console-data not included the "standard" task in preseed

[Kent Tong]

The console-data package is not included the "standard" task as used in the preseed file. The result is that, after rebooting, no matter what you type as the user name, a small diamond will be displayed as the character (keymap or charset map missing?).

Manually installing console-data will fix the problem. But you'll have to install ssh and do it remotely.

[Colin Watson (cjwatson)]

Good! It's supposed to be console-setup; console-data is obsolete.

You have a problem, but it's not due to console-data being missing. If that fixes it, it's by unsupported luck. console-setup is supposed to work on its own. Could you provide more details on your setup?

[Kent Tong (kent-tong)]

I am using a preseed file to perform unattended installations over the network. The preseed file is shown below.

d-i debian-installer/locale string en_US
d-i console-setup/ask_detect boolean false
d-i console-setup/layoutcode string en_US
d-i console-setup/variantcode string qwerty
d-i netcfg/choose_interface select auto
# Any hostname and domain names assigned from dhcp take precedence over
# values set here. However, setting the values still prevents the questions
# from being shown, even if values come from dhcp.
d-i netcfg/get_hostname string unassigned-hostname
d-i netcfg/get_domain string unassigned-domain
d-i netcfg/wireless_wep string
### Mirror settings
# If you select ftp, the mirror/country string does not need to be set.
d-i mirror/country string enter information manually
d-i mirror/protocol string http
d-i mirror/http/hostname string ftp.hostrino.com
d-i mirror/http/directory string /pub/ubuntu/archive
d-i mirror/http/proxy string
# Suite to install.
#d-i mirror/suite string testing
# Suite to use for loading installer components (optional).
#d-i mirror/udeb/suite string testing
d-i mirror/suite string hardy
### Partitioning
# If the system has free space you can choose to only partition that space.
# Note: this must be preseeded with a localized (translated) value.
d-i partman-auto/init_automatically_partition \
select Guided - use entire disk

# Alternatively, you can specify a disk to partition. The device name
# can be given in either devfs or traditional non-devfs format.
# For example, to use the first disk:
#d-i partman-auto/disk string /dev/discs/disc0/disc
#d-i partman-auto/disk string /dev/sda
# In addition, you'll need to specify the method to use.
# The presently available methods are: "regular", "lvm" and "crypto"
d-i partman-auto/method string regular
# If one of the disks that are going to be automatically partitioned
# contains an old LVM configuration, the user will normally receive a
# warning. This can be preseeded away...
d-i partman-auto/purge_lvm_from_device boolean true
# And the same goes for the confirmation to write the lvm partitions.
d-i partman-lvm/confirm boolean true
# You can choose from any of the predefined partitioning recipes.
# Note: this must be preseeded with a localized (translated) value.
#d-i partman-auto/choose_recipe \
#select All files in one partition (recommended for new users)
#select Separate /home, /usr, /var, and /tmp partitions
# This makes partman automatically partition without confirmation.
d-i partman/confirm_write_new_label boolean true
d-i partman/choose_partition \
select Finish partitioning and write changes to disk
d-i partman/confirm boolean true
### Clock and time zone setup
# Controls whether or not the hardware clock is set to UTC.
d-i clock-setup/utc boolean false
# You may set this to any valid setting for $TZ; see the contents of
# /usr/share/zoneinfo/ for valid values.
d-i time/zone string Asia/Macau
### Apt setup
# You can choose to install non-free and contrib software.
d-i apt-setup/multiverse boolean true
d-i apt-setup/universe boolean true
# Create root account.
d-i passwd/root-login boolean true
d-i passwd/root-password password papsn6k+i
d-i passwd/root...

[Kent Tong (kent-tong)]

OTOH, instead of installing console-data, running "dpkg-reconfigure console-setup" and answering the questions also fix the problem.

[Colin Watson (cjwatson)]

These lines are wrong:

d-i console-setup/layoutcode string en_US
d-i console-setup/variantcode string qwerty

Instead, can you try:

d-i console-setup/layoutcode string us

(and delete variantcode). The layoutcode and variantcode items correspond to XkbLayout and XkbVariant in xorg.conf.

[Colin Watson (cjwatson)]

I think you were probably running into bug 130444, which I fixed today in Jaunty.