stop being nice does not work

[Harald Staub]

Test Case
---------
1) Install apache2 from the -release pocket
2) Run unattended-upgrades
3) Observe apache2 running with a niceness of 19
4) Downgrade apache2 to the version from the -release pocket
5) Install the version of unattended-upgrades from -proposed
6) Run unattended-upgrades
7) Observe apache2 running with a niceness of 0 i.e. no niceness

Since version 0.81, unattended-upgrades does the upgrade calculation with os.nice(19). To finish the nice block in /usr/bin/unattended-upgrade, the following call is used:
os.nice(0)

Since the argument is interpreted as incremental, this should be:
os.nice(-19)

Without this fix, this problem is back:
https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=701850
"unattended-upgrades: nice 19/ionice idle inherited by restarted processes"

Found in the trusty version (0.82.1ubuntu2), but probably in any version (including Debian) since 0.81.

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

I was able to confirm this by downgrading the version of apache2 installed to the one from the -release pocket and then running unattended upgrades:

 5867 root 39 19 284732 15232 9748 S 0.0 0.4 0:00.04 apache2
 5871 www-data 39 19 284764 5916 420 S 0.0 0.2 0:00.00 apache2
 5872 www-data 39 19 284764 5916 420 S 0.0 0.2 0:00.00 apache2
 5873 www-data 39 19 284764 5916 420 S 0.0 0.2 0:00.00 apache2
 5874 www-data 39 19 284764 5916 420 S 0.0 0.2 0:00.00 apache2
 5875 www-data 39 19 284764 5916 420 S 0.0 0.2 0:00.00 apache2

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

Thanks for bringing this up.

[Chris J Arges (arges)]

Hello Harald, or anyone else affected,

Accepted unattended-upgrades into trusty-proposed. The package will build now and be available at http://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unattended-upgrades/0.82.1ubuntu2.1 in a few hours, and then in the -proposed repository.

Please help us by testing this new package. See https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/EnableProposed for documentation how to enable and use -proposed. Your feedback will aid us getting this update out to other Ubuntu users.

If this package fixes the bug for you, please add a comment to this bug, mentioning the version of the package you tested, and change the tag from verification-needed to verification-done. If it does not fix the bug for you, please add a comment stating that, and change the tag to verification-failed. In either case, details of your testing will help us make a better decision.

Further information regarding the verification process can be found at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/QATeam/PerformingSRUVerification . Thank you in advance!

[Chris J Arges (arges)]

Hello Harald, or anyone else affected,

Accepted unattended-upgrades into utopic-proposed. The package will build now and be available at http://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unattended-upgrades/0.82.8ubuntu0.1 in a few hours, and then in the -proposed repository.

Please help us by testing this new package. See https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/EnableProposed for documentation how to enable and use -proposed. Your feedback will aid us getting this update out to other Ubuntu users.

If this package fixes the bug for you, please add a comment to this bug, mentioning the version of the package you tested, and change the tag from verification-needed to verification-done. If it does not fix the bug for you, please add a comment stating that, and change the tag to verification-failed. In either case, details of your testing will help us make a better decision.

Further information regarding the verification process can be found at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/QATeam/PerformingSRUVerification . Thank you in advance!

[Harald Staub (staub)]

Tried the trusty version 0.82.1ubuntu2.1, works fine :-)
(Sorry, no utopic here ATM.)

Cheers
 Harry

tags:added: verification-done-trusty

[Harald Staub (staub)]

(Oops, sorry, I may have messed around with the Status trying to update the Tag.)

[Harald Staub (staub)]

FYI: Opened a corresponding Debian bug:
https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=778769

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

The fix was already merged upstream for what it is worth.

https://github.com/murraybd/unattended-upgrades/tree/lp-bug-1422345

[Harald Staub (staub)]

Thank you (sorry, should have asked before). Do you think that it is best for me to close the Debian bug report?

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

Given that the changelog entry has already been written and doesn't include a debian bug reference I think it'd be best to close and maybe include the changelog entry.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package unattended-upgrades - 0.83.5

---------------
unattended-upgrades (0.83.5) unstable; urgency=medium

  [ Brian Murray ]
  * properly restore niceness (LP: #1422345)

 -- Michael Vogt <email address hidden> Thu, 19 Feb 2015 15:06:58 +0100

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package unattended-upgrades - 0.82.1ubuntu2.1

---------------
unattended-upgrades (0.82.1ubuntu2.1) trusty-proposed; urgency=medium

  *Properly remove the niceness given. (LP: #1422345)
 -- Brian Murray <email address hidden> Tue, 17 Feb 2015 14:32:54 -0800

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

The verification of the Stable Release Update for unattended-upgrades has completed successfully and the package has now been released to -updates. Subsequently, the Ubuntu Stable Release Updates Team is being unsubscribed and will not receive messages about this bug report. In the event that you encounter a regression using the package from -updates please report a new bug using ubuntu-bug and tag the bug report regression-update so we can easily find any regressions.

