Kickstart Generator
Kickstart provides a way for users to automate a Red Hat Enterprise Linux installation. Using kickstart, a system administrator can create a single file containing the answers to all the questions that would normally be asked during a typical installation. Once a kickstart file has been generated it can either be included with boot media or made available on the network for easy and consistent configuration of new systems.
This app walks you through the process of creating optimal kickstart files for Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5, 6, 7, 8 or 9 that are tailored to meet your specific deployment goals. The app gives you options to create very advanced kickstart files with custom filesystem layouts, package selections, network configurations, and installation scripts. A new security option now also allows to deploy systems that are compliant with a security profile, such as OSPP or PCI-DSS. Alternatively, for less advanced configurations, the app will preselect intelligent defaults.
Once you are satisfied with your configuration simply click the Download button and bundle the kickstart file with boot media or deploy it on your network for easy and consistent configuration of new systems.
84 Comments
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Log InWe are using the app to create a kickstart for RHEL VMs going into Azure. For these VMs to work in Azure, we have to remove the grub parameters "rhgb quiet crashkernel=auto" and add the parameters "earlyprintk=ttyS0 console=ttyS0 rootdelay=300". On the Boot Loader pane in the app, if I remove the "rhgb quiet crashkernel=auto" parameters, these are not removed and persist when the RHEL machine is installed. The "earlyprintk=ttyS0 console=ttyS0 rootdelay=300" parameters are correctly appended. We have worked around this by removing the unwanted parameters in the post-installation script. It would be nice if these could be removed with the kickstart generator.
I have a suggestion: The rootpw should be hashed using SHA512 instead of MD5; e.g.
so how can you add or select the security policy or the security policy profiles to the Kick start its not part of the options I hope I didnt miss it.
i create a VG like Name: vg_www Disks (disk=size[MB])sdb1=102400 Physical Extent Size (kB)4096
when adding a LV of 100000
error message: Size is too large for the LVM group.
100000 is less than 102400. what i'm i missing here?
nothing presents upon entry to application, just 2 icons at left side, flask & comment icons. running chrome Version 60.0.3112.90 (Official Build) (64-bit)
Also seeing nothing loading. Tried multiple browsers.
I could be wrong but with RHEL v7 you can specify which security guideline or profile STIG that you want to use with your installation. I dont see that setting on the kickstart configurator for v7
Inadequate documentation,
a) what do I do with the bin? b) no [un-]obvious way to get a text copy of the kickstart file.
Still doesn't work even in https://access.redhat.com/labs/kickstartconfig
I can't download the Kickstart file with IE11 or Edge. Nothing happens when I click the "Download" button. Chrome has no problem downloading.
Support for Reading a pre-generated file would be rather usefull. Even if that support only handles files generated by the kickstartconfig app it would save a lot of typing.
Would it be possible to continuously show the generated kickstart file? It is not very much text, and seing what happens when you select different options would help understanding.
Broken link, no application
I've tried Firefox and Chrome and the application does not load. The "Go to Application" does not start. Simply returns to empty page with "Comments" and "Beaker" icons.
The Kickstart tool appears to be totally gone. Is this tool not available anymore?
The kickstartconfig generator provides an "office-suite" packages group that's not available. If the installation is done in text mode, the system fails silently. If it's in graphical mode, then user interaction is required to continue the installation process.
By the way, this is while using the rhel-server-7.4-x86_64-dvd.iso unpacked to an http server location.
Do we have a separate tool for creating atomic host kickstart ?
We do not have a tool for atomic host for now. Thanks!
how do you enable security profiles using this kickstart tool ? its not part of the options is there a variable that needed to be added to the post-installation script what is that variable and ho w are the options assigned ?
Hi Tamir, At this time there are no plans to add security profiles to the Kickstart Generator app.
The RHEL 8 instillation documentation is still being worked on and will be complete when RHEL 8 is officially released but you can use the upstream Kickstart Syntax Reference for the proper commands to manually enable security profiles in your kickstart file during the RHEL 8 Beta.
