[GTALUG] FW: Problems with Ubuntu 18.10

[Eric Brown]

Were you affected by this bug affecting Ubuntu 4.18 kernel:
https://news.softpedia.com/news/canonical-apologizes-for-another-ubuntu-linux-kernel-regression-fix-available-524892.shtml

On Tue, Feb 19, 2019 at 11:07 D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk <talk at gtalug.org>
wrote:

> | From: Clive DaSilva via talk <talk at gtalug.org>
>
> Note: I barely touch Ubuntu so I may be wrong in important details.
>
> | I had a problem with my recent Ubuntu 18.10 install which I thought that
> I
> | should share. I was running Ubuntu 18.04 on an older Pentium (R)Dual Core
> | CPU E5200 with 4 gigs of ram and things went well. About 2 months ago, I
> | noticed that there was an Ubuntu 18.10 so I thought that I would give it
> a
> | try. So I downloaded Ubuntu 18.10 with kernel 4.18.0.10 and it worked
> well
> | with all my machine learning stuff (Anaconda3, etc.).
>
> So far, so good.
>
> | About 2 weeks ago,
> | Ubuntu informed me that I had a kernel update so I downloaded the update
> | (kernel 4.18.0.14) and tried to install it. Couldn't get past the boot
> | screen, so I reinstalled 4.18.0.10 but right away I was informed of the
> | waiting update.
>
> I'm not 100% sure what you mean by "the boot screen".
>
> (1) trying a previous kernel
>
> My systems always have the most recent three installed kernels
> available for booting.  All you have to do is talk to grub at boot
> time to select one of the two older kernels.  Did you try that?
>
> If that works, you have something more concrete to report.
>
> (2) getting more information out of the boot process
>
> GRUB invokes the kernel with parameters.  Ted pointed you at a page
> one some parameters that you could try tweaking.
>
> Before you do that,
>
> - boot your system
>
> - early on, get grub's attention
>
> - choose the boot entry you wish to use
>
> - edit that entry (there's a key for that).  (The edit is only for this
>   boot.).  Remove "quiet splash" from the kernel parameters.  This
>   will cause the boot process to be logged to the console.  That way you
>   can often find out where it goes wrong.
>
> You should be able to tell if it is a kernel problem or an X problem
> or something else.
>
> I admit that the result looks like gobbledygook to the unfamiliar.
>
> (3) lock the system to a kernel that works.
>
> I'm pretty sure that there are magic things to do with apt-get or
> whatever you use to update to say
>
> (a) don't update the kernel (if, in fact, that turns out the be the
> problem), or
>
> (b) keep this working kernel even if you install new ones.  Also: you
> need to tell grub to keep using the kernel you like.
>
> | I googled the issue and the only comment that made sense was
> | to block Wayland being loaded and instead default to Xorg by adjust
> | custom.conf  \etc\gdm3. That made no difference to my situation as
> described
>
> Xorg and Wayland both talk to the kernel.  But there is usually a
> difference between a bug in them and a bug in the kernel.
>
> You need to narrow down the problem: identify the component that is
> the most likely culprit.  Or give up (which might save you time).
>
> I imagine that there is a way to boot to text console mode (its been years
> since I've done that).  From there you can start X by hand.  That might
> give you insight.
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>
-- 
Eric Brown MD HBSc FRCPC
For encryption, OpenPGP public key available on request.
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