File "alez-downloader.sh" referenced in ISO self-creation instructions txt no longer exists in repo

[pmarreck]

ALEZ/create-alez-iso.txt

Line 48 in cbda8a4

# cp alez-downloader.sh ~/aleziso/airootfs/usr/local/bin/alez

Basically, I want to play with a build of this. ;)

[pmarreck]

I did investigate the git history and I see this closed issue referenced #42 which seems to indicate that Docker is now the recommended way to get an updated ISO file?

[pmarreck]

Update: I tried the Docker method and couldn't get a build to complete, error on step 14/17:

~/ALEZ> docker build -t alezbuild .
# ...
Step 14/17 : RUN sed -i '\;cp\ \"\${work_dir}/x86_64/airootfs/usr/share/licenses/amd-ucode/LICENSE\";d' "${ALEZ_BUILD_DIR}/iso/build.sh" &&     sed -i '\;\"\${work_dir}/iso/${install_dir}/boot/amd_ucode.LICENSE\";d' "${ALEZ_BUILD_DIR}/iso/build.sh"
 ---> Running in 1fc2a727abd0
sed: can't read /opt/alez/iso/build.sh: No such file or directory

[pmarreck]

I'd be willing to help update this and submit a PR but I'm more of an Elixir dev and not a sysadmin (for example, I didn't understand SOME of the bash syntax in alez.sh, but I could probably figure it out, just a lot quicker with someone else... also, so much of that could have been done more readably (think: long-term maintenance) in another scripting language, but I get (kinda) why people still write Bash scripts... also, docker has been updated quite a bit since this so for example the VOLUME directive in the Dockerfile is very much actively discouraged, etc..). Pinging @johnramsden , not sure if you're still motivated and you're probably busy with school but let me know if you want to pow-wow since you made all the last commits to this.

Lastly, I'd recommend going with ONE OFFICIAL way of generating the ISO yourself instead of "maybe this bash script or maybe this dockerfile"

Lastly lastly, did something political happen with regards to ZFS and Linux distro support a year ago (other than the usual "the ZFS license is nonpermissive/still owned by Oracle")? If so, I missed the memo. A lot of zfs-related Linux projects I'm finding on ye olde Internets seem to have not been updated in over a year... might have something to do with openzfs 2.0 complicating things, or pandemic, or loss of interest, or who knows what...

[johnramsden]

Sorry for the late reply on this. I don't really have a lot of time to continue maintaining this project, and I don't believe @danboid does either. That said I'm perfectly happy to assist someone who would like to fix up whatever remaining issues there are. As well as review any new code that is required.

It was working fine before, but due to some changes to archiso, the way we were generating ISOs stopped working and I didn't have the motivation or time to get it working again.

I can try to reproduce your error this weekend, and see what might be the problem in building the image.

[pmarreck]

I get that... appreciate the response regardless! And I'm paying attention! Let me know if I can be of any assistance

[johnramsden]

@pmarreck OK, it now builds, archiso switched to mkarchiso, so changes were needed. I haven't tested building an ISO, but we're closer now, the image builds. Its possible more mkarchiso related changes are needed.

[pmarreck]

Nice, I will play with it in the next couple of days!

[pmarreck]

I was able to build it via Docker!

Will try building an ISO next but what you saw might happen is likely

[pmarreck]

[pmarreck@archvm ALEZ]$ docker run -it --rm --privileged -v /home/pmarreck/Documents/ALEZ/iso_out:/opt/alez/iso/out alezbuild
[mkarchiso] ERROR: No profile specified
usage: mkarchiso [options] <profile_dir>

seems easy enough to fix, just specify a profile_dir, but I have no idea what the concept of a "profile" is regarding mkarchiso ;)

[pmarreck]

https://www.reddit.com/r/archlinux/comments/jkg40r/archiso_build_error/

This might have the solution on how to invoke it properly now; this person had to find the answer in the mailing list archives, so I guess it wasn't terribly well documented and/or clear. Unfortunately I'm currently out of time

[pmarreck]

I got it to work!!
I added a file in the ALEZ directory called "profiledef.sh" which is basically just an unmodified copy of the releng profile (the default non-minimized ISO definition... You may want to modify values to conform to the project name etc.):

#!/usr/bin/env bash
# shellcheck disable=SC2034

iso_name="archlinux"
iso_label="ARCH_$(date +%Y%m)"
iso_publisher="Arch Linux <https://www.archlinux.org>"
iso_application="Arch Linux Live/Rescue CD"
iso_version="$(date +%Y.%m.%d)"
install_dir="arch"
bootmodes=()

I then just modified the last CMD line in the Dockerfile to pass the working directory in as a parameter:

CMD ["/usr/bin/mkarchiso", "./"]

Then I rebuilt the Docker image and reran it with:

docker build -t alezbuild .

docker run -it --rm --privileged -v /home/pmarreck/Documents/ALEZ/iso_out:/opt/alez/iso/out alezbuild

It took a few minutes (and seemed to do nothing for the first 2 minutes or so, FYI) but then the fans spun up and soon enough I had an ISO outfile!

[johnramsden]

If everything works a PR would be much appreciated

[pmarreck]

I booted off the image and trying to run the “alez” command at the root prompt gives a zsh permission error… as root… which I’ve never encountered before.

Not sure how to fix that but I can send over a WIP PR soon

[pmarreck]

PR: #70

Also, in previous comment I said "zfs" when I meant "zsh" (now edited). Important difference, that :)

[pmarreck]

I'd love to come up with an automated test that somehow persists through reboots (probably just by driving this from outside via Docker) but I'm not sure how to do procedural I/O with an interactive script running inside a Docker image... would be cool, though... it's probably googleable, maybe something like this to convert the generated ISO into a Docker image and then drive that from the outside somehow: https://www.techrepublic.com/article/how-to-convert-an-iso-to-a-docker-image/