[RFC] installer web console for headless installs (native text mode + browser front)

[feng liu <dahema@me.com>]

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Hello,

headless installs currently mean a serial TUI or a pre-authored answer.toml. For one-off boxes both loops feel heavy: no keyboard or monitor on the machine, and writing TOML before touching hardware.

Proposal: one new installer boot entry - "Install Proxmox VE (web console)" - that boots the native text-mode installer exactly as the serial entry does, and additionally serves the installer's own question flow over plain HTTP on the LAN. Implementation-wise this is a third Proxmox::UI:: backend ("Web") beside the existing Gtk3 and StdIO ones: same questions, same validations, same progress stream, same auto-installer path downstream. One flow, three faces - no parallel wizard to maintain.

Access is gated by a one-time pairing code printed at boot: a session code on the console/serial, plus an optional machine code drawn by the bootloader from the SMBIOS UUID, so a machine with no screen or serial cable attached can still be paired from a phone. The target machine keeps showing the native text-mode screens throughout.

Full proposal text (motivation, code mapping to Proxmox::UI::Base / unconfigured.sh, honest security notes, open questions):

https://github.com/yeungtuzi/pve-installer/tree/web-console-proposal/web-console

Concept mockups attached - boot menu, pairing page, setup form, progress page and the target machine's native text screen. They are concept art in the corporate palette, not UI code.

If there is interest I will follow up with an RFC patch series (small HTTP daemon in the initrd + Proxmox::UI::Web). In the meantime I would value the list's opinion - in particular whether the maintained surface of a web front is worth it versus extending the existing auto-install answer tooling.

Thanks, yeungtuzi

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