I did a quick RHEL 8 beta install and selected the "OSPP - Protection Profile for General Purpose Operating Systems" in the SECURITY POLICY spoke. This is a snippet of the anaconda-ks.cfg that was created:
I hope that helps you. If adding this functionality to the Kickstart Generator app turns out to be something that is in high demand for RHEL 8 we can look into reconsidering it.
Dear users, This app has been updated to support RHEL 8 (beta). Try and let us know your feedback/questions here.
Thanks, Dong
I am unable to access the app at this time. Is there an issue with it presently?
Hi Tim,
There was a problem causing the app to not work for a short while last night, but it is back to normal now. Can you try again?
Thanks, Dong
Just drawing blanks here... page comes up near empty...
Is this broken?
Hi HJ
let me take a look at it and give you a feedback soon
Thanks
HJ
It works normal for now
Thanks,Shiyi
I tried the link and I can see the drop-down for versions and the download button but nothing else. After temp disabling content blocking in browser I get a subscription message and it doesn't show me logged in to my developer account. Does this work with my developer account subscriptions or only the paid subscriptions? Would really be nice to use this in creating ks.cfg files for the various OS releases in my lab environment.
Hi Jeff, What type of browser were you using? Can you try again and use another browser if possible? If the problem recurs, let us know your account number. We will check your entitlement information.
Thanks, Dong
I also have a developer account and am unable to access the kickstart configurator tool. Receiving the message "SUBSCRIBER EXCLUSIVE CONTENT". Is this not available to developer accounts?
I tried both FF and Chrome and I was able to get the input portion to come up exactly once, then I was kicked to the subscription message. Disabling content blocking didn't seem to affect it as I was able to get it to come up again in FF with it enabled but after I had closed all my FF which would have cleared the cache. However I had cleared the cache manually in both browsers and that didn't help. Restarting chrome didn't help, but I don't have it set to clear everything on exit like FF. Strange issue, I haven't been able to pinpoint the underlying cause but suspect it has something to do with cookies or cache. I can't find an account number, presume because I only have a developers account. Presumably it's not a subscription issue since I was able to get the input portion to come up a couple times. Another person I know had tried it earlier and had the exact same symptoms on his system and login so it's not just me. One more thing, I see rhel8 is still showing beta, presume it will work for the production release but someone might want to update that menu item now that it's out of beta. If you're not seeing the issue, I suppose it might be that it only affects developer accounts without any ties to a paid account. I'll try a few more things and see if I can narrow it down. Thanks, Jeff
Appears we found the issue. If we start with a clean browser and go to developers.redhat.com first, login there, then go to https://access.redhat.com/labsinfo/kickstartconfig the options load up and we don't get redirected to the subscription page. So it "appears" the issue is on Redhat's end, something isn't quite right with authentication at least for those folks that only have a developers account and subscription via that. My guess is when we login via developers.redhat.com first, our auth is correctly passed to access.redhat.com when we subsequently access that page. If we don't, we get redirected to the subscription required page (in error). Thanks to Joseph for verifying the same. Jeff
Thank you for narrowing it down. We will investigate the problem.
Thanks, and I am able to use the configuration tool successfully so long as I login via developers.redhat.com before going to access.redhat.com/labsinfo/kickstartconfig page. To be clear, if I access it using this method, the tool loads every time I try. If I access the kickstartconfig page directly, sometimes it works, but only once and subsequent attempts redirects me to the "SUBSCRIBER EXCLUSIVE CONTENT" page in error. If I then logout and restart FF and start by logging into developers.redhat.com first, the kickstartconfig page works fine.
OK. the message "SUBSCRIBER EXCLUSIVE CONTENT" means there is no active subscriptions associated with your account, and hence you are not eligible to use the full features of our tools, Knowledge Based and other resources.
Hi,
When will RHEL 8 GA be added to the major release list of major releases?
Regards,
Jan Gerrit Kootstra
[SOLVED] I cannot generate a kickstart file. It gives "Error creating kickstart config file... [object Object]" error. I tried with all RHEL versions in the menu but the issue is there for all.
[SOLUTION] Browser issue. Working fine with another web browser on a different machine.
Hey, very good app, very handy ;).
It would be good if we could set the hostname as well.
