Cannot start nfs server, get errors about "nfsd" filesystem being unknown

[Timothy Miller]

When I installed this 15.10 system (clean install), I selected that I wanted to install an NFS server, so it should have had all of the packages installed, and it should have been a simple matter of editing /etc/exports and restarting the service, but not only was nfs-kernel-server NOT installed, but after installing, I can't get it to start.

First, I get this:
# service nfs-kernel-server restart
A dependency job for nfs-server.service failed. See 'journalctl -xe' for details.

So I do 'journalctl -xe', and I see stuff about missing dependencies. Initially, I got errors about "nfsd" being an unknown filesystem, and Googling that didn't get me terribly far. Here's the meat of what I see:

Oct 26 10:48:17 thing1 systemd[1]: nfs-idmapd.service: Job nfs-idmapd.service/start failed with result 'dependency'.
Oct 26 10:48:17 thing1 systemd[1]: run-rpc_pipefs.mount: Unit entered failed state.
Oct 26 10:48:17 thing1 mount[1587]: mount: unknown filesystem type 'nfsd'
Oct 26 10:48:17 thing1 systemd[1]: proc-fs-nfsd.mount: Mount process exited, code=exited status=32
Oct 26 10:48:17 thing1 systemd[1]: Failed to mount NFSD configuration filesystem.

I did an apt-get update and upgrade, and then I got an error about nfs-common having an error while being configured, so I tried to configure it with "sudo dpkg --configure -a", and I get errors about both nfs-common and nfs-kernel-server not being configured. Configuring nfs-common again, I'm told once again to look at 'journalctl -xe', and the main errors I see are all about unmet dependencies and this one:

Oct 26 10:38:32 thing1 mount[5635]: mount: unknown filesystem type 'rpc_pipefs'
Oct 26 10:38:32 thing1 systemd[1]: run-rpc_pipefs.mount: Mount process exited, code=exited status=32
Oct 26 10:38:32 thing1 systemd[1]: Failed to mount RPC Pipe File System.

Googling this, someone suggested a reboot, so I did that, but all that happened was that the "nfsd" error game back.

Note that in no instructions I've seen is mentioned to do anything with "nfsd", nor do I know of any place that it is specified. It appears that 15.10 nfs support is pretty badly broken. I would mark this bug as CRITICAL since it's taken me out of commission completely.

[Timothy Miller (theosib)]

I think I've figured out something about what's going on here.

Either:
(1) The Wily installer has bugs that occur when you install to /dev/sdb1, resulting in kernels not being setup properly,
OR
(2) If the Wily installer sees any kernels, it doesn't install the latest one.

So this clean install I mentioned, well, it's MOSTLY clean. I didn't format the drive. I just installed over what was there. The installer didn't install the latest kernel, which caused all sorts of problems.

I have another system where I UPGRADED to 15.10 server, and that also did not install the correct kernel!

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

>(1) The Wily installer has bugs that occur when you install to /dev/sdb1, resulting in kernels not
> being setup properly,
>OR
>(2) If the Wily installer sees any kernels, it doesn't install the latest one.

Neither of these things are true. However, if you are installing over an existing install and did not format the partition where your /boot directory is located, the kernel configuration logic *will* configure the bootloader to use the kernel available there that has the highest version number. If you have a non-Ubuntu kernel with a later version number, that will be configured as the default boot option. And that non-Ubuntu kernel may not have been configured in the way Ubuntu services expect.

You will want to remove any unowned /boot/vmlinuz-* files from your system along with the corresponding /boot/initrd.img- files and run 'sudo update-grub'; or you may wish to simply reinstall with a clean format.

[Timothy Miller (theosib)]

What happened here is that the bug originated somewhere else. See this discussion:

http://askubuntu.com/questions/689358/ubuntu-kernel-not-updating-with-15-10

Is there a bug database entry for fixing the install script to also upgrade the kernel? When installing or upgrading, it is important to also upgrade the kernel.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

On Mon, Oct 26, 2015 at 07:12:05PM -0000, Timothy Miller wrote:
> Is there a bug database entry for fixing the install script to also
> upgrade the kernel?

No, because that is not a thing that's broken. An Ubuntu install will
always install the kernel from the release that you're installing.

[Timothy Miller (theosib)]

I assure you, this is a thing that's broken. Please see that forum discussion I pointed out. I've upgraded two systems and did a (nearly) clean install on another. In all three cases, I had to manually install the correct kernel version. This is a bug in 15.10, and I'm not the only one who has noticed.