Choosing which OS image to build from

[macanics]

After successfully building images with the 10.7.2 MAS Lion installESD, I’ve found a new iMac will not boot from the image – it gets the question-mark folder. I’ve used the same image on a new MacBook Air with no problem. Guessing that a change to 10.7.3 would be advisable, and cut down on the updates required post-install with a new image, I ran import.py on the new 10.7.3 MAS installer. I got the 11D50 file in InstalleFiles/InstallerDiscs as expected. However, with 2 files now in this folder, running the build chain that include the Vanilla catalog chooses the 10.7.2 image by default, rather than the more recent 10.7.3. The Vanilla catalog includes all the build numbers (I svn’d the latest build of InstaDMG). I’d like to keep the older installer until testing is finished, so what’s the official way of making the base image choice – I haven’t been able to spot that in the documentation.

cheers, —john—

[bw38]

Try to take out the build number of the older installer from the 10.7 catalog. My guess is that it goes through those numbers in sequential order so an older build will probably be used first. You could try to:
1. get rid of it completely and add it back when you’re done.
2. put the older build number at the end of that line.
3. cut (move) the older build number and paste it in a separate line but comment it out in the catalog.

Let me know if any of those work.

[macanics]

All interesting solutions, I had resorted to just leaving 11D50 by itself and deleting the others. I was hoping there would be some other command. Since I make a build specific copy of the Vanilla catalog, I guess that’s all that’s needed. I just wanted to check I wasn’t missing something obvious, or doing something that would trip me up later.
Thanks!

[Allister Banks]

Hey, just wanted to chime in with two points:

1. There’s no need for importdisk.py as of Lion, since InstallESD.dmg requires no modification
2. There is a -I option (to specify the path to which installer disk to use) available when manually running instadmg.bash, but it is not exposed to instaUp2Date.py presently, although as bw38 mentions, just reducing the InstallerDiscBuilds line to the OS you’d like to use should work(haven’t tested)

Allister

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