Cannot get firstboot to apply, iso jumps straight to login screen

[Cameronsplaze]

I'm trying to use livemedia-creator that creates a custom iso, and let others setup/install it on their system. When testing it with virt-manager, I can't get the "install screen" to appear. It always jumps straight to the login screen. Any idea what I might be missing?

### Use network installation
url --mirrorlist="https://mirrors.fedoraproject.org/mirrorlist?repo=fedora-$releasever&arch=$basearch"
repo --name=fedora
repo --name=updates

keyboard 'us'
lang en_US.UTF-8
timezone US/Eastern

### User information
rootpw --iscrypted --lock locked

### Network Security
network --activate --bootproto=dhcp --device=link --noipv6
firewall --enabled
selinux --enforcing

### System bootloader configuration
zerombr
bootloader

### System Partition configuration
clearpart --all --initlabel
# ('part' only used when creating the ISO, gets compressed after)
part / --size=8192 --fstype="ext4" --asprimary

### enable first boot configuration
firstboot --enable --reconfig
xconfig --startxonboot

### Shutdown after installation
shutdown

### Packages to be installed
%packages --excludedocs --exclude-weakdeps
# Required for livemedia-creator:
dracut-live
glibc-all-langpacks
@anaconda-tools
# Required for firstboot --enable flag above
initial-setup
initial-setup-gui
# The environment you want:
@^kde-desktop-environment
# Everything else:
@virtualization
@core
@standard
@hardware-support
@base-x
kernel

# TODO: remove this in %post
dracut-config-generic
%end

And what I build the ISO with. It's always in a mock environment, or a GitHub action, so I use --no-virt:

livemedia-creator --ks ./fedora-example.ks --no-virt --make-iso --iso-only --iso-name fedora-example.iso --project fedora-example --volid fedora-example-39 --releasever 39 --resultdir ./Results

[jstodola]

Hi, it could be a problem with missing packages. I suggest having a look at the following example provided by lorax itself:

https://github.com/weldr/lorax/blob/master/docs/fedora-livemedia.ks

[Cameronsplaze]

Thanks! That helped me narrow down the problem, but I'm not sure what to do about it.

If you add firstboot --enable --reconfig to that file, then remove livesys from both services --enabled and %packages, firstboot works!

But if you then change it's selected environment from @^workstation-product-environment to @^kde-desktop-environment, you hit the same error as my file. Even if you also install @workstation-product-environment behind KDE to get it's dependencies. I'm guessing this is Wayland vs x11 maybe? When this "fails", the bottom said "Gnome Classic on wayland". It's not starting the KDE environment either then.

Here's the modifed kickstart from your link, if it helps. The only other change I made is bumping up part / --size=... so everything can fit:

#version=DEVEL
# X Window System configuration information
xconfig  --startxonboot
# Keyboard layouts
keyboard 'us'

# System timezone
timezone US/Eastern
# System language
lang en_US.UTF-8
# Firewall configuration
firewall --enabled --service=mdns
url --url="http://dl.fedoraproject.org/pub/fedora/linux/development/rawhide/Everything/x86_64/os/"
# Network information
network  --bootproto=dhcp --device=link --activate

### enable first boot configuration
firstboot --enable --reconfig

# SELinux configuration
selinux --enforcing

# System services
services --disabled="sshd" --enabled="NetworkManager,ModemManager"

# livemedia-creator modifications.
shutdown
# System bootloader configuration
bootloader --location=none
# Clear blank disks or all existing partitions
clearpart --all --initlabel
rootpw rootme
# Disk partitioning information
reqpart
part / --size=10000 --fstype="ext4" --asprimary

%post
# enable tmpfs for /tmp
systemctl enable tmp.mount

# make it so that we don't do writing to the overlay for things which
# are just tmpdirs/caches
# note https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1135475
cat >> /etc/fstab << EOF
vartmp   /var/tmp    tmpfs   defaults   0  0
EOF

# work around for poor key import UI in PackageKit
rm -f /var/lib/rpm/__db*
releasever=$(rpm -q --qf '%{version}\n' --whatprovides system-release)
basearch=$(uname -i)
rpm --import /etc/pki/rpm-gpg/RPM-GPG-KEY-fedora-$releasever-$basearch
echo "Packages within this LiveCD"
rpm -qa --qf '%{size}\t%{name}-%{version}-%{release}.%{arch}\n' |sort -rn
# Note that running rpm recreates the rpm db files which aren't needed or wanted
rm -f /var/lib/rpm/__db*

# go ahead and pre-make the man -k cache (#455968)
/usr/bin/mandb

# make sure there aren't core files lying around
rm -f /core*

# remove random seed, the newly installed instance should make it's own
rm -f /var/lib/systemd/random-seed

# convince readahead not to collect
# FIXME: for systemd

echo 'File created by kickstart. See systemd-update-done.service(8).' \
    | tee /etc/.updated >/var/.updated

# Remove the rescue kernel and image to save space
# Installation will recreate these on the target
rm -f /boot/*-rescue*

# Remove machine-id on pre generated images
rm -f /etc/machine-id
touch /etc/machine-id

%end

# Architecture specific packages
# The bootloader package requirements are different, and kde-desktop-environment
# is only available on x86_64
%pre
PKGS=/tmp/arch-packages.ks
echo > $PKGS
ARCH=$(uname -m)
case $ARCH in
    x86_64)
        echo "%packages" >> $PKGS
        echo "@^kde-desktop-environment" >> $PKGS
        echo "shim" >> $PKGS
        echo "shim-ia32" >> $PKGS
        echo "grub2" >> $PKGS
        echo "grub2-efi" >> $PKGS
        echo "grub2-efi-ia32" >> $PKGS
        echo "grub2-efi-*-cdboot" >> $PKGS
        echo "efibootmgr" >> $PKGS
        echo "%end" >> $PKGS
    ;;
    aarch64)
        echo "%packages" >> $PKGS
        echo "efibootmgr" >> $PKGS
        echo "grub2-efi-aa64-cdboot" >> $PKGS
        echo "shim-aa64" >> $PKGS
        echo "%end" >> $PKGS
    ;;
    ppc64le)
        echo "%packages" >> $PKGS
        echo "powerpc-utils" >> $PKGS
        echo "grub2-tools" >> $PKGS
        echo "grub2-tools-minimal" >> $PKGS
        echo "grub2-tools-extra" >> $PKGS
        echo "grub2-ppc64le" >> $PKGS
        echo "%end" >> $PKGS
    ;;
    s390x)
        echo "%packages" >> $PKGS
        echo "s390utils-base" >> $PKGS
        echo "%end" >> $PKGS
    ;;
esac
%end

%include /tmp/arch-packages.ks

%packages

@anaconda-tools
@workstation-product-environment
aajohan-comfortaa-fonts
anaconda
anaconda-install-env-deps
anaconda-live
dracut-config-generic
dracut-live
glibc-all-langpacks
kernel
# Make sure that DNF doesn't pull in debug kernel to satisfy kmod() requires
kernel-modules
kernel-modules-extra
-@dial-up
-@input-methods
-@standard
-gfs2-utils
-gnome-boxes
%end

[jstodola]

I'm not familiar enough with building livemedia with desktop environments to help further, but there are kickstart files for creating Fedora live KDE (and other) media, so they might help. Start with this one and check the other ones that are included via the %include kickstart command:
https://pagure.io/fedora-kickstarts/blob/main/f/fedora-live-kde.ks

[Cameronsplaze]

I don't see any firstboot flags in that ks, or any down the chain. It'll be a few days for me to be ready to flatten it, and then modify/debug probably. Thanks for the pointer!