Arch Linux

dmick1954

Member

Registered: 2021-10-07

Posts: 2

[SOLVED] Kernel downgrade failed with could not find or read package

After the update this morning (10/07/2021), I rebooted and attempted to run veracrypt.  It failed because a module had upgraded.  I went back to the fallback kernel through the grub spashscreen and confirmed that it was a kernel issue as veracrypt worked under kernel 5.10.70.

So, I went to the Archwiki under the download package heading.

As suggested I went to /var/cache/pkg and I found this:

[don@Arch-Main ~]$ ls -l /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-lts-5.10.7*
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 78490657 Sep 30 06:44 /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-lts-5.10.70-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root      310 Sep 30 06:44 /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-lts-5.10.70-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst.sig
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 78505574 Oct  6 11:41 /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-lts-5.10.71-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root      310 Oct  6 11:41 /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-lts-5.10.71-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst.sig
[don@Arch-Main ~]$
[don@Arch-Main ~]$  ls -l /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-lts-headers-5.10.7*
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 24132478 Sep 30 06:44 /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-lts-headers-5.10.70-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root      310 Sep 30 06:44 /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-lts-headers-5.10.70-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst.sig
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 24105723 Oct  6 11:41 /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-lts-headers-5.10.71-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root      310 Oct  6 11:41 /var/cache/pacman/pkg/linux-lts-headers-5.10.71-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst.sig
[don@Arch-Main ~]$

Having determined that I wanted to go back to 5.10.70,  I entered the following command with the following results:

[don@Arch-Main ~]$ sudo pacman -U linux-lts-5.10.70-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst linux-lts-headers-5.10.70-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst
loading packages...
error: 'linux-lts-5.10.70-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst': could not find or read package
error: 'linux-lts-headers-5.10.70-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst': could not find or read package
[don@Arch-Main ~]$

BTW...I did this running the current kernel:

[don@Arch-Main ~]$ uname -a
Linux Arch-Main 5.10.71-1-lts #1 SMP Wed, 06 Oct 2021 14:19:52 +0000 x86_64 GNU/Linux
[don@Arch-Main ~]$

I did some searches online and in this forum and found nothing on this.

I would like to go back to this kernel and lock Arch into this kernel for the foreseeable future.

How can I do this?

Thanks!!!!

Last edited by dmick1954 (2021-10-07 13:25:21)

V1del

Forum Moderator

Registered: 2012-10-16

Posts: 25,300

Re: [SOLVED] Kernel downgrade failed with could not find or read package

You need to specify the full file path or actually cd into the /var/pacman/cache/pkg directory beforehand.

FWIW did you retry using veracrypt after booting into 5.10.71 ? What's more likely than the specific module veracrypt requires actually breaking is that you hadn't rebooted into the new kernel before attempting to make use of it. If updated during the running session, the original kernel cannot find it's modules anymore and attempts at loading them fail, this shouldn't have been an issue anymore once you were actually booted into the .71 kernel.

Edit: A wait you did mention doing that, but in any case, what was the error message you got when attempting to use veracrypt?

Also please wrap terminal outputs in code tags

Last edited by V1del (2021-10-07 13:09:36)

dmick1954

Member

Registered: 2021-10-07

Posts: 2

Re: [SOLVED] Kernel downgrade failed with could not find or read package

@V1del  Thanks for the response.  I had indeed rebooted before I attempted veracrypt.  The issue did occur when I was booted into the .71 kernel. 

sudo pacman -U https://archive.archlinux.org/packages/.all/linux-lts-5.10.70-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst https://archive.archlinux.org/packages/.all/linux-lts-headers-5.10.70-1-x86_64.pkg.tar.zst

This successfully downgraded the package.  After my initial post here, it occurred to me that it might no longer be in the current mirrorlist for whatever reason.  Why not try the archive list?  It worked.  :-)

Thanks again for your quick response.

Last edited by dmick1954 (2021-10-07 13:25:59)

V1del

Forum Moderator

Registered: 2012-10-16

Posts: 25,300

Re: [SOLVED] Kernel downgrade failed with could not find or read package

Just to reiterate the error you received had no relation to your mirror list. pacman -U always operates on a specified package file, so if you wanted to use your own local cache you'd have needed to actually pass the file path.  The problem with your attempt was that while you identified the necessary path you didn't specify it when invoking the -U operation and you working dir wasn't  the relevant pkg directory so just checking the working dir would also not produce the correct reference.