• Problems installing trixie RC1 using an IPv6-only network and DHCPv6

    From Andy Smith@21:1/5 to All on Wed Jul 9 18:20:02 2025
    Hi,

    I've so far installed three different machines in an IPv6-only
    environment that provides initial connectivity by DHCPv6. In each case
    it was not possible to complete the install on either bookworm or the
    trixie RC1 installer, without using a workaround.

    I'm not sure what exactly the problem is but a lease *is* obtained by
    DHCPv6, then shortly afterwards it disappears.

    Example from the installer's shell shortly after the lease is obtained:

    # ip a sh dev eno1
    2: eno1: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc mq qlen 1000
    link/ether 00:25:90:5c:f7:ea brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff
    inet6 fdbf:8fb5:86ef:fda7:c9e6:dc8d:38f5:5828/128 scope global
    valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    inet6 fe80::225:90ff:fe5c:f7ea/64 scope link
    valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever
    # ip -6 ro
    fdbf:8fb5:86ef:fda7:c9e6:dc8d:38f5:5828 dev eno1 metric 256 fdbf:8fb5:86ef:fda7:c9e6:dc8d:38f5:5828/127 dev eno1 metric 256 expires 0sec fe80::/64 dev eno1 metric 256
    default via fe80::1 dev eno1 metric 1024 expires 0sec

    At this point everything seems correct and the installer is asking for
    which nameserevers to use as it did not get any from DHCP. I supply
    those and then at some point between then and the first time it tires to download anything, it loses this lease, so the install will fail.

    (Although this ULA address of
    fdbf:8fb5:86ef:fda7:c9e6:dc8d:38f5:5828/128 may look slightly bizarre to
    some, this is the intended address for this host as set by the operator
    of the DHCPv6 server. It is intentionally only meant to have access to
    other things on its local IPv6-only network and will use a proxy to
    access the Internet for the remainder of the install.)

    In all three cases I have been able to complete the install of trixie
    RC1 by going back and manually configuring the network as static IPv6,
    using the address initially obtained by DHCP and the following details:

    Netmask: ffff:ffff:ffff:ffff::
    Gateway: (left blank)

    Fortunately these leases are static so this is workable. Install may
    not be possible on a network with dynamic leases.

    I think this must be a wider known problem because it seems this company encountered it also, in very similar circumstances:

    See "Installing Debian"
    https://web.archive.org/web/20250124094351/https://www.mythic-beasts.com/support/servers/virtual/ipv6_only

    I had a quick look through the debian-installer open bugs and could not
    find one with DHCPv6 in the subject. I did see #927413:

    https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=927413

    which could be plausible.

    Does anyone know which bug number this actually is?

    Thanks,
    Andy

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