qvm-run -p --localcmd output is interpreted by shell instead of being sent to command in appvm

[homotopycolimit]

Qubes OS version:

R4.0

Affected component(s):

qvm-run

Steps to reproduce the behavior:

in dom0 run a qvm-run -p command with the --localcmd option

for example:
qvm-run -p --localcmd="cmd0" $appvm "cat > /home/user/output"

Expected behavior:

Expect the output of cmd0 to be passed to the command on the appvm side, i.e. in this example we expect the output to be written to /home/user/output

Actual behavior:

It seems as if the output of the localcmd (cmd0) is being sent to bash (qubes-VMShell?) on the appvm side instead of to cat. It is trying to be interpreted by the shell!

General notes:

This seems to potentially be a serious issue because the shell is interpreting things that it is not meant to.

Related issues:

[homotopycolimit]

A mimimal example:

qvm-run -p --localcmd "date;sleep 1" sys-net "cat > /tmp/foo"

gives

/bin/bash: line 1: Wed: command not found (at least on a Wednesday)

[homotopycolimit]

A mimimal example:

qvm-run -p --localcmd "date;sleep 1" sys-net "cat > /tmp/foo"

gives

/bin/bash: line 1: Wed: command not found (at least on a Wednesday)