[packagechooser] netinstall-add method

[udeved]

Describe the bug
If I set the packagechooser to netinstall-add, the netinstall module somehow gets a wrong datalist passed resulting is an empty item shown.
My suspicion would be, the GS value written does not match the netinstall required group data, the netgroup itself is listitem[0] of netinstallAdd GS. I think only the actual netinstall data should be written to GS? It would explain the attached screenshot, which is a slight showstopper atm.

To Reproduce
Steps to reproduce the behavior:

• set 'netinstall-add' in packagechooser, define some choice and netinstall item list in the conf
• example used:

items:
    - id: OpenRC
      name: openrc
      description: "OpenRC init system"
      screenshot: ":/images/calamares.png"
      netinstall:
        groups:
            - name: "OpenRC"
              description: "OpenRC init system"
              selected: false
              critical: true
              immutable: false
              expanded: true
              hidden: false
              packages:
                - audit-openrc

Expected behavior
The netinstall view should show the netgroup passed, and possible be expanded like set in the yaml

Screenshots and Logs

Additional context
version 3.3.0 using qt5/kf5 artix linux build

[adriaandegroot]

That's a pretty clear description of the issue, thanks.

[dalto8]

You don't use groups with netinstall-add. It basically takes the contents of a single group for each packagechooser item.

Try removing groups and not have array items directly under it. So:

netinstall:
              name: "OpenRC"
              description: "OpenRC init system"
              selected: false
              critical: true
              immutable: false
              expanded: true
              hidden: false
              packages:
                - audit-openrc

[udeved]

Try removing groups and not have array items directly under it. So:

Have you tried that?
That's not gonna fix it, no GS will be written, and a warning printed that it is not valid netinstall data if you remove the group.

[dalto8]

Have you tried that?

For reference, here is the config for EndeavourOS which uses netinstall-add: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/endeavouros-team/calamares/calamares/data/eos/modules/packagechooser.conf

That's not gonna fix it, no GS will be written, and a warning printed that it is not valid netinstall data if you remove the group.

You need to also take out the array below group.

[udeved]

You need to also take out the array below group.

Ok, this works, thanks, but I don't know if this is still a bug?
The netinstall data passed doesn't comply with the expected data and documentation.
I guess it depends if this needs fixing or updating documentation.

[dalto8]

That is definitely how it was designed to work. It adds a group and as a result expects the yaml to be the contents of a group.

That is what this means:

   The data in this field should follow the format of a group
   from the netinstall module documented in
   src/modules/netinstall/netinstall.conf.

Perhaps we could add an example to make it more clear.

[udeved]

That is what this means

Yes, but the crucial detail is to not have a sequence like netinstall yaml, but a netinstall map.

documented is ...

- name: foo

but to work:

name: foo

Anyhow, at least no show stopper any longer and I can move on. :)

[udeved]

@adriaandegroot

I would probably make this a related feature request to have the yaml definitions in a online yaml file similar to netinstall for the packagechooser.
I doubt I have the time, but if, I give it a shot including the netinstall LoaderQueue. However, this would require the data source to be "fixed" to yaml netinstall definitions.

Possible example:

items:
    - id: Foo
      name: foo
      description: "Foo description"
      screenshot: ":/images/foo.png"
      netinstall:
        groupsUrl: myurl/data.yaml

Next screenshot would have application for a packagechooser item groupsUrl, where the init package definitions are loaded from url rather than local file.

[dalto8]

documented is ...

- name: foo

but to work:

name: foo

It isn't actually different than what is documented. The groups element in netinstall yaml contains a list of groups.

However, the netinstall-add functionality requires a single group. The - indicates a list element. Using a - in the netinstall-add section would be incorrect.

[udeved]

There is another little shortcoming in the netinstall-add method.
If whatever the choice by packagechooser has conflicting packages associated to the selected value, it would be nice to eventually have a conf property to clear the global storage if "back" button is used to make a different choice if mode: required.
At the moment, the choices are merged in the packageOperations GS.