Why your kernel’s drm.edid_firmware parameter doesn’t work anymore in libvirt environments

The enterprise world is one that is fond of funny, crappy hardware gadgets such as KVM (Keyboard-Video-Mouse) switches, often in the matrix variant: you have one or more consoles connected matrix-style to different computers, for the obvious benefit of not having to connect keyboard, mouse and monitor when needed let alone have a set connected… Continue reading Why your kernel’s drm.edid_firmware parameter doesn’t work anymore in libvirt environments

Consistent udev storage names during and after OS installation: when minimal is too minimal

Getting your custom OS installation ISO to boot from both DVDs and USB sticks is but the first step in making the whole installation working from USB sticks as well. There can still be unexpected pitfalls in the course of the installation process as I encountered yesterday and while my experience was with a specific… Continue reading Consistent udev storage names during and after OS installation: when minimal is too minimal

Recreating ISOs that boot from both DVD and mass storage such as USB sticks and in both legacy BIOS and UEFI environments

This may seem to some of you like a blast from a long forgotten past but that’s what an Enterprise world often looks like: I’ve been seeing scripting that creates a custom Linux installation ISO from given public images, adds extra software repositories, install automation, provisioning for delegating to a dedicated config management tool (Puppet,… Continue reading Recreating ISOs that boot from both DVD and mass storage such as USB sticks and in both legacy BIOS and UEFI environments

Autoyast: Retaining/reusing existing partitions

If you plan to do automated installs of openSUSE or SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES), you will sooner or later meet their installation automation solution, Autoyast. Since there is not much info on the Web on Autoyast control files and scripts apart from the official documentation, I thought I could contribute some of my own… Continue reading Autoyast: Retaining/reusing existing partitions