Release notes
This document describes major installer-related changes in Fedora releases.
Fedora 38
Changes in the graphical interface
Modernized welcome screen on Live CD
The welcome screen on Live CD has been changed to follow the current design patterns, as well as fit better into the surrounding GTK4-based interface. See the pull request #4616 for more information.
Improved configuration of additional repositories in GUI
Configuration of additional repositories in the graphical user interface has been improved. The protocol selection is now replaced with a drop-down menu of source actions. The screen also shows only configuration options relevant to the selected source action. See the pull request #4498 for more details.
Installation source errors are visible again
Previously, errors related to contents of the Installation Source screen did not cause the error message bar to appear at the bottom of the screen. As a consequence, users could not review the error messages and immediately correct the errors on the screen. The error message bar now appears correctly when errors occur. As a result, users can immediately notice errors in the Installation Source screen and correct them. See the pull request #4501.
Japanese translation fits the whole screen
Previously, using Anaconda in Japanese caused the main screen elements to use larger font than in other languages. As a consequence, the user settings were hidden outside the visible screen area and required scrolling. The sizing has been corrected, and Japanese users can now see the user settings icon and description even on the smallest supported screen sizes again. See the pull request #4325.
Architecture and hardware support changes
Do not pass the rd.znet boot argument on to the installed system unconditionally
With this change, the rd.znet boot argument is no longer passed on to the installed system unconditionally on IBM Z systems and the network device is configured and activated after switchroot by udev/NetworkManager. When networking is needed early in initramfs (like in a case of the root file system on iSCSI), rd.znet is automatically added to the kernel command line of the installed via a different mechanism. See the pull request #4303.
The dmraid and nodmraid boot options are removed
The inst.dmraid and inst.nodmraid boot options have been removed. These options no longer
controlled any functionality, after Anaconda started using mdadm instead of dmraid.
See the pull request #4517 and the related
Fedora Change.
Biosboot partition verification
The biosboot partition is now verified on all installation target disks. This improves support for booting from an array. See the pull request #4277.
Multiple bootloader devices on the Manual Partitioning screen
With this change, the graphical interface displays correctly all bootloader devices on the Manual Partitioning screen. See the pull request #4271.
Payload changes
Add support for OSTree native containers
Fedora is adding a new enhanced container support for the (rpm-)ostree stack to natively support OCI/Docker containers as a transport and delivery mechanism for operating system content. Anaconda now supports these containers by a new kickstart command ostreecontainer. See the pull request #4617, Fedora Change and Pykickstart.
rpm-ostree now validates checksums for local repositories
Previously, rpm-ostree installations verified checksums only for installations from a remote repository, while installations from local repositories did not verify the checksums. As a consequence, rpm-ostree installations from local repositories could install corrupted data without any indication. This behavior is now unified, and Anaconda verifies checksums for all rpm-ostree repositories. As a result, all rpm-ostree installations are now protected against installing corrupted data. See the pull request #4357 for more information.
Kickstart support
Creating hibernation swap from kickstart
The new autopart (...) --hibernation kickstart option creates a swap partition with an
automatically determined size that is big enough for hibernation.
See the pull request #4275.
General changes
Faster core dumps
Previously, Anaconda used a custom setup for handling tracebacks and saving core dumps. This is
now realized by using the faulthandler Python module and the systemd-coredump service.
As a result, the same debugging data is still available, while the installation environment
becomes responsive significantly sooner after tracebacks. As a side effect, the logs from Anaconda
and the installation environment now contain different error messages.
See the pull request #4350 for more information.
The Web UI of Anaconda is now packaged in Fedora
Anaconda team is working for some time on the new Web UI frontend for the installer and to make this in development Web UI more accessible to people we decided to add this as a new package to Fedora repositories. To be able to consume this Web UI, you need to build ISO with the Web UI package and add kernel boot arguments inst.webui. This package is not included in the existing Fedora images by default. See the pull request #4269.
Fedora 37
General changes
GPT is the default disk label type
Fedora Linux systems installed on legacy x86 BIOS systems will get GPT partitioning by default instead of legacy MBR partitioning. This should be a new default for all products. See the Fedora Change for more info.
Read-only /sysroot on RPM OSTree systems
The RPM OSTree installations set the /sysroot mount point as read-only instead of read-write
to make the newly installed systems more robust. Users and administrators are not expected to
directly interact with the content available there and should use the available interfaces to
manage their system. See the pull request
and the Fedora Change.
Anaconda doesn’t copy /etc/resolv.conf to systems
Anaconda does not copy the /etc/resolv.conf file from the installation environment to
the installed system anymore. Creating the file is a business of systemd-resolved or
the Network Manager. Anaconda is not going to interfere into this process anymore.
Currently the file is created by systemd-resolved package during the installation.
See the pull requests #3814 and
#3818.