Thanks!!
Hi JT,
Thanks for reaching out to us, we will take a look at your suggestion.
If there is any update, we will let you know.
Thanks
Will be available sw raid?
Hi Stepan,
Thanks for reaching out to us, for now we do not have a plan to make sw raid available.
I can give you an example:
The following example shows how to create a RAID level 1 partition for /, and a RAID level 5 for /usr, assuming there are three disks on the system. It also creates three swap partitions, one on each drive:
part raid.01 --size=6000 --ondisk=sda
part raid.02 --size=6000 --ondisk=sdb
part raid.03 --size=6000 --ondisk=sdc
part swap1 --size=512 --ondisk=sda
part swap2 --size=512 --ondisk=sdb
part swap3 --size=512 --ondisk=sdc
part raid.11 --size=6000 --ondisk=sda
part raid.12 --size=6000 --ondisk=sdb
part raid.13 --size=6000 --ondisk=sdc
raid / --level=1 --device=md0 raid.01 raid.02 raid.03
raid /usr --level=5 --device=md1 raid.11 raid.12 raid.13
Is it correct that as a developer we have no access to this app ?
Hi Mike, You should be able to access this app with a Red Hat developer account. There is a problem in the service the app uses to check user's entitlements, which prevents some users from using the application. Let us know if you are affected.
Thanks, Dong
Hi Dong,
I think something something wrong with my account, when i try to access it shows me the following error:
SUBSCRIBER EXCLUSIVE CONTENT An active Red Hat subscription is required to use Customer Portal Labs.
Thank you for looking into it!, Mike
Hi,
Any update ?
Thank you, Mike
The root cause is determined. We are working with relevant teams to solve the problem. Thank you for your patience.
Hello, I also have a problem to access this app as a developer. Can you please help? I am getting SUBSCRIBER EXCLUSIVE CONTENT An active Red Hat subscription is required to use Customer Portal Labs. Could you please let me know what could be possibly wrong?
Thanks! Zdenek
Hi Zdenek, This is caused by a problem at our end. We are working with relevant teams to solve it. We will send a note here once it is solved. Thank you for your patience.
Dong Zhao
Hello, any update on this issue?
Thank you in advance, Patrik
Unfortunately it is currently not possible to download the config. Nothing happened at all. I tried with Firefox and Chrome as well. Furthermore, it is not possible to change the Release. The App switches back once you click on another field.
It works for me. Can you try again? Perhaps log out and log in, or clear browser cache, and then see if it works? We have not heard the same issue from other users.
Thanks. Today it's working fine.
Is the application down?
Hi Sinan,
Sorry for the lately response during the Chinese Spring Festival，maybe there was a network issue happened on our platform. It works well now.
Thanks,
I'm unable to download the file. I fill the config in fully but when clicking download nothing happens. I've tried Edge, Firefox and Chrome all with the same issue. There's no issues shown in any of the browsers Dev Tools logs, the button just seems to do nothing.
Hi Jay,
Sorry for the inconvenience to you, if you encounter this kind of issues again, you can refresh the page and repeat your operations. It is a known issue, we will fix it as soon as possible.
This issue has been fixed.
Thanks, Shiyi
Will there be an option for CentOS 8? The package names/group names seems to be different. We create a rather large and very customized installed. So looking through the comps xml files is not really an option.
Hi Kenneth, thanks for your question.
Our goal with this and other apps is to improve the overall product experience for our Red Hat customers. This app is solely focused on RHEL at this time.
Thanks! ~james
Thank you for the answer.
Nice tool, but are you sure, this works with RHEL 8? I tried my RHEL 7 kickstart template on a first RHEL 8 install (via Satellite) and I get
KickstartError: /usr/sbin/authconfig is missing
When I create a fresh kickstart file with the tool, the (old) auth call is still there. Regarding to https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-us/red_hat_enterprise_linux/8/html/considerations_in_adopting_rhel_8/installer-and-image-creation_considerations-in-adopting-rhel-8#kickstart-changes_installation-and-booting the auth option is no longer supported.
Ok, I see, there's now a switch in a later kickstart template for Satellite. I have to adapt this.
