Ubuntu
update-notifier package

Unimportant update notifications are sent to root from cron script

Bug #1402183 reported by Martin Stjernholm
24
This bug affects 4 people
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
update-notifier (Ubuntu)
Confirmed
Low
Unassigned

Bug Description

Whenever flashplugin-installer installs a new version, the cron system sends a mail to root:

/etc/cron.daily/update-notifier-common:
flashplugin-installer: downloading http://archive.canonical.com/pool/partner/a/adobe-flashplugin/adobe-flashplugin_11.2.202.425.orig.tar.gz
Installing from local file /tmp/tmphusER_.gz
Flash Plugin installed.

This isn't appropriate to mail root about. /usr/lib/flashplugin-installer/install_plugin sends some output to stdout, which is probably reasonable. I believe the problem here is that the /etc/cron.daily/update-notifier-common script doesn't redirect stdout to some other place.

Revision history for this message
Martin Stjernholm (msub) wrote :

update-notifier is 0.154.1ubuntu1
flashplugin-installer is 11.2.202.425ubuntu0.14.04.1

Revision history for this message
Steve Langasek (vorlon) wrote :

To some other place> like where? This is where cron jobs report their output. There isn't really an alternative channel for presenting this information.

Changed in update-notifier (Ubuntu):
status: New → Incomplete
Revision history for this message
Martin Stjernholm (msub) wrote :

Something like /var/log/update-notifications perhaps, or /dev/null. This isn't any kind of error, just status - other systems (thankfully) doesn't mail about such things.

Changed in update-notifier (Ubuntu):
status: Incomplete → New
Revision history for this message
Launchpad Janitor (janitor) wrote :

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

Changed in update-notifier (Ubuntu):
status: New → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
Landon Thomas (lthomas) wrote :

Does anyone have a creative solution for this? I just got over 400 emails from workstations this morning. I wonder if the bug should be fixed in the flashplugin-installer package rather than update-notifier.

Brian Murray (brian-murray)
tags: added: trusty
tags: added: utopic vivid
Alberto Salvia Novella (es20490446e)
Changed in update-notifier (Ubuntu):
importance: Undecided → Low
Revision history for this message
Jani Uusitalo (uusijani) wrote :

Needless verbosity is the problem here, IMO. I'd expect to receive output from the installer only when the download or install fails for some reason, not when it succeeds.

(Also, to me the culprit here seems to be flashplugin-installer and not update-notifier, as plenty of other packages also report their installation progress, but only flashplugin's seems to get forwarded to root's mail even when nothing abnormal occurs.)

To post a comment you must log in.
This report contains Public information  
Everyone can see this information.
Subscribing...

Other bug subscribers

Remote bug watches

Bug watches keep track of this bug in other bug trackers.