Computer reboots when enabling/disabling ntp

[Anders Sjölander]

Binary package hint: ntp

When using System->Administration->Time and date to enable ntp, my computer immediately reboots. When Ubuntu has restarted, ntp seem to be active, at least according to the settings (don't know how to check for sure) and when I try to disable it, my computer reboots again.

ProblemType: Bug
Architecture: i386
Date: Fri Jan 22 15:39:34 2010
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.04
Package: ntp 1:4.2.4p6+dfsg-2ubuntu4
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_US.utf8
 LANG=en_US.utf8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.32-10.14-generic
SourcePackage: ntp
Tags: lucid
Uname: Linux 2.6.32-10-generic i686

[Victor Vargas (kamus)]

@thezood, I tried to reproduce this issue in Lucid up to date (running under VirtualBox) and I can confirm this problem is still occurring (VM shutdown, not reboot, without any advertisement).

[Paul Elliott (omahn)]

Confirmed here too, the VM (under VMware Workstation) simply powered off. These are the only messages logged to the local syslog daemon:

Jan 22 16:48:15 ubuntu kernel: [ 110.162156] type=1505 audit(1264178895.435:15): operation="profile_load" pid=2000 name="/usr/sbin/ntpd"
Jan 22 16:48:19 ubuntu kernel: [ 114.710779] type=1505 audit(1264178899.983:16): operation="profile_remove" pid=2080 name="/sbin/dhclient3" namespace="defaul
t"
Jan 22 16:48:19 ubuntu kernel: [ 114.710890] type=1505 audit(1264178899.983:17): operation="profile_remove" pid=2080 name="/usr/bin/evince" namespace="defaul
t"
Jan 22 16:48:19 ubuntu kernel: [ 114.711448] type=1505 audit(1264178899.983:18): operation="profile_remove" pid=2080 name="/usr/bin/evince-previewer" namespa
ce="default"
Jan 22 16:48:19 ubuntu kernel: [ 114.711713] type=1505 audit(1264178899.983:19): operation="profile_remove" pid=2080 name="/usr/bin/evince-thumbnailer" names
pace="default"
Jan 22 16:48:20 ubuntu kernel: [ 114.712068] type=1505 audit(1264178899.983:20): operation="profile_remove" pid=2080 name="/usr/lib/NetworkManager/nm-dhcp-cl
ient.action" namespace="default"
Jan 22 16:48:20 ubuntu kernel: [ 114.716685] type=1505 audit(1264178899.990:21): operation="profile_remove" pid=2080 name="/usr/lib/connman/scripts/dhclient-
script" namespace="default"
Jan 22 16:48:20 ubuntu kernel: [ 114.716757] type=1505 audit(1264178899.990:22): operation="profile_remove" pid=2080 name="/usr/lib/cups/backend/cups-pdf" na
mespace="default"
Jan 22 16:48:20 ubuntu kernel: [ 114.716828] type=1505 audit(1264178899.990:23): operation="profile_remove" pid=2080 name="/usr/sbin/cupsd" namespace="defaul
t"
Jan 22 16:48:20 ubuntu kernel: [ 114.716871] type=1505 audit(1264178899.990:24): operation="profile_remove" pid=2080 name="/usr/sbin/ntpd" namespace="default
"

[Anders Sjölander (thezood)]

It has both rebooted and powered off my computer now.

[Milan Bouchet-Valat (nalimilan)]

Any chance you get more informations by following the procedure for time-admin at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingGnomeSystemTools? As I really don't see how the gnome-system-tools could be at fault here, you may first check that 'sudo restart ntp' doesn't trigger the same issues.

[Anders Sjölander (thezood)]

$ sudo restart ntp
restart: Unknown job: ntp

[Anders Sjölander (thezood)]

Followed the instructions on https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DebuggingGnomeSystemTools#For%20Time%20[time-admin] and this time the computer doesn't reboot or restart but the program doesn't save my configuration either.

[Anders Sjölander (thezood)]

I also tried purging and reinstalling ntp, same result. Internet time configuration aren't saved when I close the Time and date window.

[Milan Bouchet-Valat (nalimilan)]

Hmm, looks like the services are not correctly loaded, which can actually lead to this kind of trouble. I've reproduced the problem once here in Karmic, but I'm not able to get it in a Lucid virtual box.

Could you reproduce the bug once again, running the commands:
sudo killall /usr/bin/perl system-tools-backends;
sudo /usr/sbin/system-tools-backends -d &> ~/stb.log &
sudo /usr/share/system-tools-backends-2.0/scripts/SystemToolsBackends.pl -m ServicesConfig -v &> ~/stb-services.log

before launching time-admin? Please also use
time-admin &> ~/time-admin.log
so that we can check everything goes the same. Thanks!

[Paul Elliott (omahn)]

I've uploaded stb.log and time-admin.log as requested. The stb-services.log file was empty. I noticed today that the machine powers off about a second after a 'Enabling NTP' GUI progress box appears.

[Milan Bouchet-Valat (nalimilan)]

Absolutely empty? Even with the -v option? I can't believe it, I've just checked twice here, at least there's always an init output. Just check it manually by running
sudo /usr/share/system-tools-backends-2.0/scripts/SystemToolsBackends.pl -m ServicesConfig -v

Anyway, the new time-admin.log you posted is interesting because some error messages have gone. So that means they're not at fault, which prevents me from going on a wrong track.

[Paul Elliott (omahn)]

My mistake, sorry. I must have had a typo first time around. Here's the stb-services.log file. Note the last line, halt!

[Victor Vargas (kamus)]

I have my lucid fully updated and today I tried to reproduce once again this issue and is unable to reproduce anymore (no halt, no reboot).

[Milan Bouchet-Valat (nalimilan)]

That bug may very well be random, we've already seen this with the gst. The halt is logical since the backends are stopping all services one by one, which happens when the GUI sends them a kind of empty list.

Be careful when testing this bug, doing so in a real machine will make your init scripts quite messy, it changes priorities to 50.

[Paul Elliott (omahn)]

I still have this issue unfortunately with a fully patched Lucid install at the time of writing.

[Milan Bouchet-Valat (nalimilan)]

I think I'm going to fix this the right way instead of wasting time to find the precise cause of this bug. We shouldn't commit changes to all scripts each time we change one of them, here ntp. That won't enter Lucid before GNOME 2.29.90, but that should definitely prevent this mess to happen.

Even if we discover the underlying issue after that, it will be much easier to debug since the computer won't reboot... ;-)

[Milan Bouchet-Valat (nalimilan)]

Committed, will be in 2.29.90 (in two weeks).

[Milan Bouchet-Valat (nalimilan)]

Fix released upstream with the gnome-system-tools 2.29.90.

[Milan Bouchet-Valat (nalimilan)]

Package has been uploaded for a long time to Lucid.