I going to be dealing with the same issue soon, with --passalgo and --useshadow Did you use a pam.d setup instead of authconfig?
I'm not sure, if I can just ommit the authconfig part in the kickstart file. In the kickstart file we only do an initial first config. The rest will be done by puppet when the installastion has finished.
I think it can be omitted, if e.g. pam.d is configured with the same options before the users are created. Changing it for root afterwards..yeah well.
OK. I will look into it, when we get to that part on the to do list.
Hi Christian,
Thanks for reaching out to us, I will look into it and reply to you as soon as possible.
Hi,
I just installed RHEL8 system on my virtual machine, it can be installed successfully with auth or authconfig command in kickstart config file. its content as below:
lang en_US
keyboard us
timezone America/New_York --isUtc
reboot
url --url=http://192.168.31.93/mnt8/
bootloader --location=mbr --append="rhgb quiet crashkernel=auto"
zerombr
clearpart --all --initlabel
autopart
authconfig --passalgo=sha512 --useshadow
selinux --enforcing
firewall --enabled
firstboot --disable
%packages
@^minimal-environment
kexec-tools
%end
I used command " mount -o loop /home/linux/Downloads/rhel-8.0-x86_64-dvd.iso mnt8/" to build the installation repo and installed RHEL8 using HTTP installation
Hi Shiyi, We have the same issues with authconfig being depricated. Thank you for the test.
Will Red Hat continue to support authconfig during the lifespan of RHEL 8, or should we expect that it will stop to work at some point?
For now, auth or authconfig will continue to be supported, if there is any new update, we will let you know.
Thanks,
The link to the app seems to be dead: This page isn’t working If the problem continues, contact the site owner. HTTP ERROR 431
Hi Francois, The application works for me. Can you try again and let us know if the problem persists?
Thanks, Dong
I tried it in Firefox and it worked fine. Cleared all my browsing data in Chrome and that fixed it. Thanks
Hi Francois,
Yes, 431 error means your request's header beyond the maximum size at that time, so cleared your browser's cookie is right.
Thanks
I have found it always has "rhgb quiet" no matter if it is present or not. Only way to get around this is to have a "sed" statement in the post install script to remove "rhgb quiet". What reason is there to force this upon users? It should just be an option? Basically, want to see the scrolling startup messages instead of splash screen etc.
Thanks for reaching out to us, we will check it out soon.
Hi Jonathan,
rhgb and quiet are the default parameters of GRUB_CMDLINE_LINUX in /etc/default/grub.
There is a doc about how to work with GRUB 2 on RHEL7, here is the link: https://access.redhat.com/documentation/en-us/red_hat_enterprise_linux/7/html/system_administrators_guide/ch-working_with_the_grub_2_boot_loader
I hope it can help you.
Thanks
want to use Yum to install.......
why cannot use yum to install?
Hi lit,
yum has been replaced by dnf on RHEL8, so we suggest that using dnf first
The auth and authconfig commands are still being generated for RHEL 8.3. these have been depreciated and cause the beta to fail a auto install (need manual intervention to finish)
Thanks for reaching out to us, we will take a look at the issue.
I had installed the RHEL8.3-beta on my local virtual machine using the HTTP installation.
Build the installation tree by mount the ISO to the mnt8 directory.
The location of the Installation tree likes: Â url --url=http://192.168.31.93/mnt8/
The installation will not be broken by the auth or authconfig command
Thanks
Im not sure if this is the correct way to do a install. Perhaps its not supported by Red Hat, but here is my method.
