[CentOS] Anaconda allows x86_64 CD/DVD to be used to install i386 system

[Johnny Hughes]

On Wed, 2006-05-03 at 06:58 -0500, Aleksandar Milivojevic wrote:
> Karanbir Singh wrote:
> > Aleksandar Milivojevic wrote:
> >> As subject says.  I just noticed that Anaconda allows x86_64 CD/DVD to
> >> be used to install i386 system (using network installation, of course).
> > 
> > errr... you mean its installing i386 packages from the x86_64 media ? I
> > find that very hard to believe......
> > 
> > 
> >> This is basically broken.  For example, yum will believe that it is
> >> installed on x86_64, not on i386.  So when you do for example yum
> >> update, it will try to install x86_64 packages on i386 system.  Which
> > 
> > errr.. no it wont. take a look at how yum decides arch...
> > 
> >> isn't going to fly, since installed kernel is 32-bit (so you get broken
> >> executables).  It can also play havoc with postinstall scripts that will
> >> detect they are being run under 64-bit kernel during installation, but
> >> resulting system is really 32-bit.
> > 
> > Can you provide some details on howto reproduce this ? a copy of the 3
> > files in /root from postinstall would be nice. maybe post them somewhere
> > online and a url here.
> 
> Sorry, I should have been a bit more detailed.
> 
> Let say the tree on my install server looks like this:
> 
> /centos/os/i386
> /centos/os/x86_64
> 
> 
> If I use x86_64 media to boot, but by mistake in ks.cfg file I had 
> something like:
> 
> url http://installsrv/centos/os/i386
> 
> Anaconda will happily install from i386 tree.  All the packages on the 
> system will be i386.  However, $basearch in yum will expand to x86_64. 
> First time you do "yum update" your system will be basically broken (yum 
> will install 64-bit binaries on something that is basically 32-bit 
> installation).

Well ... trying to prevent that would be way to difficult as i386 things
are valid to install on x86_64.  In fact, fixing it would be breaking
it :)

Some people want to install things outside the x86_64 tree ...
specifically to get things like i386 Firefox, for example.  They include
items from the i386 tree on purpose ...

The only reason you have an error is that not all those items are in the
x86_64 tree on centos. If you had your own modified repos to include all
i386 stuff and not just what the upstream provider (and so we) include,
it would work fine.
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