Questions About InstaDMG and 10.7 Lion

[Jowy]

With the imminent release of Lion, there are a lot of questions I have about how well it will play with future releases of InstaDMG. I work at an AASP where I make clean system images for use on customer computers.

Does anyone know if it will be possible to create disk utility-restorable, clean 10.7 system images? Will this new invisible recovery partition create problems? or will I be stuck using installer disc images forever? Too soon to tell?

[Allister Banks]

It is too soon to tell… publicly, but there are threads on the dev forum for most if not all of the moving parts.
instadmg ‘proper’ is bash, instaup2date is py, and both should work fine with minimal modification by all indications.

Allister

[Jowy]

Sounds promising! Thanks

[bw38]

So now that Lion is officially out, just wanted to bump this thread. Will the latest svn support Lion or is there anything we must do on our end to get it working? On the same note, will it be possible to get a Lion image with and without the recovery partition? I can see the recovery partition being useful in some cases, but not in other cases.

On the same note, I’m wondering if the recovery partition can be modified so that it recovers the Lion image that we had just created using InstaDMG rather than the generic OS installation that Lion is probably recovering from (I haven’t actually tested the recovery partition feature yet so I’m not sure what exactly it recovers to).

[Allister Banks]

Hey bw38,

So the things that work in the svn right now:
instadmg.bash, after manually setting up numbered folders, and run with the -s flag to disable jailing of the installer daemon

there is a createUser re-roll which we’ll bundle in the svn shortly
instaup2date.py requires light plumbing changes(or targeting a version of python without the specific bug we’re experiencing) due to the way modules are loaded

the Lion restore partition is just that- a separate partition, which I’m told deploystudio can handle for you(I’m working on figuring out how its hidden and how DS handles it).
You can pop open disk utility from the restore partition and run ASR by using an http url to the source image you want, or any other dmg that filesystem can see(which would probably require a trip to the terminal).

Keep ’em coming!

Allister

[bw38]

I’m a bit confused. I’ve been using InstaDMG since last Fall. What do you mean in regards to setting up numbered folders? Maybe it’s just me, but I’ve never actually run instadmg.bash (directly anyways) so I’m not sure what you mean when referring to using the -s flag for it.

I’ve always used instaup2date.py (which I presume calls instadmg.bash to handle the OS stuff) to create the OS image with packages. I could be completely off here, but should I then be running:
sudo instaup2date.py -p -s custom.catalog

Sorry if I’m misunderstanding anything here. I know that both InstaUp2Date and InstaDMG are two different components that work together, but I just need some clarification here.

Also of interest, I know for the longest it’s always been recommended to avoid building images on OS X Server. I’m wondering if that is still the case with Lion since it appears the server component is just an app itself.

Thanks again for any clarification you can provide.

[Allister Banks]

This is great! Keep ’em coming worked! Yes, things would be confusing, they certainly still are for me.

Running InstaDMG ‘ol skool’, meaning just calling instadmg.bash instead of having instaUp2Date.py call it for you), is outlined by the guide in the documentation folder(start with the section titled ‘Procedurals’), á la:[code]sudo instadmg.bash -s[/code] I just found a typo in the guide, so I can surely revise it with any recommendations you may have.

I’m working on the Lion updates for instaup2date.py, but I need to test on 10.5 and 6 at the same time.

As of Lion, consider our encouragement not to run on [i]server software[/i] lifted. Server [u]HARDWARE[/u] on the other hand, as long as its not in production, is… still less than ideal to use. You need I/O to pump out images in a timely fashion, and tinkering with RAID and screaming SSD’s should happen on a machine you can reboot at will, and don’t need up to provide services on your network. Right?

Allister

[Tim Sutton]

To second that, my current build hardware is a spare 2009 Mini server with internal drives in RAID0, and a FW800 disk for scratch.

I’d love to have something faster, but it’s what I’ve got and it works fine.

[nobrainer]

Am I reading this right? The instadmg.bash work with the Lion installer file as long as we don’t use instaup2date?

[Allister Banks]

Yes. Custom packages also require the -s flag.

Allister

[typofonic]

[quote]there is a createUser re-roll which we’ll bundle in the svn shortly
instaup2date.py requires light plumbing changes(or targeting a version of python without the specific bug we’re experiencing) due to the way modules are loaded[/quote]
—–
Not to be pushy, but any timeframes on these two (createUser and instaup2date.py)?

P.S. Don’t know why the quotes on the post I’m answering doesn’t show up…

[Allister Banks]

As soon as I can. MagerValp may approve us bundling his createUser re-roll, and he’s posted a patch to the dev list for instaup2date, so you can help whenever you get a chance, it’d be greatly appreciated!

Allister

[typofonic]

[QUOTE][u]Quote by: Allister[/u][p]As soon as I can. MagerValp may approve us bundling his createUser re-roll, and he’s posted a patch to the dev list for instaup2date, so you can help whenever you get a chance, it’d be greatly appreciated!

Allister[/p][/QUOTE]

What can I help with?

[Allister Banks]

Take MagerValp’s patch(found here, at the bottom of his post:)
[url]http://code.google.com/p/instadmg/issues/detail?id=92[/url]
and apply it to the newest svn download. Then change line 50 to have ‘disable_installd_chroot=false’ and try running instaup2date.py

And if you don’t have MagerValp’s createUser for Lion, please let me know. Thanks,
Allister

[typofonic]

[QUOTE][u]Quote by: Allister[/u][p]Take MagerValp’s patch(found here, at the bottom of his post:)
[url]http://code.google.com/p/instadmg/issues/detail?id=92[/url]
and apply it to the newest svn download. Then change line 50 to have ‘disable_installd_chroot=false’ and try running instaup2date.py

And if you don’t have MagerValp’s createUser for Lion, please let me know. Thanks,
Allister[/p][/QUOTE]

Great! I will try that. I don’t have createuser though?

[Author]

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