[CentOS] CR repo update disaster for my desktop.

[Simon Matter]

> On 4/12/18 9:06 AM, Rob Kampen wrote:
>> Sorry for top post, my android BlueMail will not let me insert at the
>> bottom.
>>
>> I have found that tracker-extract seems to trigger a segfault. I note
>> this is not updated in CR, but comes from base. Removal of tracker seems
>> too harsh as it has dependant modules like brasero, evince, grilo,
>> nautilus and totem.
>> Maybe there is an obscure relationship in tracker that need attention.
>> Stumpped.
>>
>> ⁣Sent from BlueMail ​
>>
>> On 03 Dec 2018, 11:28 PM, at 11:28 PM, Fabian Arrotin
>> <arrfab at centos.org> wrote:
>>> On 03/12/2018 11:14, John Hodrien wrote:
>>>> On Mon, 3 Dec 2018, Simon Matter wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>> Le 03/12/2018 à 06:25, Rob Kampen a écrit :
>>>>>>> I enabled the CR repo and did the yum update. Some 800+ rpms were
>>>>>>> offered and all seemed to resolve depenancies OK, so yes it was
>>>>>>> started. The updates completed and all looked good, until the
>>> reboot.
>>>>>> I got a similar disaster here. I guess the lesson to be learned is
>>> that
>>>>>> CR is nice to have on servers, but don't use it on desktops.
>>>>> My question is what will change with the final release of 7.6? I
>>> thought
>>>>> the CR repo usually holds all updates with the exception of
>>>>> centos-release, or are there more updates to come? I had the
>>> impression
>>>>> that in the past, the final release brought only cosmetic changes
>>> with
>>>>> the
>>>>> centos-release being updated.
>>>> I've seen zero problems on Desktops I've installed CR on.
>>>>
>>>> If CR has issues, as you say you'd expect 7.6 to have problems.  If
>>>> things are
>>>> failing with CR updates, you really want to investigate what's going
>>> on.
>>>> jh
>>> +1 as 7.6.1810 is exactly 7.5.1804+updates+CR so only missing packages
>>> are centos-release/anaconda and install tree/media ..
>>>
>>> So if there are issues with CR, using the list and bugs.centos.org
>>> would
>>> be good.
>>> BTW : the goal of CR is exactly to find those issues earlier and then
>>> write Release Notes with workarounds/warnings
>
> So in an effort to narrow down the problem I also have an old Samsung
> laptop - i5 with an nvidia card - all up-to-date 7.5 - I thought I would
> try a more conservative upgrade approach.
>
> first updated to the CR kernel with yum upgrade kernel*
>
> then after successful reboot did an update to gdm* and gnome*
>
> another reboot and all is well
>
> then update of xorg* (only 20 files)
>
> Now it will not boot - keyboard is non responsive so cannot even do a
> Ctrl Alt F2 to access a shell. Old kernel is also non boot. Left this
> machine for now and back to my main desktop workstation.
>
> No idea if this xorg problem relates to my original workstation - so on
> that machine I did a downgrade of xorg* - seemed to complete ok, but on
> reboot and login - still the same problem.
>
> As the only clue in the logs is the libc segfault I did a downgrade of
> glibc - this too seemed to work but no change to the system - gnome
> crashes after 5 - 10 seconds.
>
> Wasted far too much time on this, no idea what to do now so I have done
> a fresh 7.5 install and all works again - just need to install all the
> additional stuff I use each day, but at least I have a desktop that
> functions.
>
> I will wait until 7.6 is officially released, watch the list for a week
> or two and then with much fear and trepidation give it a go. <sad face>
>
> As a long time user of CentOS (well over a decade - I started with 5.x
> workstations, then had a couple of 6.x, and used two 7.x machines, not
> counting my servers), I must observe that the core server stuff "just
> works" e.g. mail, mysql / mariadb, postfix, dovecot, apache, php. Even
> the migration to libreoffice was okay.
>
> The major version upgrades each gave an all over better desktop
> experience. What has also happened however is that some of the 7.x
> upgrades have been difficult to deal with - one of the recent firefox
> updates lost all my local password databases which I do not back up to
> the cloud for obvious reasons. Unable to resolve the instability after
> many hours of testing and trialing combinations, I have left firefox and
> moved to vivaldi - we'll see how that works. As upstream seems to
> include more bleeding edge versions of major desktop utilities such as
> firefox, stability has been compromised.
>
> Now with this latest CR update, I have no idea if it is gnome, gdm, xorg
> or some other component, but to have two quite differently configured
> machines both loose their desktops, I am unhappy. The use of roll back
> of over 800 files just didn't pass the transaction test thus that too
> was futile.
>
> I thought the approach I used with my laptop today was sufficiently
> cautious, yet it caught me and I am still trying to work out what to do
> next.
>
> As always, happy to entertain ideas and suggestions. My main workstation
> however is now safely working at a clean install of 7.5, thus cannot do
> further tests there, life must go on, four days of down time is far too
> much.
>
> Also let me give a heartfelt thanks to the hard working CentOS team, I
> see the more and more difficult task you need to navigate with each
> major update, you do an outstanding task, and I am most grateful!

The big question remains, what did you install which is not part of the
base CentOS distribution? You mentioned vivaldi browser, Nvidia stuff,
what else did you install from EPEL or other sources? I mean, is it
possible in your case that something causes problems now which is not part
of CentOS?

Regards,
Simon