[Precise] Installation freezes after "Who are you?" (Ubiquity hangs in ubi-webcam.py)

[Geir Ove Myhr]

During installation, after entering the user information, the installer slows down to a crawl and the status bar (which says "Copying files") stops. Upon switching VT to 2 and back to 7, the window contents is not updated. Checking with top, the ubiquity process first uses 100 % CPU and eats memory, and after a while it uses e 750 M (of 1 G) of real memory and 3.5 G (of 4.0 G) of virtual memory causing massive swapping.

The hang occurs when loading the page titled ubiquity/text/webcam_heading_label after the comment '# This page is just a UI page' in gtk_ui.py. This invokes plugin_get_current_page() in ubi-webcam.py, where the call self.faceselector.webcam_play() never returns.

In UbiquityDebug.txt, the following error message occurs twice:
Error opening file for reading: Permission denied
I have traced the origin to ubi-webcam.py as well, in __init__(): They come from the calls
Gst.init(sys.argv)
(sys.argv here resolves to ['/usr/lib/ubiquity/bin/ubiquity'])
and
self.faceselector = gtkwidgets.FaceSelector()

Workaround:

Before starting the installer, run the following command in a terminal:
sudo rm /usr/lib/ubiquity/plugins/ubi-webcam.py

ApportVersion: 1.90-0ubuntu1
Architecture: amd64
CasperVersion: 1.296DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.04
LiveMediaBuild: Ubuntu 12.04 LTS "Precise Pangolin" - Alpha amd64 (20111227)
Package: ubiquity 2.9.10
PackageArchitecture: amd64
ProcEnviron:
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.2.0-7.13-generic 3.2.0-rc7
Tags: precise running-unity ubiquity-2.9.10
Uname: Linux 3.2.0-7-generic x86_64
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
UserGroups: adm cdrom dip lpadmin plugdev sambashare sudo

[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

I tried again using 'ubiquity --debug --pdb'. Same thing happened, but now hopefully the apport-collected files will contain more useful information.

[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

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[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Michael G. Fronk (raghnallmordecai)]

This also affects me.
I believe this may also be the root cause of Bug #933105

[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

Thanks Michael. I have marked bug #933105 and bug #950952 as duplicates of this bug. Apologies for making the title of this bug report so much geared towards the developers who could fix the bug that regular users experiencing it would not recognize that they were affected by it. I hope the new title fixes this.

I would like to highlight Michaels's workaround (from https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ubiquity/+bug/933105/comments/15) here as well:

Before starting the installer, run the following command in a terminal:
sudo rm /usr/lib/ubiquity/plugins/ubi-webcam.py

In my opinion (and other's as well: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/ubiquity/+bug/869239/comments/5), while the webcam/set login image feature is cool, it should be considered for removal if it causes problems. It also adds another step to the installation process which is hardly necessary and adds workload during the installation process.

[korziner (korziner)]

Removing the ubi-webcam.py solves 99% cpu and all RAM consuming issue of ubiquity on Thinkpad edge14 (arrandale).

[miegiel (nix-miegiel)]

Possible duplicates :
bug #950322
bug #952529
bug #944639

[Thomas82 (tommo1982)]

https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/952529 is my report. I is the same like this one so feel free to remove it.

I support removing the ubi-webcam.py feature. It shouldn't be during installation anyway. I don't need a picture taken. Leave it to people who like it after the system is installed.

[Robert Spanjaard (spamtrap-arumes)]

Same here, I'd rather have this 'feature' removed from the installation process instead of fixed.

[miegiel (nix-miegiel)]

I just tried to install ubuntu from the liveCD. I didn't see any option to make a login/user photo using the webcam (at the "who are you" screen). Maybe it has been partially removed and whatever remains is causing the bug?

[Geir Ove Myhr (gomyhr)]

migiel, the login/user photo screen is supposed to be _after_ the "who are you" screen. It is the loading of that page (which you don't get to see) which triggers the bug.