Correct SELinux contexts on existing home directories
Previously, the installer set incorrect SELinux contexts on home directory contents when reusing home directory from previous installation. The contexts are now set correctly. See the pull request.
Enabled hibernation on arm64 with swap
Previously, the installer enabled resume from hibernation by adding kernel command line option
resume=swap_device only on the x86 architecture family. With this change, the same is done
also for the arm64 architecture. As a result, devices of the arm64 architecture are now able to
correctly resume from hibernation.
See the pull request.
Changed default swap size for large-memory systems
The default swap size on systems with 64 GiB or more RAM is 32 GiB now. Previously, it was 4 GiB. See the pull request.
Removed some scripts provided by Anaconda
The following undocumented installed scripts were removed from anaconda packages:
/usr/bin/analog/usr/bin/restart-anaconda
The following unused development scripts were removed from the Anaconda repository:
run_boss_locally.pyanaconda-read-journallist-screensmake-sphinx-docs
Changes in the graphical interface
The media verification dialog is improved
Previously, the media verification dialog indicated a good or bad media check result using the same sentence, differing only in presence of a single “not”. Additionally, the dialog did not visually change much upon completion of the check. Consequently, it was not easy to interpret the result of the media check, or even see if it was finished.
The dialog now uses a large icon to signal whether the media is good or not, and while the check is running, this icon is absent. As a result, it is now possible to easily tell the state of the media check. See the pull request and the screenshot.
Improved calculation of the space estimation
During automatic partitioning the disk spoke estimates the space required for the installation and if there isn’t enough free space it display a warning dialog suggesting more space should be reclaimed. This estimate included the recommended swap size even when swap wasn’t configured to be created. See the bug 2068290.
The zFCP dialog supports NPIV-enabled devices
The “Add zFCP” dialog supports NPIV-enabled zFCP devices. NPIV-enabled devices are activated just by using the device ID. The kernel module will detect the WWPNs and LUNs and bring all the devices up automatically. This means the user doesn’t have to provide the WWPN and LUN IDs. See the pull request.
The timezone map doesn’t show borders
Anaconda is not showing timezone borders in the Time & Date spoke. The map is white now. See the bug 2103657
Changes in the kickstart support
Prompt for a missing passphrase in GUI
If the kickstart file defines a partitioning that requires a passphrase, the graphical user interface shows a dialog that allows users to provide the missing passphrase. The installation automatically continues after the passphrase is provided. It works the same way in the text user interface. See the pull request.
rootpw --allow-ssh is supported
Use the --allow-ssh option of rootpw kickstart command to allow remote logins of the
root user via SSH using only the password. This is disabled by default for the security reasons,
so be aware of risks. See the pull request
and the Fedora Change
for the default behaviour.
zfcp --devnum= is supported
The zfcp kickstart command supports NPIV-enabled zFCP devices. NPIV-enabled devices are
activated just by using the device ID. The kernel module will detect the WWPNs and LUNs and
bring all the devices up automatically. This means the user doesn’t have to provide the WWPN
and LUN IDs:
zfcp --devnum=<device_number>
See the pull request for more info.
Changes in Anaconda options
inst.gpt is deprecated
Use the inst.disklabel boot option to specify a preferred disk label type. Specify gpt
to prefer creation of GPT disk labels. Specify mbr to prefer creation of MBR disk labels if
supported. The inst.gpt boot option is deprecated and will be removed in future releases.
See the pull request.
Changes in Anaconda configuration files
The gpt option is replaced
The default value of the preferred disk label type is specified by the disk_label_type
option in the Anaconda configuration files. The gpt configuration option is no longer
supported. See the pull request.
The decorated_window option is removed
The decorated_windows option is removed from Anaconda’s configuration files.
It was never requested and we have no evidence that it was used.
See the pull request.
The enable_ignore_broken_packages option is removed
The enable_ignore_broken_packages option in Anaconda’s configuration files is removed.
The pykickstart decides whether the %packages --ignorebroken feature is supported or not.
See the pull request.
The blivet_gui_supported option is removed
The support for Blivet-GUI will be disabled automatically if it is not installed.
Use the hidden_spokes option of the User Interface section to disable it explicitly.
See the pull request.
The can_detect_unsupported_hardware and can_detect_support_removed options were removed
The support for detection of unsupported hardware is no longer available. See the pull request for more info.
Fedora 36
General changes
The help support is unified
The help support on RHEL and Fedora uses new mapping files with a unified format. The mappings files are located in the root of the help directory. For example for RHEL, they are expected to be at:
/usr/share/anaconda/help/rhel/anaconda-gui.json
/usr/share/anaconda/help/rhel/anaconda-tui.json
The mapping files contain data about the available help content.
The UI screens are identified by a unique screen id returned by
the get_screen_id method, for example installation-summary.
The help content is defined by a relative path to a help file and
(optionally) a name of an anchor in the help file.
For example:
{
"_comment_": [
"This is a comment",
"with multiple lines."
