[Bug 864466] Re: break=foo boot option incompatible with gfxpayload=keep

[Steve Langasek]

Further testing shows that totextmode is both insufficient and
unnecessary.

- If a framebuffer module is loaded so that the kernel has an fbcon, 'chvt 1' is sufficient to get a text console, and the panic() function already does this.
- If no framebuffer module is loaded, the kernel seemingly doesn't know how to change the console from graphics mode to text mode, regardless of how many times you call totextmode or chvt.
- We currently do not include any framebuffer modules in the initramfs by default.  We could change this so that they're included unconditionally, but this would increase the size of the initramfs (possibly impacting boot speed) and would result in them being autoloaded by default (definitely impacting boot speed, as well as impacting boot experience since on intel this brings a modeswitch that clears the purple background).
- We could avoid the full overhead of having all the modules in the initramfs by only including vesafb.  However, this precludes loading other framebuffer modules later for the same card, which means users would be stuck with vesafb instead of the native driver, making it impossible to resume from a 'break' and get the correct post-boot experience.

So this is definitely a 'wontfix' for oneiric.  We should still do
something to improve the handling of 'break=', but this isn't it, and
any other solution is too risky for oneiric.

** Changed in: console-setup (Ubuntu Oneiric)
       Status: Triaged => Won't Fix

** Changed in: console-setup (Ubuntu Oneiric)
    Milestone: oneiric-updates => None

** Changed in: console-setup (Ubuntu Oneiric)
     Assignee: Steve Langasek (vorlon) => (unassigned)

** Changed in: kbd (Ubuntu Oneiric)
       Status: Triaged => Won't Fix

** Changed in: kbd (Ubuntu Oneiric)
    Milestone: oneiric-updates => None

** Changed in: kbd (Ubuntu Oneiric)
     Assignee: Steve Langasek (vorlon) => (unassigned)

** Changed in: kbd (Ubuntu)
    Milestone: oneiric-updates => None

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/864466

Title:
  break=foo boot option incompatible with gfxpayload=keep

Status in “console-setup” package in Ubuntu:
  Triaged
Status in “kbd” package in Ubuntu:
  Triaged
Status in “console-setup” source package in Oneiric:
  Won't Fix
Status in “kbd” source package in Oneiric:
  Won't Fix

Bug description:
  Since grub2 now starts Linux with the console in graphics mode by
  default (gfxpayload=keep), in order to get a text console, something
  must explicitly switch the VT to KD_TEXT mode.  For a full boot, this
  is handled by plymouth when it exits; in the initramfs, there is
  nothing that fulfills this function.  This means that booting with
  'break=top|modules|premount|mount|mountroot|bottom|init', unless also
  explicitly changing the gfxpayload setting, will result in an
  initramfs prompt that you can't see.  (Unless you give up waiting for
  the prompt and boot a second time; then the recordfail handling will
  cause the next boot to be in text mode!)

  /usr/share/initramfs-tools/scripts/panic/console_setup looks like the
  logical place to handle the switch to text mode, along with all the
  other console setup.  We need a C program that lets us do the actual
  video mode switch, however.  The kbd source package includes a
  'totextmode' utility that's not built by default.  We should probably
  build it and integrate it into the console_setup panic script.

  Providing totextmode would let us boot with gfxpayload=keep by default
  in recovery mode as well.

  ProblemType: Bug
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.10
  Package: keyboard-configuration 1.57ubuntu27
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.0.0-11.18-generic 3.0.4
  Uname: Linux 3.0.0-11-generic x86_64
  ApportVersion: 1.23-0ubuntu2
  Architecture: amd64
  Date: Sat Oct  1 22:22:32 2011
  InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04.1 LTS "Lucid Lynx" - Release amd64 (20100816.1)
  PackageArchitecture: all
  ProcEnviron:
   PATH=(custom, user)
   LANG=en_US.UTF-8
   SHELL=/bin/bash
  SourcePackage: console-setup
  UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to oneiric on 2011-09-23 (8 days ago)

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