dracut does not support booting from an encrypted ZFS volume

Bug #2070066 reported by Benjamin Drung
10
This bug affects 2 people
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
dracut (Ubuntu)
Triaged
Medium
Unassigned
zfs-linux (Ubuntu)
Confirmed
Undecided
Unassigned

Bug Description

Dracut does not support booting from an encrypted ZFS volume. Steps to reproduce:

1. In a VM install Ubuntu 24.10 with an encrypted ZFS volume
2. Install dracut afterwards: sudo apt install dracut zfs-dracut
3. Add rd.shell to the boot arguments
4. Reboot

The boot will fail:

```
dracut-pre-mount[817]: Warning: ZFS: Key /run/keystore/rpool/system.key for rpool hasn't appeared. Trying anyway.
dracut-pre-mount[863]: Key load error: Failed to open key material file: No such file or directory
[FAILED] Failed to mount sysroot.mount - /sysroot.
```

The initrd should have asked for the password, but it did not.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 24.10
Package: dracut-core 102-3ubuntu2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 6.8.0-31.31-generic 6.8.1
Uname: Linux 6.8.0-31-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: zfs
ApportVersion: 2.28.1-0ubuntu4
Architecture: amd64
CasperMD5CheckResult: pass
CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME
Date: Fri Jun 21 09:35:42 2024
InstallationDate: Installed on 2024-06-20 (1 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 24.10 "Oracular Oriole" - Daily amd64 (20240617)
ProcEnviron:
 LANG=de_DE.UTF-8
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 SHELL=/bin/bash
 TERM=xterm-256color
 XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=<set>
SourcePackage: dracut
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

Benjamin Drung (bdrung)
tags: added: amd64 apport-bug oracular wayland-session
Changed in dracut (Ubuntu):
importance: Undecided → Medium
status: New → Triaged
Revision history for this message
Launchpad Janitor (janitor) wrote :

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

Changed in zfs-linux (Ubuntu):
status: New → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
l (tcrfvyguiop) wrote :
Revision history for this message
Benjamin Drung (bdrung) wrote :

I tried 103-1ubuntu2 with the patch from https://github.com/dracut-ng/dracut-ng/pull/529 and the result is the same.

Changed in dracut (Ubuntu):
milestone: none → ubuntu-25.04
Revision history for this message
l (tcrfvyguiop) wrote (last edit ):

> The initrd should have asked for the password, but it did not.

If you supply the key in the initrd (e.g. with /etc/cryptab), it should work.

For the "should have asked for the password", `--add bash` is likely a workaround. See https://github.com/zbm-dev/zfsbootmenu/issues/690

Possible fix - https://github.com/dracut-ng/dracut-ng/pull/1012 . Please help testing it !

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