virt-install --name rhel8-24S --memory 8192 --vcpus 24 --disk size=20 --location http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/BaseOS/x86_64/os/ --initrd-inject=/tmp/kickstart.ks --extra-args="ks=file:/kickstart.ks console=tty0 console=ttyS0,115200n8"&
KICKSTART
lang en_US
keyboard us
timezone America/New_York --isUtc
rootpw PASSWORD --iscrypted
platform x86, AMD64, or Intel EM64Ttext
url --url=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/BaseOS/x86_64/os/
bootloader --location=mbr --append="rhgb quiet crashkernel=auto"
zerombr
clearpart --all --initlabel
** authselect select minimal **
selinux --disabled
firewall --disabled
skipx
firstboot --disable
%packages
@^server-product-environment
%end
%post
Add Harness Repocat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-harness.repo [beaker-harness] name=beaker-harness baseurl=http://beaker.engineering.redhat.com/harness/RedHatEnterpriseLinux8/ enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 EOF
Add distro and custom Reposcat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-AppStream-debuginfo.repo [beaker-AppStream-debuginfo] name=beaker-AppStream-debuginfo baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/AppStream/x86_64/debug/tree enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-BaseOS-debuginfo.repo [beaker-BaseOS-debuginfo] name=beaker-BaseOS-debuginfo baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/BaseOS/x86_64/debug/tree enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-CRB-debuginfo.repo [beaker-CRB-debuginfo] name=beaker-CRB-debuginfo baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/CRB/x86_64/debug/tree enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-HighAvailability-debuginfo.repo [beaker-HighAvailability-debuginfo] name=beaker-HighAvailability-debuginfo baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/HighAvailability/x86_64/debug/tree enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-NFV-debuginfo.repo [beaker-NFV-debuginfo] name=beaker-NFV-debuginfo baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/NFV/x86_64/debug/tree enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-ResilientStorage-debuginfo.repo [beaker-ResilientStorage-debuginfo] name=beaker-ResilientStorage-debuginfo baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/ResilientStorage/x86_64/debug/tree enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-RT-debuginfo.repo [beaker-RT-debuginfo] name=beaker-RT-debuginfo baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/RT/x86_64/debug/tree enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-SAP-debuginfo.repo [beaker-SAP-debuginfo] name=beaker-SAP-debuginfo baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/SAP/x86_64/debug/tree enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-SAPHANA-debuginfo.repo [beaker-SAPHANA-debuginfo] name=beaker-SAPHANA-debuginfo baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/SAPHANA/x86_64/debug/tree enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-AppStream.repo [beaker-AppStream] name=beaker-AppStream baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/AppStream/x86_64/os enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-BaseOS.repo [beaker-BaseOS] name=beaker-BaseOS baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/BaseOS/x86_64/os enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-CRB.repo [beaker-CRB] name=beaker-CRB baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/CRB/x86_64/os enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-HighAvailability.repo [beaker-HighAvailability] name=beaker-HighAvailability baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/HighAvailability/x86_64/os enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-NFV.repo [beaker-NFV] name=beaker-NFV baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/NFV/x86_64/os enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-ResilientStorage.repo [beaker-ResilientStorage] name=beaker-ResilientStorage baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/ResilientStorage/x86_64/os enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-RT.repo [beaker-RT] name=beaker-RT baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/RT/x86_64/os enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-SAP.repo [beaker-SAP] name=beaker-SAP baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/SAP/x86_64/os enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF cat <<"EOF" >/etc/yum.repos.d/beaker-SAPHANA.repo [beaker-SAPHANA] name=beaker-SAPHANA baseurl=http://download.eng.bos.redhat.com/rhel-8/rel-eng/RHEL-8/RHEL-8.3.0-20200701.2/compose/SAPHANA/x86_64/os enabled=1 gpgcheck=0 skip_if_unavailable=1 EOF
%end
You should also provide the location of the Appstream repo at the same time, for example:
repo --name="AppStream" --baseurl=http://192.168.31.93/mnt8/AppStream
If only has the BaseOS location, installer can not detect the location of the AppStream repo automatically.
Thanks
There is a typo.
I the Security - Apply Security Policy section:
OSPP - Protection Profile for General Purpose Opreating Systems should be OSPP - Protection Profile for General Purpose Operation Systems
i have an issue with installation kickstart tool and some packages also , when i install kickstart by yum it show this error "Updating Subscription Management repositories. Last metadata expiration check: 0:55:33 ago on Thu 16 Sep 2021 12:15:13 AM PDT. No match for argument: system-config-kickstart Error: Unable to find a match: system-config-kickstart"
Hi moha,
Please check your account first and make sure you have a valid subscription.
Thanks
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