Something very strange happened during a dist-upgrade - 16.04 Beta 1

[Wise Melon]

Sorry to be so vague in the Title/Summary, but I really just don't know how to describe it... I installed Ubuntu GNOME 16.04 with the Beta 1 ISO, ran 'sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade' and then at some point in the 'setting up' part of the upgrade the screen suddenly just became:

    Strange_Ubuntu_GNOME_16.04_Beta1_Error.png

And upon moving my mouse nothing happened for a while until suddenly a weird view of my mouse appeared, and then when I moved it a little again it was gone (and then when moving my mouse about 10% of the time I would get it come into view and look similar to how it does in the screenshot):

    Strange_Ubuntu_GNOME_16.04_Beta1_Error_With_Mouse.png

I'm sorry that I can't be more helpful than that, I really have no idea why it came, and as I wasn't looking at my machine the whole time I don't know what came just before it was triggered... But this is a VM (32-bit, though the host machine is 64-bit).
---
ApportVersion: 2.20-0ubuntu3
Architecture: i386
CurrentDesktop: GNOME
DisplayManager:

DistroRelease: Ubuntu 16.04
GsettingsChanges:
 org.gnome.shell favorite-apps ['ubiquity.desktop', 'firefox.desktop', 'evolution.desktop', 'empathy.desktop', 'rhythmbox.desktop', 'org.gnome.Photos.desktop', 'libreoffice-writer.desktop', 'org.gnome.Nautilus.desktop', 'yelp.desktop']
 org.gnome.desktop.interface gtk-im-module 'gtk-im-context-simple'
InstallationDate: Installed on 2016-03-04 (1 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu-GNOME 16.04 LTS "Xenial Xerus" - Alpha i386 (20160225.1)
Package: gnome-shell 3.18.3-3ubuntu1
PackageArchitecture: i386
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.4.0-9.24-generic 4.4.3
Tags: xenial
Uname: Linux 4.4.0-9-generic i686
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
UserGroups: adm cdrom dip lpadmin plugdev sambashare sudo
_MarkForUpload: True

[Tim Lunn (darkxst)]

well that is indeed strange! perhaps a graphics driver update or something caused the glitch, there has been a new kernel since beta 1 was released.

Did the dist-upgrade finish? Does this persist after reboot?
Can you attach logs (and run apport-collect)

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

I don't think that the dist-upgrade finished... And I didn't actually shut it down, I just saved its state... But I will try and manually power it down, and then see what I can do about the logs...

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

I have now rebooted it and all seems well except for when running 'sudo apt-get dist-upgrade' I get the following error so I don't think that it did finish:

    E: dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run 'sudo dpkg --configure -a' to correct the problem.

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

Ah, but I have a slight problem, running that command just tells me that the "dpkg: error: dpkg status database is locked by another process"... But I get a similar error if I try to install the package I need to run python-collect so I think that the log extraction will need to be more manual... Which logs exactly do you need?

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

Actually, just fixed the issue with installing 'python-apport' so should hopefully have the logs with you shortly...

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

apport information

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

apport information

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

apport information

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

I installed from the same ISO and during a 'dist-upgrade' it happened again...

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

As I ran into the problem again, I have taken the dpkg.log file and uploaded it here.

[Bruce Pieterse (octoquad)]

I've just hit this trying to do a wily to xenial upgrade in Virtualbox on Xenial. This happened shortly after the font cache was regenerated. If I switch to tty3 with ALT+F3 and back to tty2 everything is back to normal (this wasn't immediate, 3-5 minutes later).

After this occurred, I switched to tty3 and ran ps aux | grep dpkg and I could see packages still being installed. I think Nikita got "E: dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run 'sudo dpkg --configure -a' to correct the problem." message because the VM was restarted shortly after this issue occurred. Nikita, could you confirm?

The gnome-shell did not crash, it looks more like the display was being reinitialized. I was able to remove obsolete packages after packages were installed and asked to reboot. This issue doesn't seem to persist across a reboot either.

Nikita, did you install the Virtualbox Guest Additions when you ran the upgrade?

Also, distribution upgrade logs are located under /var/log/dist-upgrade.

I will rollback to wily, install the virtualbox guest additions, reboot then upgrade to see if missing guest additions could be the cause.

Logs attached.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

@Bruce,

> After this occurred, I switched to tty3 and ran ps aux | grep dpkg and
> I could see packages still being installed. I think Nikita got "E:
> dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run 'sudo dpkg --configure -a'
> to correct the problem." message because the VM was restarted shortly
> after this issue occurred. Nikita, could you confirm?

Yes, that is correct.

> Nikita, did you install the Virtualbox Guest Additions when you ran
> the upgrade?

I normally like to install them after I've done a 'dist-upgrade' so that I have the latest kernel version, so I don't think that they would have been installed already...

> I will rollback to wily, install the virtualbox guest additions,
> reboot then upgrade to see if missing guest additions could be the
> cause.

I think I will also do similar and report back...

[Wise Melon (wise-melon-deactivatedaccount)]

I have now tested it and if I first install the VirtualBox Guest Additions before I do the upgrade it is fine and I don't get this issue.

[Daniel van Vugt (vanvugt)]

Thank you for reporting this bug to Ubuntu.
Ubuntu GNOME 16.04 (xenial) reached end-of-life on April, 2019

https://ubuntugnome.org/ubuntu-gnome-16-04-lts-is-here/
https://wiki.ubuntu.com/XenialXerus/ReleaseNotes/UbuntuGNOME

We appreciate that this bug may be old and you might not be interested in discussing it any more. But if you are then please upgrade to the latest Ubuntu version and re-test. If you then find the bug is still present in the newer Ubuntu version, please add a comment here telling us which new version it is in.