I encountered this error when deploying the Hosted Engine via Cockpit:
[ INFO ] TASK [ovirt.engine-setup : Run engine-setup with answerfile]
[ ERROR ]
fatal: [localhost -> engine.ovirt.trashnet.xyz]: FAILED! =>
{"changed": true, "cmd": ["engine-setup", "--accept-defaults",
"--config-append=/root/ovirt-engine-answers"], "delta":
"0:00:01.396490", "end": "2020-05-22 18:32:41.965984", "msg": "non-zero
return code", "rc": 1, "start": "2020-05-22 18:32:40.569494", "stderr":
"", "stderr_lines": [], "stdout": "[ INFO ] Stage: Initializing\n[
ERROR ] Failed to execute stage 'Initializing': '%' must be followed by
'%' or '(', found: '%JUUj'\n[ INFO ] Stage: Clean up\n Log
file is located at
/var/log/ovirt-engine/setup/ovirt-engine-setup-20200522183241-c7d1kh.log\n[
ERROR ] Failed to execute stage 'Clean up': 'NoneType' object has no
attribute 'cleanup'\n[ INFO ] Generating answer file
'/var/lib/ovirt-engine/setup/answers/20200522183241-setup.conf'\n[ INFO
] Stage: Pre-termination\n[ INFO ] Stage: Termination\n[ ERROR ]
Execution of setup failed", "stdout_lines": ["[ INFO ] Stage:
Initializing", "[ ERROR ] Failed to execute stage 'Initializing': '%'
must be followed by '%' or '(', found: '%JUUj'", "[ INFO ] Stage: Clean
up", " Log file is located at
/var/log/ovirt-engine/setup/ovirt-engine-setup-20200522183241-c7d1kh.log",
"[ ERROR ] Failed to execute stage 'Clean up': 'NoneType' object has no
attribute 'cleanup'", "[ INFO ] Generating answer file
'/var/lib/ovirt-engine/setup/answers/20200522183241-setup.conf'", "[
INFO ] Stage: Pre-termination", "[ INFO ] Stage: Termination", "[
ERROR ] Execution of setup failed"]}
The important bit is this: Failed to execute stage 'Initializing': '%'
must be followed by '%' or '(', found: '%JUUj'"
Hey! Those are the last few characters of the admin password. Note that I don't mean the root password to the VM, but the one for the "admin" user of the web interface. I added some debug lines to the Ansible play to see the answerfile that was being generated.
OVESETUP_CONFIG/adminPassword=str:&6&yGfcWf#b%JUUj
Apparently engine-setup can no longer handle an answerfile with a "%" character in it. This same password worked in 4.3.
Once I changed the admin password, installation progressed normally.