Build VMs stopped starting after a reboot into a new kernel: vmmon/vmnet
were left unloaded and vmnet1/vmnet8 (DHCP/NAT) never came up, so
vmware-vmx died (status=237/KEYRING) and clones got no IP. Root cause:
the LSB->systemd sysv-generated vmware.service intermittently fails to
generate at early boot ("systemd-sysv-generator: Cannot find unit
vmware.service"), and the existing module-rebuild guard only builds the
modules -- it never loads them or starts vmnet networking.
Add a native vmware-host.service that runs `/etc/init.d/vmware start`
(loads vmmon/vmci + brings up vmnet), ordered after the rebuild guard,
and mask the flaky sysv vmware.service so the native unit is the sole
owner. Provisioned by scripts/install-vmware-host-services.sh and wired
into setup-host-linux.sh (new step 8/9). VMware ships no native unit and
no kernel postinst hook, so this native wrapper around VMware's own
tools is the reliable boot path.
Verified: linked clone boots and gets a vmnet8 DHCP IP.
On a Linux host the UUP converter only produces the RTM install.wim (build
26100.1), so Windows Update had to install the entire cumulative anyway —
the UUP download/convert machinery added a slow ~5 GB step and several host
tools (aria2/wimtools/cabextract/chntpw) for no benefit.
Replace it: deploy-win now takes the install ISO directly via `--iso-url`
(urllib download + cache by file name under <CI_ROOT>/iso/, optional
--iso-sha256) or a local `--win-iso` (exactly one required). Patch + deploy
flow is unchanged. Supply an already-updated ISO (e.g. a massgrave link) to
skip the WU step entirely.
- Remove winimage/uup.py and its tests.
- Trim setup-host-linux.sh deps to p7zip-full + xorriso + genisoimage.
- Update RUNBOOK §5 and the Windows-host port plan. Coverage 93.6%.
xorriso -extract reads the ISO9660 name tree, which on a Windows ISO has
no Rock Ridge — names come back upper-cased/truncated, so the
`efi/microsoft/boot/efisys_noprompt.bin` lookup failed ("missing from
ISO") and a repack from that tree would corrupt Windows' long file names.
Extract with 7z instead (reads the UDF/Joliet tree, preserving the real
lower-case paths), excluding 7z's synthetic `[BOOT]` dump. Verified
end-to-end on the cached 26100.32860 ISO: 7z extract → xorriso repack
yields a 5 GB ISO with autounattend.xml + post-install.ps1 at the root and
efisys_noprompt.bin as the UEFI El Torito image (no boot prompt).
Also: cap the Joliet volume id at 16 chars (silence xorriso warning), add
a 7z preflight check, and add p7zip-full to setup-host-linux.sh.
Add aria2 + wimtools (wimlib-imagex) + xorriso + genisoimage + cabextract
+ chntpw to setup-host-linux.sh (Step 3) — the UUP dump → ISO conversion
and the no-prompt ISO repack that `ci template deploy-win` needs. Also
create the <CI_ROOT>/iso cache dir in the layout step.
`ci vmware` runs as ci-runner and relies on host-based X auth (xhost),
but the grant is per-session and wiped on logout / X restart, so the GUI
launch fails with "cannot open X display" after every desktop relogin.
Add scripts/install-vmware-gui-access.sh: installs an XDG autostart entry
in the desktop user's home that re-applies `xhost +SI:localuser:ci-runner`
at each graphical login, and applies it immediately when a display is
reachable. Desktop user resolves from --desktop-user / $CI_DESKTOP_USER /
$SUDO_USER (never root); service user from $CI_RUN_USER. --uninstall
removes the autostart entry and revokes the live grant.
Wire it into setup-host-linux.sh as Step 8, with --desktop-user (default
$SUDO_USER) and --skip-gui-access for headless hosts.
scripts/install-ci-alias.sh installs `ci` (runs the orchestrator as ci-runner
via the prod venv) and `ci-me` (current user). Idempotent, marker-bounded;
supports --system (/etc/profile.d), --uninstall. setup-host-linux.sh gains a
step [7/7] that installs it system-wide, passing CI_PROD_PYTHON/CI_RUN_USER.
Simone