[maemo-users] [maemo-users] help - attempted N770 python upgrade -- system keeps rebooting

[From: Marius Gedminas]

On Mon, Feb 12, 2007 at 02:50:04PM -0500, Jeff G wrote:
> I probably did something really stupid, but don't know how to recover.

What you did is not stupid, but it is a common mistake: sudo apt-get
upgrade that tried to upgrade an important system package
(maemo-launcher).

> Nokia770-26:/media/mmc1# apt-get upgrade hildon-libs0
...
> Preparing to replace maemo-launcher 0.17-1.1 (using
> .../maemo-launcher_0.17-1.1sdk1_armel.deb) ...
> Stopping Maemo Launcher: maemo-launcher.

There is a process called the lifeguard.  When a critical system process
dies, it reboots the device.  Apt-get upgrade stopped maemo-launcher,
and shortly after that, the lifeguard rebooted the device.

> Unpacking replacement maemo-launcher ...
> Preparing to replace maemo-recorder 0.0.18 (using
> .../maemo-recorder_0.0.19_armel.deb) ...
> Unpacking replacement maemo-recorder ...
> -----------------
> 
> Now, it keeps rebooting about one 30 seconds after the last reboot

Unfortunately, your new maemo-launcher is not yet fully configured and
cannot start, so the device cannot boot, and restarts.

There are two ways to fix this situation:

  1. Reflash the OS, restore data from backups, reinstall applications
     (and take care not to upgrade maemo-launcher again).

  2. Enable R&D mode and disable lifeguard reset (with the flasher app),
     boot, ssh into it and finish the interrupted upgrade.  Disable R&D
     mode and see if it works.  If it doesn't, use alternative 1.

In my humble opinion, maemo-launcher's preinst/postinst scripts should
never stop it.  That's what, for example, gdm scripts do on desktop
Linux systems: if they find a running X server, the scripts do not
restart gdm.

HTH,
Marius Gedminas
-- 
if (DefRel.empty() == false)
	-- apt-pkg/policy.cc (apt 0.5.23)
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