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

stgraber indicates this is causing issues in lxc containers:

11:14 < stgraber> bdmurray: your unattended-upgrade SRU
                  is making all my containers crash
                  once an hour ;)
11:14 < bdmurray> stgraber: hunh?
11:15 < stgraber> you can't set negative nice values in
                  an unprivileged LXC container even if
                  you're root inside it
11:15 < stgraber> so now every time unattended-upgrade
                  runs (in my case every hour), it
                  crashes on that os.nice call
11:18 < stgraber> what we've done in other tools (like
                  systemd) is make this non-fatel if
                  the error is EACCES (typical for
                  unprivileged containers) or EPERM
                  (typical for apparmor preventing it)
11:19 < bdmurray> stgraber: but then wouldn't bug
                  1422345 still happen?
11:22 < stgraber> bdmurray: sure, the bug would still
                  happen in this case
11:23 < stgraber> bdmurray: root in a userns has the
                  same rights as a regular user with
                  regard to process priorities
11:23 < stgraber> bdmurray: and as a regular user, you
                  can increase the niceness but never
                  decrease it
11:24 < bdmurray> would it better to first try
                  decreasing and only increase it if
                  decreasing works?
11:25 < stgraber> yep, that'd be a good trick
11:25 < stgraber> so -1, if that works then 20,
                  otherwise keep is it is

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

The discussed changes were merged upstream:

https://github.com/mvo5/unattended-upgrades/commit/ca3014220ce93717806353cf2c5cb7f3661c4e33

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

I've uploaded the improvements for this to the utopic and trusty queues.

[Timo Aaltonen (tjaalton)]

Hello Harald, or anyone else affected,

Accepted unattended-upgrades into utopic-proposed. The package will build now and be available at https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unattended-upgrades/0.82.8ubuntu0.2 in a few hours, and then in the -proposed repository.

Please help us by testing this new package. See https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/EnableProposed for documentation how to enable and use -proposed. Your feedback will aid us getting this update out to other Ubuntu users.

If this package fixes the bug for you, please add a comment to this bug, mentioning the version of the package you tested, and change the tag from verification-needed to verification-done. If it does not fix the bug for you, please add a comment stating that, and change the tag to verification-failed. In either case, details of your testing will help us make a better decision.

Further information regarding the verification process can be found at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/QATeam/PerformingSRUVerification . Thank you in advance!

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

Hello Harald, or anyone else affected,

Accepted unattended-upgrades into trusty-proposed. The package will build now and be available at https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/unattended-upgrades/0.82.1ubuntu2.2 in a few hours, and then in the -proposed repository.

Please help us by testing this new package. See https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/EnableProposed for documentation how to enable and use -proposed. Your feedback will aid us getting this update out to other Ubuntu users.

If this package fixes the bug for you, please add a comment to this bug, mentioning the version of the package you tested, and change the tag from verification-needed to verification-done. If it does not fix the bug for you, please add a comment stating that, and change the tag to verification-failed. In either case, details of your testing will help us make a better decision.

Further information regarding the verification process can be found at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/QATeam/PerformingSRUVerification . Thank you in advance!

[Harald Staub (staub)]

Tried the newest trusty version 0.82.1ubuntu2.2, on hardware, works fine :-)
I leave the verification-needed flag since the test should also be done in a container.

Cheers
 Harry

[Stéphane Graber (stgraber)]

Works fine in an unprivileged container. Thanks!

[Rolf Wojtech (rolf-g)]

I can confirm, worked fine in my LXC containers.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package unattended-upgrades - 0.82.8ubuntu0.2

---------------
unattended-upgrades (0.82.8ubuntu0.2) utopic-proposed; urgency=medium

  * Handle the situation where you may not be able to decrease process
    niceness e.g on an LXC container. (LP: #1422345)
 -- Brian Murray <email address hidden> Thu, 05 Mar 2015 15:03:10 -0800

[Foo (foo-foo-ch)]

Tested on unprivileged Docker container (Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS) and confirmed that it worked fine.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package unattended-upgrades - 0.82.1ubuntu2.2

---------------
unattended-upgrades (0.82.1ubuntu2.2) trusty-proposed; urgency=medium

  * Handle the situation where you may not be able to decrease process
    niceness e.g on an LXC container. (LP: #1422345)
 -- Brian Murray <email address hidden> Thu, 05 Mar 2015 15:03:10 -0800