(*) Terms and conditions apply. See post for details.
Specifically:
x86_64. Sorry ARM enthusiasts!- Uses
apt, which is probably true for ~every Debian-derivative.
- Currently the Debian-derivative must be using SystemD.
I know ZFS includes scripts that work in sysvinit, but
I'm not familiar with how Debian-derivatives add those
scripts to rc directories; help from a Devuan native
wanted.
- The Live ISO MUST use a specific layout and
install technique.
Most Live ISOs use Casper to create an in-memory Live
filesystem overlay, and then use Calamares to install
the distro.
- Most Casper uses have a directory
casper/ in the
Live ISO, containing filesystem.squashfs as the
root filesystem, and optionally
filesystem.manifest-remove for packages to remove
after installation.
- Most Calamares uses will just copy the root
filesystem underneath the Casper overlay into the
new root partition on the persistent storage, then
uninstall Live packages (sometimes listed in the
filesystem.manifest-remove file).
Usually the distro only changes the Calamares
branding.
- Live ISOs which use the above pattern, which is
nearly all Debian- and Ubuntu-derivatives, can be
used with the
...FromISO option.
- SlimbookOS and especially TUXEDO-OS (Ubuntu-derived
version) have a variant of the above technique; the
script detects when those variants are in use and
will adapt to their Live ISOs automatically.
- Ironically, neither Debian nor Ubuntu use this
technique for their Live ISOs; instead they
debootstrap into the new rootfs, indicating the
on-USB apt cache as a (temporary) repository.
Some Debian installers even forget to remove the
temporary repository after installing.
- You can just select Ubuntu26.04 or Debian13 on
the directly-supported distro list if you want
those; they use the classic
debootstrap
technique.
- The script automatically detects the ZFS situation
of your distro:
- ZFS in kernel package --- does not separately
install ZFS, only its utility tools.
- ZFS in
zfs-dkms package in distro repo
- No ZFS in distro repo --- compile OpenZFS from
source.
- The script automatically handles signing of
installed kernels and DKMS kernel modules for
Secure Boot.
- You need to install a Machine Owner Key once, on
first reboot.
Just "Enrol MOK" when prompted and select
"Continue" then enter your password.
__ ___ _ __ . ,
'/ |_ (_' |_) |_ |\ /| _ _ -INSTALLER
/_ | ._) |_)()()|_ | \/ |(=| ||_|
The script is intended to be used primarily for
daily-driver laptops and personal / family
desktops.
You might think "isn't ZFS for big servers and
won't I need tons of ECC memory and at least
three disk bays?"
But you get SNAPSHOTS, and for a typical
modern daily-driver system with an SSD, you can
get away with a small zfs_arc_max of 10% of
your memory or less (1Gb ARC max is fine for a
typical SSD daily-driver).
The script provides direct support for:
- Ubuntu26.04 / KUbuntu26.04 (Resolute)
- Debian13 (Trixie)
- SlimbookOS26
- Pop!_OS24.04
- TUXEDO-OS 2026/09 (Ubuntu version)
- PureOS11
- elementaryOS8
For everything other than Ubuntu / KUbuntu and
Debian13, the script actually just downloads and
validates the .iso file and then uses the "install
from ISO file" path internally.
In addition, it has been tested (in a virtual
machine) to be able to install from the following
Live .iso files:
Zorin-OS-18.1-Core-64-bit.isolinuxmint-22.3-cinnamon-64bit.iso
Note that the script makes an effort to remove grub
and os-prober, both of which will annoy you with
warnings when they can't find a Grub bootloader in
the ESP every time you apt upgrade the kernel.
Unfortunately, some distros make them a strong
dependency of their distro-specific packages:
tuxedo-base-fileszorin-os-desktop
If the distro has such strong package dependencies
on grub and/or os-prober, the script does not
remove them as this can lead to broken installs.
You'll just have to tolerate the nagging.
Pop!_OS24.04 Cosmic has a known issue where
auto-login will disable screen locking until you log
out and log in again.
Please ask System76 to fix it.
The script automatically installs
zfs-auto-snapshot, because automatically-managed
snapshots are AWESOME.
If you want to disable it completely:
- On distros where ZFS is available either in-kernel
or in
zfs-dkms, just
sudo apt remove zfs-auto-snapshot.
- On distros without ZFS,
zfsbootmenu-installer
will install zfs-auto-snapshot-activate and
zfs-auto-snapshot-deactivate scripts to completely
activate or deactivate zfs-auto-snapshot.
Run those as root.
