Incorrect disk information is displayed after creating a new partition
| Affects | Status | Importance | Assigned to | Milestone | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GNOME Disks |
Unknown
|
Unknown
|
|||
| gnome-disk-utility (Ubuntu) |
New
|
Undecided
|
Unassigned | ||
Bug Description
After creating a new partition, GNOME Disks did not indicate whether or not the partition creation had succeeded. Instead, it indicated that several partitions had been destroyed, when this was not correct.
I will describe the steps that lead to the issue:
1. A disk divided into several ext4 and NTFS partitions existed.
2. I shrank the last partition (NTFS) using Windows.
3. I rebooted into Ubuntu and GNOME Disks correctly displayed the empty space at the end of the disk.
4. I instructed GNOME Disks to create a new ext4 logical partition using the dialog opened by the + symbol.
5. The dialog disappeared without any indication of whether the operation had succeeded or not. At the same time, the disk graphic was updated (see screenshot in attachment). It said that the disk had only one partition (/) and the rest of the disk was free space. This implied that the operation had failed and all the other partitions had been destroyed.
6. I tried closing and opening Disks, but it continued to indicate that most of the disk had been wiped.
7. I looked at the relevant filesystems in GNOME Files (Nautilus) and GNOME System Monitor. The information there suggested that the existing partitions were intact and the new partition had been successfully created.
8. I rebooted Ubuntu and opened Disks again. It correctly displayed the new disk layout (see screenshot in attachment in comment below).
I have not attempted to reproduce the issue as I cannot afford to risk damaging a hard disk in daily use.
This behaviour is highly undesirable. Users who are informed that their hard disk has been wiped suffer greatly increased stress and in their panic may take irreversible actions in an attempt to remedy the situation.
I am using GNOME 3.28.2 as supplied with Ubuntu 18.04.4 LTS. The Disks utility itself does not seem to have a version number.
I originally reported the issue upstream at GNOME (https:/
| description: | updated |
| description: | updated |
| Sebastien Bacher (seb128) wrote | #3 |
The attachment shows the disk layout after the partition was created and I rebooted. This is what GNOME Disks should have displayed when the partition-creation operation succeeded.