Bug 1195674

Summary:	Partitioner will not create a new volume group
Product:	[openSUSE] openSUSE Tumbleweed	Reporter:	Lars Marowsky-Bree <lmb>
Component:	Installation	Assignee:	E-mail List <yast2-maintainers>
Status:	RESOLVED NORESPONSE	QA Contact:	Jiri Srain <jsrain>
Severity:	Normal
Priority:	P5 - None	CC:	ancor, lmb
Version:	Current	Flags:	ancor: needinfo? (lmb)
Target Milestone:	---
Hardware:	Other
OS:	Other
Whiteboard:
Found By:	---	Services Priority:
Business Priority:		Blocker:	---
Marketing QA Status:	---	IT Deployment:	---

Description Lars Marowsky-Bree 2022-02-08 11:21:28 UTC

Installing Tumbleweed on a system with both an internal storage device (NVMe, if that matters) and an external one (USB storage).

The external device uses LVM. I wanted to create a new VG on the internal storage device.

This was not possible - the installer detected the external device/VG (good), and then insisted that that was the VG my root volume should be on if I flipped the "use LVM" box (bad).

The workaround is easy enough (disconnect the external storage device before install), but I don't think it should be necessary.

Comment 1 Ancor Gonzalez Sosa 2022-02-08 13:18:11 UTC

Are you really referring to the Expert Partitioner here or just the Guided Setup?

With the Partitioner it should be possible to setup any possible configuration. If that's not the case, please attach YaST logs to see the concrete error.

If you only mean that is unexpected that the Guided Setup tries to reuse existing volume groups, then I agree... but is a very sensitive topic with confronted opinions. More than you may think.

Historically the SLE-12 proposal (and likely the SLE-11 one and even before) always reused existing volume groups when the "Use LVM" checkbox was ticked. We tried to change that in SLE-15 (since we were rewriting the whole storage stack of the installer anyways) and we had to revert to the original behavior due to popular demand.

We have this Trello card to summarize the situation.
https://trello.com/c/Ib7QC298/19-proposal-strategy-for-reusing-stuff-in-proposal-bug1091998-and-others

So if you really had problems with the Partitioner itself to create your custom setup please attach logs as already requested to continue investigation.

But if you only used the Guided Setup and your point is that reusing the VG was unexpected in that case, I will add your bug to the list of opinions/scenarios in the already mentioned card (with no concrete promise about when the topic will be really addressed as a whole).

Comment 2 Lars Marowsky-Bree 2022-02-10 11:27:55 UTC

Hmmm, it's a good question. I'll try to get to reproduce for more clarity.

It definitely started with the "Guided Setup" - that'd detect the existing Volume Group and didn't give me an option whether I wanted to create a new one on another device. (Both have merit, and perhaps there should be a choice?)

I also think that I did, indeed, try the expert partitioner - but that even there, when I selected the LVM option, it'd pick up on the existing VG and not give me a choice. I'll try to reproduce this part.

Comment 3 Ancor Gonzalez Sosa 2022-02-24 12:29:31 UTC

(In reply to Lars Marowsky-Bree from comment #2)
> Hmmm, it's a good question. I'll try to get to reproduce for more clarity.

Please, reopen when you are able to shed that light. ;-)