Manual Partitioning during Installation: Mount Point Selection screen not updated after multiple partition attempts

[Johnathan Zhuang]

This bug only appear when the user opts to manually partition their harddrive.

The two screens in sequence prior to installation confirmation are:
1) Hard drive partitioning
2) Mount Point Selection

At screen (2), if the user decides to return to (1) via the back button. Any changes they make to the drive partition will not take effect in the drop down list of partitions in (2).

Example of steps to replicate error:
Step 1.
At screen (1) the following partition was created for a 40GB harddrive
a-i) ext3, 39GB, label: /
a-ii) linux-swap, 1GB, label: swap

Step 2.
Click next to proceed to screen (2)
Examine the drop down offered. Two options should be possible, made up of (a-i) and (a-ii) from above

Step 3.
Go back to screen (1) via back button.

Step 4.
Repartition harddrive so that the final format is:
b-i) ext3, 30GB, label: /home
b-ii) ext3, 9GB, label: /
b-iii) linux-swap, 1GB, label: swap

Step 5.
Repeat Step 2. Note how the drop down still retains the listing of (a-i) and (a-ii) instead of the new harddrive partition layout.

WORKROUND:
At Step 4. "Commit" the partition changes. Exit & restart installer. Screen (2) will subsequently be updated with the newest harddrive partition layout.

[Colin Watson (cjwatson)]

Yes, your analysis is quite right; this is a known bug that unfortunately can only really be fixed sanely by rewriting the partitioner. Fortunately, that's on the agenda for Edgy (https://launchpad.net/distros/ubuntu/+spec/ubiquity-advanced-partitioner).

[Colin Watson (cjwatson)]

(At least, it will be on the agenda for Edgy if the Technical Board agree with me.)

[Johnathan Zhuang (johnathan-zhuang)]

I don't see why they wouldn't. It a major issue - that is unless we say to the user: "You have only 1 chance at partitioning your harddrive, make it count" :p

[Nico Veenkamp (nico)]

When I chose manual partitioning on my Acer Travelmate Laptop it just hangs. I see the spinning disc icon with only the cancel button active. When I used the partitioner from the system menu to delete the relevant partition I received an extra option to use the free space. Even when I select that option I can not get any further.

QUESTION: should I enter this as a separate bug?

[Colin Watson (cjwatson)]

Nico: yes, please file a separate bug.

[Nico Veenkamp (nico)]

This same problem occurs in knot2

[Colin Watson (cjwatson)]

Partitioning and mount point selection are no longer separate steps in Feisty, so we don't suffer from this problem any more.