
> which is required and must be installed always. And it hasn't been
> touched in ages.
>
> I wonder which arguments are passed to /sbin/installkernel by $ sudo
> make install. And whether the 4th argument is passed, and if it is
> empty, /, or /boot. It should be either empty, or /boot.
>
> --
> Regards,
>
> Dimitri.
So when I built on a beefy development server I usually copy a tar of the modules + bzImage + System.map and e.g.:

# sudo tar -xavf 5.8.0-rc6-06703-g93c67d794cfc.tar -C /usr/
# sudo installkernel 5.8.0-rc6-06703-g93c67d794cfc bzImage System.map /boot

that works well on RHEL, Fedora, SUSE and I'm pretty sure it worked on Ubuntu only a week prior to me opening this Bugzilla. I also looked in the history
and didn't find anything so yeah I'm pretty confused how that
used to work on Ubuntu but I've even bisected like that (on Ubuntu) so have used that approach dozens of times.

Of course for us working with multiple distros there's a lot of value in
this working the same on all of them and I think that's the main point
of the installkernel script.

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1877088

Title:
  [UBUNTU 20.04] installkernel script does not symlink /boot/initrd.img
  which is required with the default zipl.conf

Status in Ubuntu on IBM z Systems:
  Triaged
Status in debianutils package in Ubuntu:
  New
Status in linux-base package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  When testing development kernels I usually rely on the installkernel
  script either through the "make install" target of the Kernel source
  or manually. This used to work great on Ubuntu on Z.

  On Ubuntu 20.04 (freshly installed up to date) this fails however because
  /boot/initrd.img is not updated (/boot/vmlinuz is) and thus zipl installs the
  wrong kernel/initrd combination rendering the system unbootable.

  (with the correct modules already copied to /usr/lib/modules/5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd/)
  # sudo installkernel 5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd bzImage System.map /boot
  run-parts: executing /etc/kernel/postinst.d/apt-auto-removal 5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd /boot/vmlinuz-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd
  run-parts: executing /etc/kernel/postinst.d/initramfs-tools 5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd /boot/vmlinuz-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd
  update-initramfs: Generating /boot/initrd.img-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd
  Using config file '/etc/zipl.conf'
  Building bootmap in '/boot'
  Building menu 'menu'
  Adding #1: IPL section 'ubuntu' (default)
  Adding #2: IPL section 'old'
  Preparing boot device: dasda (3844).
  Done.
  run-parts: executing /etc/kernel/postinst.d/zz-zipl 5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd /boot/vmlinuz-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd
  Using config file '/etc/zipl.conf'
  Building bootmap in '/boot'
  Building menu 'menu'
  Adding #1: IPL section 'ubuntu' (default)
  Adding #2: IPL section 'old'
  Preparing boot device: dasda (3844).
  Done.
  # ls -l /boot
  total 178364
  -rw------- 1 root root    135168 May  6 11:52 bootmap
  -rw-r--r-- 1 root root     90471 Apr 29 15:34 config-5.4.0-29-generic
  lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root        27 May  6 11:40 initrd.img -> initrd.img-5.4.0-29-generic   <====== should point to new version
  -rw-r--r-- 1 root root  19663996 May  6 11:42 initrd.img-5.4.0-29-generic
  -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 125339494 May  6 11:52 initrd.img-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd
  lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root        27 May  6 11:40 initrd.img.old -> initrd.img-5.4.0-29-generic
  -rw------- 1 root root   3087920 Apr 29 15:34 System.map-5.4.0-29-generic
  -rw-r--r-- 1 root root   4031691 May  6 11:52 System.map-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd
  -rw-r--r-- 1 root root   4031691 May  6 11:49 System.map-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd.old
  lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root        37 May  6 11:52 vmlinuz -> vmlinuz-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd
  -rw------- 1 root root   8086072 Apr 29 15:54 vmlinuz-5.4.0-29-generic
  -rw-r--r-- 1 root root   9080832 May  6 11:52 vmlinuz-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd
  -rw-r--r-- 1 root root   9080832 May  6 11:49 vmlinuz-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd.old
  lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root        41 May  6 11:52 vmlinuz.old -> vmlinuz-5.7.0-rc4-06500-gb67ea026badd.old

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