With the release of F34 it became evident as a problem that recommended packages are not included in the full-install iso image, but are included in net-install. It was decided years ago to keep the iso file small enough for a standard DVD.
In the case of release 34, this now led to significant last minute problems with the cockpit-storaged module. It surprisingly displayed neither a device list nor iscsi devices. This made the module largely unusable for administration purposes. (see: https://lists.fedoraproject.org/archives/list/server@lists.fedoraproject.org/thread/GSJM6TE76QKSNPNU7EX63AATOB4ZP5IU/ )
The reason was that an important package is now "recommended". Therefore it got not included in the full-install image, but included in net-install. These types of issues may become more common as "small footprint" has become an important feature in the age of containerization since that said decision.
There are at least 3 solution options:
(a) Dropping the limit of DVD capacity
For some time now, server hardware has been shipped without a DVD drive. Their decreased importance might not justify this hard limit anymore. Older hardware without USB boot ability is still supported by net-install.
On the other hand, the size of the iso image should be reasonably limited. We should avoid a bloated and frayed image.
(b) Dropping additional installation options
We keep the DVD capacity limit, install recommended packages, but drop additional installation options down to reaching the capacity limit again.
Candidates for omission:
1) Containerization – we don't include Virtualization either 2) Domain Membership – same type as containerization / virtualization 3) Server System Administration – we already includes the most important tools
(c) Distribution-wide refinement of 'Recommended'
According to Martin Pitt: Recommends: ... does work without it, but with less features.
Formally, this is correct in the case of cockpit-storaged.
It works: Yes, it displays a widget, albeit an empty one. You can even create a partition, though no longer use it (by creating a file system or a volume group).
Less features: Indeed, if sensible usefulness is a feature worth recommending nowadays in the world of 'apps'.
DVD-5 is the common 12cm diameter DVD single-sided, single-layer disc with capacity of 4.7G - including DVD-R, DVD-RW, DVD+R, DVD+RW. Compare to: Fedora-Server-dvd-x86_64-Rawhide-20210804.n.0.iso 2021-08-04 08:34 2.1G
Fedora-Server-dvd-x86_64-Rawhide-20210804.n.0.iso 2021-08-04 08:34 2.1G
Would "recommends" increase the size by more than 2.5G?
As I understand Stephen Gallagher, the idea of size limitation is not just, or even at all, about the physical size of the DVD. In many parts of the world, access to the Internet is very limited, even in parts of the US and Europe. To ensure feasible access to Fedora everywhere, the size of the download file should / must be as small as possible. NetInstall with its already much smaller file size is not an alternative under these conditions, as the Internet connection in these regions is not only slow, but also very unreliable.
I think this argument is valid and worth following.
A maximum size of 2 GB was or is therefore a "rule of thumb".
Depending on how big the installation ISO grows, we want to discuss and decide whether we want to omit something else. But before we rack our brains over that, we wanted to know what size we're actually talking about.
No one expected the answer to be that complicated and elaborate.
I'm pretty sure the answer to this is, if you don't understand comps, pungi, and lorax you should file a releng issue and be clear what is happening that shouldn't be and what should be happening that isn't, i.e. Fedora Server dvd and netinstaller ISO installations result in different outcomes (e.g. nano is not installed at all on dvd, but is in netinstaller; among other issues I assume).
This is comps for F35, specifically the start of Server Edition https://pagure.io/fedora-comps/blob/main/f/comps-f35.xml.in#_6021
This is pungi, highlighted range is for Server Edition https://pagure.io/pungi-fedora/blob/main/f/variants-fedora.xml#_37-66
But I'm not sure what else could cause them to be this different. In fact since comps no longer contains nano at all since this commit, I don't understand how anything has nano included, including netinstallers. Maybe lorax is having an effect here too?
@mohanboddu
Metadata Update from @pboy: - Issue tagged with: meeting
This could be a problem in pungi that it does not handle weak dependencies properly. But users can still install nano-default-editor after the installation and it works just fine, doesn't it? https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1955884
@lsedlar could you comment on whether pungi might have an issue handling weak dependencies properly? And how we might go about a work around or enhancement? thanks!
Metadata Update from @pboy: - Issue untagged with: meeting
Issue tagged with: pending activity
So there is an older Bugzilla bug for this: https://bugzilla.redhat.com/show_bug.cgi?id=1569242
I think it's still a live issue, and has never really been resolved. I think we tried for a brief time changing the behaviour so weak deps were pulled in, but then reverted, I don't recall why.
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