qubes-dom0-update fails when the template is missing /var/lib/qubes/dom0-updates dir

[ij1]

Qubes OS version:

R3.2

Affected TemplateVMs:

debian-9 derived template that for some reason had /var/lib/qubes/dom0-updates missing.

The reason why it has gone missing is unknown, however, I recently (a few days ago) installed QSB#38 packages into that template and this was the first time I used qubes-dom0-updates after that (IIRC).

---

Steps to reproduce the behavior:

• Remove /var/lib/qubes/dom0-updates from updatevm
• Run sudo qubes-dom0-update in dom0

Expected behavior:

Normal update process.

Actual behavior:

[dom0]$ sudo qubes-dom0-update
Using sys-firewall as UpdateVM to download updates for Dom0; this may take some time...
Running command on VM: 'sys-firewall'...
Running command on VM: 'sys-firewall'...
tar: /var/lib/qubes/dom0-updates: Cannot open: No such file or directory
tar: Error is not recoverable: exiting now
Dom0 updates dir does not exists: /var/lib/qubes/dom0-updates
[dom0]$

General notes:

I was able to restore the functionality by adding that /var/lib/qubes/dom0-updates and chowning it to user.user.

The same problem occurs also with --clean option so it won't help any.

[donob4n]

Fixed with donob4n/qubes-core-admin-linux@facf84a

But I'm not sure if the bug is this not working when there is no /var/lib/qubes/dom0-updates or the fact it doesn't exist.

Qubes 4.0 seems affected too.

[ij1]

Will that fix actually work? Doesn't mkdir return an error if the directory is already there?
That is, I guess it would fix my problem but break it for the another case.

[donob4n]

Yes but qvm-run doesn't, so it just ignores it. I thought about doing more elegant "if" but there is no too much benefit since it's ignored and chown could fix a rare permission corruption.

[donob4n]

uhM, it seems that retcode is ignored because there is no --pass-io

[ij1]

I think I've now found the cause for the missing the directory. The directory was present in qubes-core-agent v3.2.22 but not any more in the #QSB38-fixed versions (probably due to some non-#QSB38 related pending work that got included to the newer version).

[qubesos-bot]

Automated announcement from builder-github

The package qubes-core-dom0-linux-4.0.12-1.fc25 has been pushed to the r4.0 testing repository for dom0.
To test this update, please install it with the following command:

sudo qubes-dom0-update --enablerepo=qubes-dom0-current-testing

Changes included in this update

[qubesos-bot]

Automated announcement from builder-github

The package qubes-core-dom0-linux-4.0.13-1.fc25 has been pushed to the r4.0 stable repository for dom0.
To install this update, please use the standard update command:

sudo qubes-dom0-update

Or update dom0 via Qubes Manager.

Changes included in this update

[qubesos-bot]

Automated announcement from builder-github

The package qubes-core-dom0-linux-3.2.18-1.fc23 has been pushed to the r3.2 testing repository for dom0.
To test this update, please install it with the following command:

sudo qubes-dom0-update --enablerepo=qubes-dom0-current-testing

Changes included in this update

[qubesos-bot]

Automated announcement from builder-github

The package qubes-core-dom0-linux-3.2.18-1.fc23 has been pushed to the r3.2 stable repository for dom0.
To install this update, please use the standard update command:

sudo qubes-dom0-update

Or update dom0 via Qubes Manager.

Changes included in this update