From 732a0c6ac831ebcdfbaa41834d771e40e83894db Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Chuck <chuck@example.com>
Date: Sat, 29 Aug 2026 18:20:21 -0400
Subject: [PATCH] fix(install): don't abort when journald settings are absent
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Step 13 reads the effective journald config to decide whether persistent
storage and a size cap are already set. Both settings are optional and
stock Raspberry Pi OS images ship them commented out, so the grep in the
journald_cap pipeline exits 1 — under set -Eeuo pipefail that failed the
assignment and killed the entire install at line 1748 on every fresh
image. Guard the four optional-lookup pipelines with || true so an
absent setting reads as empty instead of aborting.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01YF7Q48EYCCkU1Vs932uDY1
---
 first_time_install.sh | 11 +++++++----
 1 file changed, 7 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/first_time_install.sh b/first_time_install.sh
index c7ec7cf1..198a8f2e 100755
--- a/first_time_install.sh
+++ b/first_time_install.sh
@@ -1740,12 +1740,15 @@ journald_effective() {
        systemd-analyze cat-config systemd/journald.conf >/dev/null 2>&1; then
         systemd-analyze cat-config systemd/journald.conf 2>/dev/null
     else
-        cat /etc/systemd/journald.conf /etc/systemd/journald.conf.d/*.conf 2>/dev/null
+        cat /etc/systemd/journald.conf /etc/systemd/journald.conf.d/*.conf 2>/dev/null || true
     fi
 }
 journald_conf="$(journald_effective)"
-journald_storage="$(printf '%s\n' "$journald_conf" | grep -E '^[[:space:]]*Storage=' | tail -n1 | cut -d= -f2 | tr -d '[:space:]')"
-journald_cap="$(printf '%s\n' "$journald_conf" | grep -E '^[[:space:]]*SystemMaxUse=' | tail -n1 | cut -d= -f2 | tr -d '[:space:]')"
+# Both settings are optional, and stock images ship them commented out. grep
+# exits 1 on no match, which pipefail turns fatal under set -e — an absent
+# setting must read as empty, not abort the install.
+journald_storage="$(printf '%s\n' "$journald_conf" | grep -E '^[[:space:]]*Storage=' | tail -n1 | cut -d= -f2 | tr -d '[:space:]' || true)"
+journald_cap="$(printf '%s\n' "$journald_conf" | grep -E '^[[:space:]]*SystemMaxUse=' | tail -n1 | cut -d= -f2 | tr -d '[:space:]' || true)"
 
 if [ "$journald_storage" = "persistent" ] && [ -n "$journald_cap" ]; then
     echo "Persistent journald storage already configured (SystemMaxUse=$journald_cap)"
@@ -1771,7 +1774,7 @@ else
     # after ledmatrix-persistent.conf (zz-local.conf and friends) still wins.
     # Writing the file is not evidence it took effect -- re-read and say so
     # plainly rather than reporting success we cannot confirm.
-    journald_now="$(journald_effective | grep -E '^[[:space:]]*Storage=' | tail -n1 | cut -d= -f2 | tr -d '[:space:]')"
+    journald_now="$(journald_effective | grep -E '^[[:space:]]*Storage=' | tail -n1 | cut -d= -f2 | tr -d '[:space:]' || true)"
     if [ "$journald_now" = "persistent" ]; then
         echo "  Persistent journald storage active"
     else