428. system-config-kickstart on debian

Don't know much about kickstart, but you can compile the redhat tool using the Canonical-patched sources. This is in response to this post: http://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=104286

Note that:
1. The Debian way to create pre-configured installations is using Preseed
2. Debian has python-pykickstart for those who want kickstart.
3. I haven't tested system-config-kickstart beyond making sure that it runs

Dependencies and preparation:

sudo apt-get install build-essential gfortran checkinstall python-all-dev cdbs debhelper quilt intltool python-central rarian-compat pkg-config gnome-doc-utils samba python-libuser libuser1 python-glade2 console-setup hwdata python-apt
sudo apt-get install isoquery
mkdir ~/tmp
cd ~/tmp

---

localechooser

cd ~/tmp
wget http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/l/localechooser/localechooser_2.49ubuntu4.tar.gz
tar xvf localechooser_2.49ubuntu4.tar.gz
cd localechooser/
dpkg-buildpackage -uc -us
sudo dpkg -i ../localechooser-data_2.49ubuntu4_all.deb 

---

system-config-kickstart

cd ~/tmp
wget http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/s/system-config-kickstart/system-config-kickstart_2.5.20.orig.tar.gz
tar xvf system-config-kickstart_2.5.20.orig.tar.gz
wget http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/s/system-config-kickstart/system-config-kickstart_2.5.20-0ubuntu22.diff.gz
gunzip system-config-kickstart_2.5.20-0ubuntu22.diff.gz
patch -p0 < system-config-kickstart_2.5.20-0ubuntu22.diff
cd system-config-kickstart-2.5.20/
dpkg-buildpackage -uc -us
sudo apt-get install ../system-config-kickstart_2.5.20-0ubuntu22_all.deb

---

Edit line 46 in /usr/share/system-config-kickstart/packageGroupList.py

availparse = apt_pkg.TagFile(availfile)

ParseTagFile is deprecated in Debian, so you'll need to do a bit of impromptu patching:

sudo sed -i 's/ParseTagFile/TagFile/g' /usr/share/system-config-kickstart/*.py
sudo sed -i 's/availparse.Step/availparse.step/g' /usr/share/system-config-kickstart/*.py
sudo sed -i 's/availparse.Section/availparse.section/g' /usr/share/system-config-kickstart/*.py

Then start with

gksu system-config-kickstart