Self-install image and Virtualbox, anyone managed to install?

E.g. Leap Micro 6.0 - neither upgrade from 5.5 nor fresh install works in Virtualbox.

Probably related to “first boot” mechanisms as error is similar, initrd cannot detect volumes.

Oh wow, I learned a lot - a lot more than I wanted to for checking out new Leap Micro 6.0 on VirtualBox. Here’s how you get booted:

  1. Since the installer is dropped, you need to configure in advance. EVEN if you do not want to have any configuration because you would set everything on console (first boot fails if no config is found). Goto openSUSE ignition Installer config creator. . At least add root with password, otherwise you are locked out. *)
  2. On that site go to Convert to Ignition-Combustion-Ready Filesystem IMG in the Browser to Download your config as raw hdd image (ignition-dummy.img).
  3. Convert the img to a VirtualBox HDD on your host: VBoxManage convertfromraw --format VDI ignition-dummy.img ignition.vdi
  4. Go to VirtualBox machine’s settings, mass media and add the VDI-file as HDD besides the installer image (e.g. openSUSE-Leap-Micro.x86_64-Base-SelfInstall.iso). Eventually, the first-boot will find your config!
  5. Add a HDD. Run the machine, select Install (from the DVD/iso) and wait until root prompt appears. To be clear: You need at least minimal config, otherwise boot fails (a bug imho).

*) If you are a UI kind of type than Add Custom Lines To Combustion Script to enable web access systemctl enable --now cockpit.socket

Hi @lab-at-nohl
Thanks for pointing this WA out. Based on your findings and studied openSUSE ignition Installer config creator I created a manual installation WA to make Leap Micro 6.0 VBox Self-install installation work. This way you don’t need to use config creator site, only need a Linux machine/VM and VBox to create the VDI file manually, and you can use Combustion script and include custom files in the image on normal way.

  • Create 20MB size IMG file
    truncate -s 20m combustion.img

  • Create FAT filesystem on image
    mkfs -t vfat combustion.img

  • Mount the image in /mnt
    mount -o loop combustion.img /mnt/

  • Label the image (FAT filesysytem) with the following:
    dosfslabel /dev/loop0 ignition
    NOTE1: ignition name is mandatory (however it’s quiet contradictive, because it’s needed for Combustion too as well. In case of Leap Micro 5.5 it was much simpler, because I created an ISO file with combustion label and via combustion directory only, and it was working fine.
    NOTE2: In case of dosfslabel (install it if missing) and /dev/loop0 can be vary on your system.

  • Create the following dir structure in /mnt

.
├── combustion/
│   ├── script
│   ├── file1.sh
│   └── file2.txt  
└── ignition/
    └── config.ign

The most important are combustion/script & ignition/config.ign files. Combustion script is a bash script actually (you can use your old one if exist) and include all files which are used in script for installation (e.g.: file1.sh, file2.txt) as a dependency.
config.ign file does not need to be populated. Only the following base content is needed:

{
  "ignition": {
    "version": "3.2.0"
  }
}

Rest of them are the same. Now you have a manually generated img file, and convert it to a VBox VDI file as follows on your VBox machine:
VBoxManage convertfromraw --format VDI combustion.img combustion.vdi

If its done, then attach beside the Self-Install media as disk image combustion.vdi:


Boot up the VM and it must be working fine!

1 Like

Reported as a bug on openSUSE bugzilla:
https://bugzilla.opensuse.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1230668

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