The base image (macos.images.tahoe.upstream) now installs and boots end to end
with no dependency on Apple's servers — proven on the KVM host: the finished
qcow2 boots standalone (OpenCore from its own ESP) to the macOS 26.6.2 loginwindow.
Install driving (vm-driver.py, screenshot + OCR over QMP):
- map the whole InstallAssistant.pkg as a raw disk and dd it byte-exact into the
app as SharedSupport.dmg (it is a pkgdmg: xar + koly footer — the bare xar
member fails startosinstall with "pkgdmg is missing a footer")
- offline install: no NIC + /etc/hosts blackhole of Apple install/verify
endpoints so startosinstall's calls fail fast instead of hanging
(SecureBootModel=Disabled allows the sealed-volume install offline)
- keep the recovery display awake with a tiny mouse jiggle; coarse settle
fingerprint so the cursor is not seen as a change
- guest watchdog re-erases/retries a startosinstall attempt that stalls or runs
too long (prepare is intermittently slow)
- disk-aware boot watchdog: QMP system_reset only when the screen is dark AND the
disk is idle (never interrupts a slow-but-working boot); recovery-restart if a
post-prepare reboot lands back on recovery
- detect the bright loginwindow and power the VM down (install complete); a
black + disk-idle screen is treated as a completed halt
- copy OpenCore into the image ESP so it boots standalone
recovery.file pins a content-addressed local BaseSystem.dmg (Apple's CDN
load-balances Sequoia/Tahoe during the rollout). fetchRecovery retries to the
pinned hash when used instead.
Not yet done: .generalize (user creation) — the first-boot agent LaunchDaemon is
blocked by Ventura+ Background Task Management on headless boots; next step is
offline user injection from the agent pkg postinstall.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.8 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01XsESshRCoBoUVWV9qKURUF
Add a macOS image pipeline mirroring the Windows one: unattended install,
generalization and user creation, driven end to end in QEMU on a KVM host.
lib/images/macos:
- makeOpenCore: OSX-KVM OpenCore ESP with a config.plist rewritten per image —
SMBIOS model + serial/MLB (macserial) + UUID + ROM=en0 MAC (built-in NIC pinned
to PciRoot(0x0)/Pci(0x12,0x0)) for Apple ID / iMessage / App Store; boot disk;
OpenCore self-entry hidden. ident.nix derives MAC+UUID from a seed so the NixOS
module and CLI know the NIC MAC at eval time.
- makeImage: one QEMU session driven by vm-driver.py (QMP + screenshot settle
detection + OCR of the menu bar) — boots the recovery via OpenCore, opens
Terminal (Ctrl-F2 -> Utilities -> Terminal), types the bootstrap command;
vmix-install.sh erases the disk as APFS, lays down the host-extracted installer
app skeleton + a byte-exact SharedSupport.dmg (raw disk mapped to that byte range
of the pkg, dd'd in — Recovery's xar truncates an 18 GB member), runs
startosinstall with the vmix agent pkg. OpenCore is then copied into the image's
ESP so it boots standalone with OVMF.
- customizeImage / templates: boot the image with a FAT-then-HFS+ VMIX volume; the
vmix agent (LaunchDaemon) runs a script as root, records status and powers off —
the macOS counterpart of Windows Audit Mode. generalize creates the admin user +
auto-login (kcpassword), suppresses Setup Assistant, sets hostname/timezone,
grows APFS, and assigns a fresh SMBIOS identity. Templates: noUpdates,
performance, remoteAccess (ssh + screen sharing).
- fetchRecovery: Apple recovery BaseSystem, retried until the pinned Tahoe build
(osrecovery load-balances Sequoia/Tahoe during the rollout). makeAgentPkg builds
a distribution flat pkg on Linux (xar+bom+cpio) for startosinstall --installpackage.
CLI: vmix build/copy/run for macOS (run --macos --vnc, reads the image's MAC from
its ESP), and a `vmix macserial` helper. NixOS module: disks.os.file carrying
_vmixOsType="macos" auto-enables the macOS QEMU profile (AppleSMC+OSK, Skylake
CPU spoof, AHCI system disk, VMware SVGA, pinned NIC); macos.{enable,cpu,mac}.
Status: proven through the installer prepare phase (SharedSupport.dmg mounts,
version 26.6.2 read, SU catalog loads). Two blockers remain, documented in
lib/images/macos/README.md: (1) startosinstall's OSISVerifyBaseSystemOperation
rejects the byte-identical plain-UDIF SharedSupport as "pkgdmg missing a footer"
in this Tahoe recovery/VM; (2) Apple's CDN unreliably serves the Tahoe recovery
during rollout (self-hosting the verified BaseSystem is the robust fix).
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01XsESshRCoBoUVWV9qKURUF
