Cannot install Silverblue 30: "failed to write boot loader configuration"

Project Discussion
1

Hi all,
I am new to Fedora, or at least would like to be but I cannot get Silverblue to install onto my laptop!

  1. In the installer I choose the advanced custom partitioner to retain Windows. I create btrfs subvolumes for / and /home, I assign it an exclusive EFI partition. I try to avoid any future break points and to please the partitioner by omitting encryption and creating separate /boot (ext4) (why is that even necessary?).

  2. the installer proceeds right to the end where a popup complains:
    failed to write boot loader configuration

  3. Before closing the popup window I switch to console with ctrl-alt-F2. Because the destination filesystem is still mounted:
    –
    # chroot /mnt/sysimage/fedora/ostree/deploy/......123.0
    I notice that
    /etc/grub2-efi.cfg -> ../boot/efi/EFI/fedora/grub.cfg
    which is nonexistent (/boot/efi is mounted) and
    /etc/grub2.cfg -> ../boot/grub2/grub.cfg
    also nonexistent.
    –
    As instructed in fedoraproject.org/wiki/GRUB_2 I run
    # grub2-mkconfig -o /boot/efi/EFI/fedora/grub.cfg
    only to get this error:
    /usr/sbin/grub2-probe: error: cannot find a device for / (is /dev mounted?).
    –
    yes, /dev is mounted because it is populated with my /dev/sdaX and /dev/nvme0n1pX devices

How can I fix this please?

–
edit:
added 1741060 – F30 Silverblue installation: "failed to write boot loader configuration"

2

Last time I tried, the Silverblue installer didn’t work with btrfs, most likely this is that same issue.

3

I guess I have to learn more about ostree - I thought it would use btrfs snapshots when available!

In any way I don’t see a bug report and this seems like a very basic feature…

4

Silverblue doesn’t need to use btrfs for rollbacks, it has ostree for that…

But otherwise, yes it’s a known bug. It’s possible it might work with btrfs for /home, but I haven’t tested it.

5

I will try it with ext4 then.
How do you think I should split the space between / and /home when I have 100GB of space?
…this sounds a lot more like 2009

6

This is likely the same issue as reported here 1289752 – atomic installation on btrfs results in "failed to write boot loader configuration" error

There are some suggestions to try in the comments there, but overall it looks like btrfs is not working.

7

If space is a concern, you can forgo the separate /home partition.

8

It probably isn’t a concern so far but it’s exactly what I did in the end anyway.

So installing onto luks/ext4 works just fine by the way! Now, how to get rid of the pesky unencrypted /boot partition?
I tried moving its content to /boot dir on the root partition, commenting out the entry in /etc/fstab and running the grub2-mkconfig - it still does boot but only until I delete contets of the original boot partition
: )

9

A bug from 2015! Thank you for the link - it does seem to be a problem with grub2, ie. grub2-probe triggered by grub2-mkconfig, not just the installer then, or is it not?