init package is missing

[Removed by request]

I'm using Ubuntu 15.04 dev and upstart 1.13.2-0ubuntu10 doesn't contain files like /sbin/init anymore. This caused that after upgrading to this package I wasn't able to reboot/shutdown my system and to fully boot it after a hard reboot.
---
ApportVersion: 2.16.2-0ubuntu4
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: LXDE
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 15.04
EcryptfsInUse: Yes
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
Package: upstart 1.13.2-0ubuntu9 [origin: unknown]
PackageArchitecture: amd64
ProcEnviron:
 TERM=xterm
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 LANG=de_DE.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
ProcKernelCmdline: BOOT_IMAGE=/boot/vmlinuz-3.19.0-10-generic root=UUID=05338ff8-a226-421b-90a4-1dd45199f783 ro elevator=cfq
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.19.0-10.10-generic 3.19.2
Tags: third-party-packages vivid
Uname: Linux 3.19.0-10-generic x86_64
UnreportableReason: Das ist kein offizielles Ubuntu-Paket. Bitte entfernen Sie alle Pakete von Drittanbietern und wiederholen Sie den Vorgang.
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
UpstartBugCategory: System
UpstartRunningSystemJobs:
 Error: command ['initctl', '--system', 'list'] failed with exit code 1: initctl: Unable to connect to system bus: Did not receive a reply. Possible causes include: the remote application did not send a reply, the message bus security policy blocked the reply, the reply timeout expired, or the network connection was broken.
UpstartRunningSystemVersion: Error: command ['initctl', '--system', 'version'] failed with exit code 1: initctl: Unable to connect to system bus: Did not receive a reply. Possible causes include: the remote application did not send a reply, the message bus security policy blocked the reply, the reply timeout expired, or the network connection was broken.
UserGroups: adm audio cdrom dip lpadmin plugdev sambashare sudo vboxusers wireshark
_MarkForUpload: True
modified.conffile..etc.init.acpid.conf: [modified]
modified.conffile..etc.init.cgmanager.conf: [modified]
modified.conffile..etc.init.d.acpid: [modified]
mtime.conffile..etc.init.acpid.conf: 2014-02-19T20:08:15.825697
mtime.conffile..etc.init.cgmanager.conf: 2015-02-25T20:58:42.596226
mtime.conffile..etc.init.control.alt.delete.conf: 2014-08-16T13:50:31.422130
mtime.conffile..etc.init.d.acpid: 2014-05-30T01:07:43.027750
mtime.conffile..etc.init.tty2.conf: 2014-08-16T13:50:31.430130
mtime.conffile..etc.init.tty3.conf: 2014-08-16T13:50:31.434130
mtime.conffile..etc.init.tty4.conf: 2014-08-16T13:50:31.438130
mtime.conffile..etc.init.tty5.conf: 2014-08-16T13:50:31.442130
mtime.conffile..etc.init.tty6.conf: 2014-08-16T13:50:31.446130

[Robie Basak (racb)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. Please execute the following command, as it will automatically gather debugging information, in a terminal:

apport-collect 1436691

When reporting bugs in the future please use apport by using 'ubuntu-bug' and the name of the package affected. You can learn more about this functionality at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/ReportingBugs.

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I'm noticing that these essential files have been moved from the package upstart to the new package upstart-sysv. This package has just to be missed being installed on upgrading because the package init is not essential (while its description says it is (also it says that it allows to select between 3 init systems while it actually lists only 2)).

[Lin (sl85mail)]

This is a bug in the "upstart" package. Please refer to bug #1436956 that I had reported:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/upstart/+bug/1436956

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Removed by request (removed3425744)]

This seems not to be a bug in the upstart package - see comment #10 for the details. If the init package should get marked as essential apt will automatically install it on the next "apt-get dist-upgrade" and because init depends on "systemd-sysv | upstart-sysv" it will install one of these 2 packages which both does contain the missing files (at default systemd-sysv gets installed so you maybe want to install upstart-sysv afterwards which should also remove systemd-sysv then).

[Robie Basak (racb)]

Please can you explain why you think this is a bug? As far as I understand, you now need to install upstart-sysv if you want to keep your system running upstart on Vivid. But ordinarily users should not be affected because they should all have been migrated to systemd, unless there is a bug that prevents that happening? If this is the case, please can you explain what installer you used to install your system? Can you reproduce steps in a virtual machine that lead to the system becoming broken on a dist-upgrade?

[Lin (sl85mail)]

I have found some additional information on how this bug would be reproduced, let me explain:

If you visit this URL: http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-gnome/releases/15.04/ , there are four alpha/beta releases of 15.04 in that directory: alpha-1, alpha-2, beta-1 and beta-2.

Now check the manifest file for alpha-1, alpha-2 and/or beta-1 (but not beta-2), for example:
http://cdimage.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-gnome/releases/15.04/beta-1/ubuntu-gnome-15.04-beta1-desktop-amd64.manifest

You will see that these packages related to systemd and upstart were installed by default:

systemd 219-3ubuntu1
systemd-shim 9-1
upstart 1.13.2-0ubuntu7
upstart-bin 1.13.2-0ubuntu7

Notice that the systemd-sysv package is NOT installed by default in the manifest file? This means the binaries such as /sbin/init and /sbin/shutdown are only provided by the "upstart" package.

Now, in the latest version of upstart package, these binaries were moved to upstart-sysv and are no longer contained in the upstart package itself.

To sum it up, if you start with an alpha-1, alpha-2 and/or beta-1 build of Ubuntu 15.04, and from there, attempt to do a "apt-get update; apt-get dist-upgrade" (or "aptitude update; aptitude upgrade"), it will cause the system to lose those essential binaries and can no longer shutdown/reboot.

[Martin Pitt (pitti)]

The idea is that the "Priority: required" init package is always installed, which depends on systemd-sysv | upstart-sysv. upstart-bin is history, that's "upstart" now (and as you already found out, upstart-sysv now contains /sbin/init).

Any idea how "init" got missing on your system?

[Lin (sl85mail)]

As far as I know, in the scenario I described in my previous comment, the "apt-get dist-update" process will NOT require the install of either systemd-sysv or upstart-sysv. It will just update "upstart" to the latest version which no longer contain binaries such as /sbin/init and /sbin/shutdown, and as a result, remove those essential binaries from the system and leaves it broken.

[Removed by request (removed3425744)]

@Martin Pitt: In my case this happened likely because I'm configuring my system to be minimalist. This means that I'm removing all packages which are not needed (and init wasn't needed for a working system). The upgrade caused then that the new package upstart-sysv hasn't made it to such systems without init.

But init was now made essential which fixes this issue (but the other mentioned bug on the package description does still exist but I have now opened another ticket for it).