Bug#1080207: lxde and lxqt bookworm live images fail to install without network

Hello Steve, list,

On 31/08/2024 19:47, Steve McIntyre wrote:
> Found in testing of the 12.7.0 live images.
> 
> Doing a live installation using calamares from either of these images
> fails if no network is available.

That is an openQA-scenario that I have been working on, but did not 
complete yet.

> Running /usr/sbin/bootloader-config fails to install the appropriate
> grub packages and times out after 600 seconds.

I've tested with the 12.6.0 lxde image: Calamares installs fine without 
a network device (UEFI-secure boot)
With the 12.7.0 lxde image: I've started Calamares from the console with 
the --debug commandline option, otherwise there would not be a log 
visible (the missing log issue has been fixed in newer versions of 
Calamares)
- sources-media uses 'apt-get update' and takes 1.5 minute
- bootloader-config calls 'apt-get install grub-efi-amd64' and 
'install-grub'. 'apt-get install' would have taken about 13 minutes with 
the timeouts, where it would have failed much quicker in 12.6.0

So what changed in 12.7 that makes the network time-out so slow?

> Sequence of issues:
> 
> 1. /etc/apt/sources.list for the image has deb.debian.org listed above
>     the on-media packages. Has that changed in live-build?

The 11.4 image (built with live-wrapper) only has deb.debian.org in 
/etc/apt/sources.list
There is no difference in content of sources.list between the 12.6.0 and 
12.7.0 live images.

Interestingly, the order in sources.list appears to matter.
I've recently manually tested a sid gnome image with Calamares without 
network and all lines in sources.list are attempted, until one works.
Here in the 12.7.0 lxde image, if the local repository is mentioned 
first, the installation of grub-efi-amd64 happens in a few seconds, no 
network access is being attempted.

Changing the order doesn't work for the Calamares installer, Calamares 
creates its own variant of this file when installing.

> 2. Connman is running a DNS server on 127.0.0.1, which apt uses to
>     look up deb.debian.org
> 3. That DNS server does not fail if no network is available. Instead,
>     it hangs.

This is a new regression. It should have failed quickly.

> The bootloader-config script eventually times out and the installation
> fails.
> 
> The workaround is to configure networking and then things work, but
> offline installation is an important thing for some people.

That is rather unfortunate, that a computer without network access 
cannot be upgraded to 12.7 with a live image, but needs to stay at 12.6.

Proposed fixes:
* Could you add on the down page a note for the 12.7.0 live images, 
mentioning this regression?
* Fix connman, to have a shorter timeout
* Fix Calamares, to benefit from a more suitable order of sources.list

Future prevention:
* How could this be prevented? Can a live image which will be 12.8.0 be 
prepared and tested by openQA, before the next point-release weekend?

With kind regards,
Roland Clobus

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