],
"_default_": {
"file": "default-help.xml",
"anchor": "",
},
"installation-summary": {
"file": "anaconda-help.xml",
"anchor": "",
},
"user-configuration": {
"file": "anaconda-help.xml",
"anchor": "creating-a-user-account"
}
}
The default_help_pages configuration option is removed. The helpFile attribute is removed
from the UI classes. See the pull request for more info.
Changes in the graphical interface
Users are administrators by default
In the User spoke, the “Make this user administrator” checkbox is now checked by default. This improves installation experience for users who do not know and need to rely on the default values to guide them. See the Users are admins by default change.
Keyboard configuration is disabled on Live media with Wayland
The keyboard switching in the Anaconda installer on the Live media did not behave as expected on Wayland based environments (#2016613). When users changed the keyboard layout configuration that configuration was reflected in the Live environment. However, if users pressed modifier keys (CTRL or SHIFT) the keyboard specified by the Anaconda installer was changed back for the Live environment. That is the result of how the Wayland protocol handles keyboard layout.
To avoid this unexpected behavior Anaconda will no longer control keyboard layout configuration of the Live systems on Wayland Live environment. The keyboard configuration set by Anaconda on the Live environment will be reflected only to the installed system. This means that users have to pay attention that their passwords are written by the correct layout in the installer running inside the Live environment to be able to use the password in the system after installation.
Changes in the kickstart support
The %anaconda section is removed
The support for the deprecated %anaconda section is removed. Use Anaconda configuration files instead.
ANA_INSTALL_PATH is deprecated
The ANA_INSTALL_PATH environment variable is deprecated. The support for this variable will be removed in future releases. Use the /mnt/sysroot path in your kickstart scripts instead. See the Installation mount points documentation.
Changes in Anaconda options
inst.nompath is deprecated
The inst.nompath boot option is deprecated. It has not been doing anything useful for some time already.
Changes in Anaconda configuration files
Saving Anaconda’s data to target system
Anaconda configuration file format now includes additional options to control what is saved to the target system.
The options are:
# Should we copy input kickstart to target system?
can_copy_input_kickstart = True
# Should we save kickstart equivalent to installation settings to the new system?
can_save_output_kickstart = True
# Should we save logs from the installation to the new system?
can_save_installation_logs = True
The default values above cause no change in behavior, the new options are only another way to configure the behavior.
Fedora 35
General changes
Limited support for braille devices
The Server image (boot.iso) now contains the brltty accessibility software. This means that some braille output devices can be automatically detected and used. This feature works only in text mode, started with the inst.text boot option. See the bug.
Visible warnings in initrd
Installation shows critical warnings raised in Dracut/initrd again when Anaconda is starting or when Dracut starts to timeout. This should help users to resolve installation issues by avoiding that the important message was scrolled out too fast. See the bug.
Changes in the graphical interface
New look of the NTP server dialog
The NTP server dialog has been redesigned. The new look uses more traditional approach to management of lists (such as in hexchat). See the pull request.
The set of controls to add a new server is no longer present. Instead, a “blank” new server is added by clicking an “add” button. The details can be filled in by editing the server in the list, as was already possible.
The method to remove a server is now more intuitive. Users can simply click the “remove” button and the server is instantly removed from the list. Previously, users had to uncheck the “Use” checkbox for the server in the list and confirm the dialog.
New look of the root configuration screen
The root configuration screen has been redesigned and is no longer ambiguous. All root account options are visible only if root account is enabled. The new layout also contains text to let users understand their choices. See the pull request.
Changes in the text interface
The packaging log in tmux tabs
Add a new tab to the tmux session starting the Anaconda installer. This new tab will follows
the /tmp/packaging.log log file. This change should make it easier for users to spot software
installation errors. See the pull request.
Changes in Anaconda configuration files
Replacement of product configuration files
The support for the product configuration files was removed and replaced with profiles. See the Fedora change and the documentation.
Each profile can be identified by a unique id and it can define additional options for
the automated profile detection. The profile will be chosen based on the inst.profile
boot option, or based on the ID and VARIANT_ID options of the os-release files.
The profile configuration files are located in the /etc/anaconda/profile.d/ directory.
The inst.product and inst.variant boot options are deprecated.
Options for Anaconda DBus module activation
We have introduced new configuration options that affect the detection and activation of
the Anaconda DBus modules. Use the activatable_modules option to specify Anaconda DBus
modules that can be activated. Use the forbidden_modules option to specify modules that
are not allowed to run. Use the optional_modules to specify modules that can fail to run
without aborting the installation.
The DBus modules can be specified by a DBus name or by a prefix of the name that ends with an asterisk. For example:
org.fedoraproject.Anaconda.Modules.Timezone
org.fedoraproject.Anaconda.Addons.*
The addons_enabled and kickstart_modules options are deprecated and will be removed
in the future.
See the pull request.