HCL - LENOVO X1 Carbon 20BSCTO1WW

[george]

No graphics available with Qubes kernels which prevents installation due
to anaconda issues. I'm sure the following could be improved and maybe
all included in the kickstart file but that wasn't my priority. I got
Qubes installed and working like this:

Before starting you need the kickstart file and the Fedora kernel rpm on
removable media (sdb1 in my case but check your own setup). Similarly,
sda in the kickstart file may not be right for you. Also check
language, keyboard and timezone.

Some wrinkles I found:
- Don't change the hostname from "dom0" as it will break things
- anaconda in text mode demands a user is set up
- Qubes first-boot also sets up a user, couldn't skip this either
- With two users strange stuff happened in first-boot
- That's why I delete a user before doing anything and need root login
- In one test run I saw nomodeset as a kernel parameter and that caused
graphics to fail, after finding that I never saw it again

Boot installation media and hit tab, adding (after "quiet")
ks=hd:sdb1:/ks.cfg

Installation should run with no further interaction.
Once it is complete change to another console (Alt-F2)
# mount /dev/sdb1 /root
# cp /root/kernel*.rpm /mnt/sysimage/var/lib/qubes/updates
# umount /root

I chose /root as the mount point as it didn't seem to have anything
important in it. It worked so I didn't think any further about it.

Back to console 1 and press the finished key which will reboot.
Still no graphics, so after boot finishes with a blank screen,
find a text console to log in on as root. Then

# userdel -r deleteme
# yum install /var/lib/qubes/updates/kernel*.rpm
# grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/grub2/grub.cfg
# dracut -f
# vi /etc/yum.repos.d/qubes-dom0.repo
add "exclude = kernel" at end of [qubes-dom0-current] section
# passwd -l root

Reboot and (hopefully) enjoy. Don't forget to change the LUKS password,
or put a proper one in the kickstart file if you're happy to can erase
it safely or keep it secure some other way.

So far so good for me. There is a TPM but I haven't got round to
testing that yet (and it will be a while).

[george]

I've since found that the wifi and the ethernet on the OneLink dock are
also too new for qubes kernel 3.12. I have installed the unstable
kernel and they have appeared now.

dom0 # qubes-dom0-update --enablerepo=qubes-dom0-unstable kernel-qubes-vm

Time will tell how unstable it is ...

[Rob]

Hi George,

What do you mean by....

>
> Boot installation media and hit tab, adding (after "quiet")
> ks=hd:sdb1:/ks.cfg

> Installation should run with no further interaction.

I am trying to get around the LUKS encryption section in the text based installation of Qubes 3.2.
When you say "tab" I am guessing you are exiting to a shell, so for v3.2 it is "Ctrl-Tab-F2"
When you say "after quiet", I am guessing you are editing the following line in the xen.cfg file...
kernel=vmlinuz inst.stage2=hd:LABEL=Qubes-R3.2-x86_64 i915.preliminary_hw_support=1 quiet rhgb

to become:
kernel=vmlinuz inst.stage2=hd:LABEL=Qubes-R3.2-x86_64 i915.preliminary_hw_support=1 quiet ks=hd:sdb1:/ks.cfg rhgb

however the whole filesystem is read-only and I cannot save the edit.

Please could someone assist?

Thanks,

Rob.

[Marek Marczykowski-Górecki]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA256

On Fri, Dec 23, 2016 at 02:05:34AM -0800, Rob wrote:
> Hi George,
>
> What do you mean by....
> >
> > Boot installation media and hit tab, adding (after "quiet")
> > ks=hd:sdb1:/ks.cfg
>
> > Installation should run with no further interaction.
>
> I am trying to get around the LUKS encryption section in the text based installation of Qubes 3.2.
> When you say "tab" I am guessing you are exiting to a shell

It's about isolinux command prompt - in legacy (non-UEFI) mode.

> , so for v3.2 it is "Ctrl-Tab-F2"
> When you say "after quiet", I am guessing you are editing the following line in the xen.cfg file...
> kernel=vmlinuz inst.stage2=hd:LABEL=Qubes-R3.2-x86_64 i915.preliminary_hw_support=1 quiet rhgb
>
> to become:
> kernel=vmlinuz inst.stage2=hd:LABEL=Qubes-R3.2-x86_64 i915.preliminary_hw_support=1 quiet ks=hd:sdb1:/ks.cfg rhgb
>
> however the whole filesystem is read-only and I cannot save the edit.

Actually, you can. You need to mount vfat partition (not iso9660 one) of
the installation disk (AFAIR it's the second partition). Note that
changing anything on installation disk will fail media verification, so
you may want to first start the installer just to verify it, then apply
above change and while starting for actual installation, go with just
"install" option, not "verify and install". Keep it in mind when editing
xen.cfg - those are separate sections there.

- --
Best Regards,
Marek Marczykowski-Górecki
Invisible Things Lab
A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
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[heroo...@gmail.com]

I suppose it'd be a long shot for me to get an answer, but this problem STILL hasn't been fixed, so I'll try anyway.

What file are you referring to when you say "fedora kernel"?

[morheng...@gmail.com]

> Installation should run with no further interaction.
> Once it is complete change to another console (Alt-F2)
> # mount /dev/sdb1 /root
> # cp /root/kernel*.rpm /mnt/sysimage/var/lib/qubes/updates
> # umount /root

Not sure if you made a typo there but when I try to run that line with cp it say that this file can't be found :/

[dale...@gmail.com]

It took me a few days, but I think the solution I found is simpler.
At least for getting Qubes installed. I still don't have it booting
from the hard drive, but I can do a rescue boot and proceed from there.

My computer is an H-P compact desktop. The Qubes install (4.0-rc3 for
x86_64) doesn't like something about either the Intel ethernet or the
Intel i915, so it doesn't automatically try vnc and Xorg fails.
And with text, the disk autopart fails for lack of an encryption
password for the LVM partition.

I let the default (not text) install fail, unable to start Xorg.
I press Alt-Tab until I get the shell window. I find the network
interface name by running networkctl. I run dhclient with the
interface name as the sole argument. I use ifconfig to find the
IP address that DHCP assigned. I remove /var/run/anaconda.pid.
I run

anaconda --vnc

On a remote computer behind the same router I start a vnc client and
connect to the Qubes target IP::5901. I think the client (tightvnc
on Windows 8.1) defaults to port 5900, and the anaconda sets up 5901.

Just do the graphical install on the vnc client and all goes well right
up to the reboot failing to boot from the hard drive, which I consider
to be a separate problem.