Arch Linux

aliibrahim

Member

Registered: 2025-01-07

Posts: 3

[SOLVED] Error During Post-Transaction Hooks in pacman

I encountered an issue while using pacman. During the post-transaction hooks after updating or installing packages, I received the following error:

:: Running post-transaction hooks...

( 3/13) Reloading user manager configuration...
user@970.service is not active, cannot reload.
error: command failed to execute correctly

I also run systemctl status user@970.service and got his:

× user@970.service - User Manager for UID 970
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/user@.service; static)
    Drop-In: /usr/lib/systemd/system/user@.service.d
             └─10-login-barrier.conf
     Active: failed (Result: exit-code) since Tue 2025-01-07 18:09:34 +04; 59min ago
 Invocation: bed9a289926e40cfb5dee667ad2092c2
       Docs: man:user@.service(5)
    Process: 1722 ExecStart=/usr/lib/systemd/systemd --user (code=exited, status=224/PAM)
   Main PID: 1722 (code=exited, status=224/PAM)
   Mem peak: 3.2M
        CPU: 7ms
Jan 07 18:09:34 arch systemd[1]: Starting User Manager for UID 970...
Jan 07 18:09:34 arch (systemd)[1722]: pam_unix(systemd-user:account): account sddm has expired (account expired)
Jan 07 18:09:34 arch (systemd)[1722]: PAM failed: User account has expired
Jan 07 18:09:34 arch (systemd)[1722]: user@970.service: Failed to set up PAM session: Operation not permitted
Jan 07 18:09:34 arch (systemd)[1722]: user@970.service: Failed at step PAM spawning /usr/lib/systemd/systemd: Operation not permitted
Jan 07 18:09:34 arch systemd[1]: user@970.service: Main process exited, code=exited, status=224/PAM
Jan 07 18:09:34 arch systemd[1]: user@970.service: Failed with result 'exit-code'.
Jan 07 18:09:34 arch systemd[1]: Failed to start User Manager for UID 970.

Last edited by aliibrahim (2025-01-07 15:40:46)

Scimmia

Fellow

Registered: 2012-09-01

Posts: 12,323

Re: [SOLVED] Error During Post-Transaction Hooks in pacman

What does `sudo chage --list sddm` show?

aliibrahim

Member

Registered: 2025-01-07

Posts: 3

Re: [SOLVED] Error During Post-Transaction Hooks in pacman

What does `sudo chage --list sddm` show?

Hi, Scimmia
I'm sorry, I must have reported the issue too quickly because I found the solution after talking to chatgpt for a while.
the solution:

sudo chage -E 2200-12-31 sddm

Scimmia

Fellow

Registered: 2012-09-01

Posts: 12,323

Re: [SOLVED] Error During Post-Transaction Hooks in pacman

And again, chatgpt tells you something stupid.

First off, why was it set to expire at all? That's not default, so something went wrong somewhere and if you don't know where, it could happen again. Second, why would you choose some random date in the future instead of just removing the expiration?

aliibrahim

Member

Registered: 2025-01-07

Posts: 3

Re: [SOLVED] Error During Post-Transaction Hooks in pacman

And again, chatgpt tells you something stupid.

First off, why was it set to expire at all? That's not default, so something went wrong somewhere and if you don't know where, it could happen again. Second, why would you choose some random date in the future instead of just removing the expiration?

I just installed arch Linux today using arch install, and when I ran

sudo chage -l sddm

it showed account expiration Jan 1, 1970.

When I ran

sudo chage -E never sddm

it did not work.

Scimmia

Fellow

Registered: 2012-09-01

Posts: 12,323

Re: [SOLVED] Error During Post-Transaction Hooks in pacman

Then it looks like https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/ … 31dd309961 had some unintended consequences.

From the chage man page: "Passing the number -1 as the EXPIRE_DATE will remove an account expiration date."

Edit: I opened https://gitlab.archlinux.org/archlinux/ … -/issues/6

Last edited by Scimmia (2025-01-07 16:12:33)