Switching from rolling to stable release removed the kernel, making system unbootable

[Julio Amorales]

I switched armbian repo to stable via armbian-config 24.11.2. The first thing it did, judging by /var/log/apt/history.log, was purging linux-image*:

Start-Date: 2025-01-04  22:47:25
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y purge linux-image*
Requested-By: user (1000)
Purge: linux-image-current-sunxi64:arm64 (24.11.1)
End-Date: 2025-01-04  22:47:27

 

Then it proceeded to purge and reinstall dtb and armbian-firmware, but not linux-image:

Start-Date: 2025-01-04  22:48:34
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y purge linux-dtb*
Requested-By: user (1000)
Purge: linux-dtb-current-sunxi64:arm64 (24.11.1)
End-Date: 2025-01-04  22:48:35

Start-Date: 2025-01-04  22:48:54                                                                                                  
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 --allow-downgrades -y install linux-dtb-current-sunxi64
Requested-By: user (1000)
Install: linux-dtb-current-sunxi64:arm64 (24.11.1)
End-Date: 2025-01-04  22:48:55

Start-Date: 2025-01-04  22:49:18
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y purge armbian-firmware*
Requested-By: user (1000)
Purge: armbian-firmware:arm64 (24.11.2)
End-Date: 2025-01-04  22:49:19

Start-Date: 2025-01-04  22:49:47
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 --allow-downgrades -y install armbian-firmware
Requested-By: user (1000)
Install: armbian-firmware:arm64 (24.11.2)
End-Date: 2025-01-04  22:50:01

 

I don't know if this is an error in the script, or in package dependencies, but getting an unbootable system was very unpleasant 

Edited January 19 by Julio Amorales

[MaxT]

Had a very same issue just recently.

Guess there is no check in armbian-config whether package was downloaded before removing an old one and in case of multiple packages this is done one by one package rather than downloading all required before processing further.

Failure to download might relate to mirror availability - seems that every new download might be from a different mirror- in my case dtbs were installed, but kernel only removed.

Ad-hoc solution- keep bootable usb or sd to chroot and fix.

[Igor]

On 1/19/2025 at 9:20 PM, MaxT said:

Guess there is no check in armbian-config whether package was downloaded before removing an old one and in case of multiple packages this is done one by one package rather than downloading all required before processing further.

This is the mechanism:
https://github.com/armbian/configng/blob/main/tools/modules/system/module_armbian_firmware.sh#L106-L107

In case anyone can spot the bug. Digging into ...

 

Trying to reproduce - fail:
 

Spoiler

v25.5 rolling for NanoPi K1 Plus running Armbian Linux 6.6.72-current-sunxi64

igorp@nanopik1plus:~$ sudo tail -f  /var/log/apt/history.log
[sudo] password for igorp: 

Start-Date: 2025-02-06  13:36:03
Commandline: apt-get -y -qq -o Dpkg::Use-Pty=0 -o APT::Get::List-Cleanup=0 --no-install-recommends install armbian-config
Install: armbian-config:arm64 (25.5.0-trunk.5.0206.130706), whiptail:arm64 (0.52.23-1+b1, automatic), libtext-iconv-perl:arm64 (1.7-8, automatic), libnewt0.52:arm64 (0.52.23-1+b1, automatic)
End-Date: 2025-02-06  13:36:05

Start-Date: 2025-02-07  07:05:54
Commandline: apt upgrade
Upgrade: armbian-config:arm64 (25.5.0-trunk.5.0206.130706, 25.5.0-trunk.5.0206.155506)
End-Date: 2025-02-07  07:05:55

Start-Date: 2025-02-07  07:07:21
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y autopurge linux-image*
Purge: linux-image-current-sunxi64:arm64 (25.5.0-trunk.4)
End-Date: 2025-02-07  07:07:23

Start-Date: 2025-02-07  07:07:40
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y install --allow-downgrades linux-image-current-sunxi64
Install: linux-image-current-sunxi64:arm64 (24.11.1)
End-Date: 2025-02-07  07:08:35

Start-Date: 2025-02-07  07:08:53
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y autopurge linux-dtb*
Purge: linux-dtb-current-sunxi64:arm64 (25.5.0-trunk.4)
End-Date: 2025-02-07  07:08:54

Start-Date: 2025-02-07  07:09:08
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y install --allow-downgrades linux-dtb-current-sunxi64
Install: linux-dtb-current-sunxi64:arm64 (24.11.1)
End-Date: 2025-02-07  07:09:09

Start-Date: 2025-02-07  07:09:28
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y autopurge armbian-firmware*
Purge: armbian-firmware:arm64 (25.5.0-trunk.4)
End-Date: 2025-02-07  07:09:28

Start-Date: 2025-02-07  07:09:49
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y install --allow-downgrades armbian-firmware
Install: armbian-firmware:arm64 (24.11.3)
End-Date: 2025-02-07  07:10:09

 

 

Recreated !

 

Nightly to stable, fine, going back to nightly it fails - it just removes packages, while not installing new due to repo troubles.
 

Start-Date: 2025-02-07  07:14:22
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y autopurge linux-image*
Purge: linux-image-current-sunxi64:arm64 (24.11.1)
End-Date: 2025-02-07  07:14:24

Start-Date: 2025-02-07  07:14:45
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y autopurge linux-dtb*
Purge: linux-dtb-current-sunxi64:arm64 (24.11.1)
End-Date: 2025-02-07  07:14:46

Start-Date: 2025-02-07  07:15:07
Commandline: apt-get -o APT::Status-Fd=4 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=5 -o APT::Keep-Fds::=6 -y autopurge armbian-firmware*
Purge: armbian-firmware:arm64 (24.11.3)
End-Date: 2025-02-07  07:15:08

 

[Igor]

This https://github.com/armbian/configng/pull/424/files should fix it. Update will be avail in couple of minutes after the merge.

Thank you!

 

apt update & upgrade will update armbian-config where this works as expected.

 

Until next bug found ...