On Mon, Mar 24, 2025 at 07:11:40PM +0000, g4sra wrote:
>
> Progress...
>
> Manually partitioning can yield the required layout.
> After defining the device as encrypted it is necessary to go back and unselect it's usage which partman automatically does without notification.
> Removing the ext4 filesystem here then permits selection and creation of a VG in in the LVM configuration menu, placing LV's on top.
>
> Issues..
>
> 1) The ability to select F2FS as the filesystem when defining a partition's usage is missing.
>
> 2) During boot loader stage installation 'grub-install-dummy' fails.
>

>     Fixed by the following (note must be a lower case 'y'):

>

>     chroot /target
>     echo 'GRUB_ENABLE_CRYPTODISK=y' >> /etc/default/grub

>

>     # manually install GRUB, although installation from the Menu should now work (untested)
>     grub-install /dev/sda
>     grub-mkconfig > /boot/grub/grub.cfg
>     exit

>

>     Select 'Continue without installing bootloader'

>
> 3) Need to edit UEFI vars and manually add EFI/debian/grub64.efi from /dev/sda1
>
> 4) EFI boots, GRUB prompts for password to decrypt, and then drops to prompt.
>
> 5) I have no idea how to proceed, assume issue with Grub but could be the console wetware :(

I think you'll need to inspect the boot script (grub.cfg) to trace the
steps it takes to build up your partitions abstraction stack. Just off
hand I would guess it lacks an f2fs module in the efi collection; or
perhaps worse, that the uefi boot is set up as a chain loader that
will want modules in the /boot/grub directory of the main partition.

UEFI boot requires the bootloader to reside in the EFI/FAT partition,
and the grub bootloader is modular with the primary part grub64.efi
and a bucket of support modules to handle things like lvm2 setup and
f2fs formatting as well as display variants etc. Those modules reside
somewhere and obviously they must be accessible for bootloading
without disk abstractions.

I believe the grub setup designers have thought about that and can
handle many cases but presumably they have missed something for your
setup case. So that would be the first thing to look into and verify.

Ralph.