[Intrepid] Live CD Install - incorrect image for free space partition

Further information that might be important. The free space seen in the screenshots is inside a logical partition, but the two other partitions are not inside that logical partition. I have installed into that free space successfully, even though the preview shows me writing over the entire disk.

Pardon, it is not a logical partition, but an extended partition.

Can you please paste the output of `parted /dev/$DISK print` and attach /var/log/installer/debug and /var/log/syslog after running the install up to that screen with the -d option (`ubiquity -d` from a terminal window).

Thanks

Okay, I tried installing on my other laptop with a similar setup, and the bug occurs there, too. Could someone please confirm?

The parted command didn't return much of anything:
----------------
WARNING: You are not superuser. Watch out for permissions.
Warning: Unable to open /dev read-write (Is a directory). /dev has been opened read-only.
Warning: Unable to open /dev read-write (Is a directory). /dev has been opened read-only.
Error: /dev: unrecognised disk label
----------------
So, I've attached a screenshot of gparted to show the partition setup of the disk. I've also attached the /var/log/installer/debug and /var/log/syslog files as well as a screenshot of the bug with 'ubiquity -d'.

Same error experienced,

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo parted /dev/sda print
Model: ATA HITACHI_DK23FB-6 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 60.0GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos

Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
 1 32.3kB 20.0GB 20.0GB primary ntfs boot

Attachment shows relevant ubiquity screenshot displaying incorrect report of 100% partition size.

Later installation summary shows the following information

The partition tables of the following devices are changed:
 SCSI2 (0,0,0) (sda)

The following partitions are going to be formatted:
 partition #5 of SCSI2 (0,0,0) (sda) as ext3
 partition #6 of SCSI2 (0,0,0) (sda) as swap

This suggests correct operation of the largest continuous free space option. However the earlier report of 100% drive partitioning was worrying.

After installation,

Model: ATA HITACHI_DK23FB-6 (scsi)
Disk /dev/sda: 60.0GB
Sector size (logical/physical): 512B/512B
Partition Table: msdos

Number Start End Size Type File system Flags
 1 32.3kB 20.0GB 20.0GB primary ntfs boot
 2 20.0GB 60.0GB 40.0GB extended
 5 20.0GB 58.3GB 38.3GB logical ext3
 6 58.3GB 60.0GB 1686MB logical linux-swap

The free space guided partitioner performed the correct and expected operation. This just leaves the problem with the misleading and incorrect partition display discussed previously.

What more information do we need to confirm this bug exists?

I will confirm this based on Ian's confirmation!

I can confirm that this bug still exists in Jaunty Jackalope 9.04 (daily build 1/23/09). I've attached a screenshot. I also think this should be a higher priority bug than Low. It depicts a scenario where a user might think they would lose data in other partitions when they, in fact, would not.

I can confirm again that this bug is still present in Jaunty Jackalope 9.04 beta Live CD.

This bug was fixed in the package ubiquity - 1.12.10

---------------
ubiquity (1.12.10) jaunty; urgency=low

  [ Evan Dandrea ]
  * Fix a crash when in OEM mode. Child widgets are members of the
    self.userinterface list (LP: #361668).
  * Add support for displaying the "Use the largest continuous free space"
    option in the partition bars. Previously ubiquity would create a single
    Ubuntu partition that filled the entire drive when this option was
    selected (LP: #289663).
  * Pack the SegmentedBar widgets in GtkFrames rather than GtkEventBoxes
    to work around repainting issues (LP: #362334).
  * Automatic update of included source packages: flash-kernel
    2.13ubuntu7, user-setup 1.23ubuntu20.

  [ Colin Watson ]
  * Fix stripping of '=dev=' from device names when creating partition bars
    to avoid reducing e.g. '=dev=vda' to 'a' (LP: #362466).
  * KDE frontend:
    - Start the resize slider at the maximum possible size for the partition
      being resized; this is in line with the GTK frontend, and fixes the
      situation where the previous default (half-way between the minimum
      size and the current size) is out of range.
    - Use a better colour to represent the results of automatic partitioning
      (LP: #348461).
  * Preseed tzsetup/selected up-front rather than filtering it and then
    preseeding it; filtering it causes the backup state to be reset, which
    causes an infinite loop when backing up from the timezone page when the
    default country only has one timezone (LP: #361674).
  * Preseed passwd/auto-login-backup=oem in OEM mode, so that the original
    configuration files are available for restoration (LP: #361272).
  * Add a little extra state machine debugging to the partman component.
  * If an error/question dialog is displayed while changing steps is
    disabled, we currently need to re-enable changing steps in order to get
    a normal cursor, but that also enables the Back/Forward buttons and
    allows people to violate assertions by being too quick (e.g. selecting
    an autopartitioning choice while the installer is still busy analysing
    the possible choices). We should clean this up properly later, but for
    now just restore the allowed-change-step state when the dialog is
    finished.
  * Fix preseeding of the autopartitioning question to work in automatic
    mode: it needs to be preseeded as unseen, otherwise going back from a
    confirmation question doesn't work (LP: #361828). Remove an old code
    path that would have been very complicated to fix for this and is
    guaranteed to never be used nowadays.
  * Update translations from Launchpad.

  [ Jonathan Riddell ]
  * KDE frontend:
    - port reboot code to KDE 4, (LP: #360838)

  [ Mario Limonciello ]
  * Mythbuntu Frontend:
    - Don't launch GUI applications from within the chroot as this causes
      problems when libGL.so.1 and friends are diverted. Instead bind
      mount the necessary files to launch them outside the chroot.
      (LP: #362419)

 -- Evan Dandrea <email address hidden> Fri, 17 Apr 2009 10:07:14 +0100

The fix released in Jaunty shows an incorrect partition size for the Ubuntu installation. I've attached three screenshots showing this. The first (PartitionDefault.png) shows the menu when you first come to it. Notice the free space at the bottom is listed as 5.2GB. The second (PartitionFreeSpace.png) shows when you select the free space option. Notice how the Ubuntu partition is 2.5GB, not 5.2GB. You can scroll the slider back and forth, but I left it at 2.5GB to see if it really would install to a 2.5GB partition. Where did the other 2.7GB go? The other partitions remain unchanged, so it looks like the space beyond 2.5GB disappeared! The third (PostInstallParition.png) shows the actual size of the partitions installed. It appears that the free space option worked as it's supposed to, installing in the 5.2GB space. So I think the number on the picture (PartitionFreeSpace.png) is simply incorrect.

This seems like a bug that is trivial to fix. It was partially fixed for Jaunty, but still not quite there.

This is not a paper cut because it is not a general usability issue, but rather a bug affecting a relatively small user population.

I can confirm that this bug is fixed in Karmic 9.10 beta.