snapd

snap cannot be run while being upgraded − no user feedback

Bug #1850282 reported by Simon Lambourn
6
This bug affects 1 person
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
snapd
In Progress
Medium
Zygmunt Krynicki
chromium-browser (Ubuntu)
New
Undecided
Unassigned
snapd (Ubuntu)
Confirmed
Undecided
Unassigned

Bug Description

I've just upgraded to Ubuntu 19.10 with the new snap version of Chromium a week or two ago

On starting my system today, I found that Chromium had disappeared from the launcher and wasn't even in the apps list. using the command 'chromium' didn't work either, giving me the message that chromium wasn't installed. "You can install it using snap install chromium". Then when I try to install it, I get the message "chromium is already installed".

After about 10 minutes of digging around, I discovered that the chromium snap was disabled. I couldn't enable it because it was being refreshed.

Come on! this is unacceptable behaviour for any tool but especially a browser which must be one of the most heavily used applications on Ubuntu. This will really hit the reputation of ubuntu with any user who has to take maybe more than 10 minutes to discover the problem, or may never discover it - Chromium may just mysteriously reappear some time later.

Desired behaviour: Never disappear. Allow refresh to happen under the covers, transparently (as it used to with apt).
Minimally acceptable behaviour: never disappear, but display a message "chromium is being refreshed. Please try later".

$ snap info chromium
name: chromium
summary: Chromium web browser, open-source version of Chrome
publisher: Canonical✓
contact: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/chromium-browser/+bugs?field.tag=snap
license: unset
description: |
  An open-source browser project that aims to build a safer, faster, and more
  stable way for all Internet users to experience the web.
commands:
  - chromium.chromedriver
  - chromium
snap-id: XKEcBqPM06H1Z7zGOdG5fbICuf8NWK5R
tracking: stable
channels:
  stable: 78.0.3904.70 2019-10-29 (920) 160MB -
  candidate: 78.0.3904.70 2019-10-29 (920) 160MB -
  beta: 78.0.3904.70 2019-10-22 (907) 165MB -
  edge: 79.0.3941.4 2019-10-21 (905) 159MB -
installed: 78.0.3904.70 (917) 167MB disabled

Revision history for this message
Simon Lambourn (simon-lambourn-o) wrote :

(And just to add insult to injury - you can't even report a bug using ubuntu-bug chromium! You get an error message saying "this is produced by Canonical - for help visit <a launchpad url>. The url is not properly clickable, perhaps because Chromium is not working, and you can't select it and copy it into another browser.)

Revision history for this message
Olivier Tilloy (osomon) wrote :

If chromium-browser is installed, you can report a bug that will include useful information about the snap by executing `ubuntu-bug chromium-browser`.

I acknowledge the problem, it seems like an unfortunate race condition where you tried to launch the snap while it was being refreshed. I'm adding a snapd task so that snapd developers can comment on whether this is a known problem, and being addressed.

Note that with debs and apt, you could theoretically have hit an even worse problem: if you tried running chromium (or any application really) in the middle of an update, it could have crashed and corrupted your data because of dependencies mismatch.

summary: - Chromium disappears from system on refresh
+ snap cannot be run while being upgraded − no user feedback
Revision history for this message
Simon Lambourn (simon-lambourn-o) wrote :

Thank you Olivier. Yes, I forgot that I should have named "chromium-browser" rather than "chromium" when submitting the bug report.

I agree that there could have been problems when upgrading the old chromium browser using apt, but when using apt, the upgrade is user-initiated, and the user is informed that chromium is going to be upgraded. What makes the situation worse with the snap, is that as far as I recall, the upgrade happens without user knowledge or involvement. I don't recall being prompted to upgrade anything, it just seemed to happen automatically and invisibly, until I couldn't access my browser. It's the lack of info to the user that makes this particularly annoying.

Revision history for this message
Olivier Tilloy (osomon) wrote :

The fact that updates are automatic in snapd is by design.
I agree that some sort of user feedback would be helpful.

Maciej Borzecki (maciek-borzecki)
Changed in snapd:
status: New → In Progress
assignee: nobody → Zygmunt Krynicki (zyga)
importance: Undecided → Medium
Maciej Borzecki (maciek-borzecki)
Changed in snapd (Ubuntu):
status: New → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
Zygmunt Krynicki (zyga) wrote :

This is still in development but there's some actual progress recently. Complete development history is visible in https://github.com/snapcore/snapd/projects/3

We are aiming to release a, still disabled by default, but much improved version of this as either 2.47 or 2.48, depending on when the reviews arrive.

Revision history for this message
themusicgod1 (themusicgod1) wrote :

newer versions seem to at least warn the user that an upgrade is coming and to not have chromium open during the upgrade

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