Casper's USB update-initramfs shim should look for initrd.img in /boot
Affects | Status | Importance | Assigned to | Milestone | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
casper (Ubuntu) |
Fix Released
|
High
|
Colin Watson | ||
Lucid |
Fix Released
|
High
|
Colin Watson | ||
Maverick |
Fix Released
|
High
|
Colin Watson |
Bug Description
When upgrading a live USB stick, we use a diverted version of update-initramfs installed by casper which arranges for /casper/vmlinuz and /casper/initrd.lz at the top level of the CD to be updated. Unfortunately this script does not quite operate correctly; it assumes that there will be vmlinuz and initrd.gz links in the root directory, when in fact they are often (although not exclusively) in /boot. It needs to try both.
Stable update justification:
Impact: USB stick upgrades fail with obscure errors when upgrading the kernel. This results in very large numbers of duplicate bug reports.
Development branch: Fixed in casper 1.237/1.253/1.254 by making the writable-USB-stick update-initramfs shim handle vmlinuz and initrd.img being in /boot rather than /, making it more robust against the bits it's copying not existing for various reasons, and making it be a separate executable which can be upgraded in ways that don't involve regenerating the USB stick.
Patch:
http://
http://
TEST CASE: Create an Ubuntu USB stick, making sure that you do *not* drag the "Stored in reserved extra space" slider all the way to the right in usb-creator (see bug 562312), and upgrade the kernel to the current version in lucid-proposed or maverick-proposed as applicable. 10.04.1 and 10.10 as released should fail. A lucid daily build dating from after this SRU is accepted should succeed (we're unlikely to do more daily builds of maverick), although this only applies if you find a daily build which contains this fixed version of casper but doesn't have the newest version of the kernel in the archive, so don't worry if you can't test this case. Also, if you start from 10.04.1 or 10.10 as released, upgrade the casper package to the current version in lucid-proposed or maverick-proposed after this SRU is accepted, and then run 'sudo update-initramfs -u', that should succeed.
Regression potential: I don't think update-initramfs will fail in any more situations due to this change. Possible sources of regression are problems upgrading the casper package, and testers should also make sure that the upgraded image actually still boots correctly into the new kernel version following this change.
Please note the similar bug 557023, which we're fixing along with this bug, and the related bug 591202 in grub2, which you may run into along the way.
Changed in casper (Ubuntu): | |
status: | New → Confirmed |
Changed in casper (Ubuntu): | |
status: | Confirmed → Triaged |
importance: | Undecided → High |
description: | updated |
Changed in casper (Ubuntu Lucid): | |
status: | New → In Progress |
Changed in casper (Ubuntu): | |
assignee: | nobody → Colin Watson (cjwatson) |
Changed in casper (Ubuntu Lucid): | |
importance: | Undecided → High |
assignee: | nobody → Colin Watson (cjwatson) |
Changed in casper (Ubuntu Lucid): | |
milestone: | none → ubuntu-10.04.2 |
Changed in casper (Ubuntu): | |
status: | Fix Released → In Progress |
description: | updated |
Changed in casper (Ubuntu Maverick): | |
status: | New → Confirmed |
importance: | Undecided → High |
assignee: | nobody → Colin Watson (cjwatson) |
tags: | added: testcase |
This bug was fixed in the package casper - 1.237
---------------
casper (1.237) maverick; urgency=low
[ Colin Watson ]
* Add btrfs support.
* Make ip=* command-line parsing more precise (thanks, Bill Nickless;
LP: #586553).
* Make the USB update-initramfs shim cope with vmlinuz and initrd.img
being in /boot rather than / (LP: #591207).
* Depend on file for /etc/init.d/casper (thanks, Alon Swartz;
LP: #591213).
* Conflict with live-initramfs, as they overlap and people can pick one or
the other (LP: #453476).
[ Martin Pitt ]
* debian/casper.init: Change shutdown splash message to refer to
"installation media" instead of "disc"; a lot of installs happen
from USB sticks these days. Thanks to Debbie Beliveau for the idea.
-- Colin Watson <email address hidden> Mon, 28 Jun 2010 16:53:17 +0100