apport-cli prints dots while waiting for password input

[David Cary]

Summary
=======

apport-cli might ask the user to authenticate:

```
Authentication is required to collect system information for this problem report
Authenticating as: <the install full user name>,,, (<the install user>)
Password:
```

But it still continues to print a dot every second or so. This confuses the user thinking that apport-cli is still doing something and then not entering the password.

Solution / Workaround
=====================

Enter your password and press enter. Then apport-cli will continue. You might be asked multiple times for your password.

Original bug report
===================

After a fresh install of Ubuntu Server 15.04 on an HP Pavilion 15-f039wv laptop, I wanted to report an installation bug. In the newly installed server I ran the command:
    apport-bug debian-installer
(https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Bugs/FindRightPackage says to use debian-installer as the package name for this situation)
It produced the following output (lines of only minus signs not included):

------------------------------------------------------------
*** Collecting problem information

The collected information can be sent to the developers to improve the application. This might take a few minutes.
..dpkg-query: no packages found matching debian-installer
....==== AUTHENTICATING FOR com.ubuntu.apport.root-info ===
Authentication is required to collect system information for this problem report
Authenticating as: <the install full user name>,,, (<the install user>)
Password: ..........................................................................................................................................................
.............................................................................................................................................................................
------------------------------------------------------------

where <the install full user name> and <the install user> were values I entered during the install and were for the user I was logged in as at the time of running the command, although the actual values are redacted for this public bug report.
There were a total of 32 lines of period on a 17-inch display, more than 5440 periods, that were regularly displayed over more than 40 minutes.

I finally hit Ctl-C, and got the additional messages (lines of only minus signs not included):
------------------------------------------------------------
==== AUTHENTICATION FOR com.ubuntu.apport.root-info ===
Authentication is required to collect system information for this problem report
Authenticating as: <the install full user name>,,, (<the install user>)
Password:
------------------------------------------------------------

This time the blinking cursor waited after the "Password: " prompt.

Not knowing (or being able to find in man pages) what kind of password I should use, I again pressed Ctl-C, which produced the following messages (lines of only minus signs not included):

------------------------------------------------------------
Exception ignored in <module 'threading' from '/usr/lib/python3.4/threading.py'>
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/lib/python3.4/threading.py", line1294, in _shutdown
    t.join()
  File "/usr/lib/python3.4/threading.py", line 1060, in join
    self._wait_for_tstate_lock()
  File "/usr/lib/python3.4/threading.py", line 1076, in _wait_for_tstate_lock
    elif lock.acquire(block, timeout):
Keyboard Interrupt
------------------------------------------------------------

Where "<module 'threading' from '/usr/lib/python3.4/threading.py'>" is what was actually displayed.

This terminated my apport-bug command and returned to the command prompt.

I subsequently submitted the bug through the Launchpad web interface.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[pleabargain (dennisgdaniels)]

Here's the video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ZMczJ8k9ZY

after the third ubuntu 19.1 system crash...

I have tried using apport-bug and got nowhere... and then I found that this bug is very very old.

[Benjamin Drung (bdrung)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. I watched the video and that was helpful. I was able to reproduce it on Ubuntu 22.10, but the issue is not that apport-cli hangs. It just waits for you to enter your password while still printing dots. So I will rephrase this bug report that the UI is bad/misleading.

Solution: Enter your password and press enter. Then apport-cli will continue. You might be asked multiple times for your password.