You are not logged in.
Hi everybody...
A few minutes ago I performed a system update and, when generating the kernel images (Linux 6.14.5-arch1-1 and Linux-lts 6.12.27-1-lts), an error related to boost-libs and dwarFS has been generated, which means that they are incomplete (==> WARNING: errors were encountered during the build. The image may not be complete.). After some research, I have seen that, while dwarFS expected to find boost-libs version 1.87.0, the version installed on my system was 1.88.0. So, while checking the AUR packages pending upgrade with Paru, I've seen that dwarFS was one of them, so I upgraded it.
Now the issue is that dwarFS installed itself (i.e. without me explicitly installing it) a few days ago when I upgraded the AUR packages pending upgrade, with Paru. Pamac tells me that it was installed as a dependency of another application, but it doesn't tell me which application required AUR dwarFS to be installed.
So now my worries are:
1. How can I find out who installed AUR dwarFS?
2. What exactly has changed with the installation of AUR dwarFS, as far as generating the kernel images is concerned. And should I be aware from now on if pacman has updated boost-libs and AUR dwarFS is not up to date, before upgrading the system?
3. Now that I have updated dwarFS (against boost-libs version 1.88.0), should I regenerate the kernel images (and in any case how do I do it manually?), or should I wait for a kernel update to regenerate the images again? [I am really scared about this, since I suppose that if I now turn off the laptop, later I won't be able to boot it].
Thanks in advance for any help on the subject.
Last edited by JosepF (2025-05-08 21:11:55)
Offline
1. How can I find out who installed AUR dwarFS?
pacman -Qi dwarfs2. What exactly has changed with the installation of AUR dwarFS, as far as generating the kernel images is concerned. And should I be aware from now on if pacman has updated boost-libs and AUR dwarFS is not up to date, before upgrading the system?
This warning:
==> WARNING: errors were encountered during the build. The image may not be complete.
Is related to the generation of the initramfs, which contains all the required utilities for the Linux kernel to do the basic initialization of some devices (including the IO ones), mount root file system specified in "root=..." kernel parameter, and then continue with the system boot up process.
Regarding the incomplete image - consequences may be either unbootable system or just modules related to dwarfs not working. Probably the latter.
About dwarfs - if it's known that a newer version of boost-libs may break the package and you use that filesystem, then you should probably specify "boost-libs=REQUIRED_VERSION" in the PKGBUILD so that pacman doesn't accidentally upgrade it again. Partial upgrades are not supported, but this is at least some kind of a solution.
3. Now that I have updated dwarFS (against boost-libs version 1.88.0), should I regenerate the kernel images (and in any case how do I do it manually?), or should I wait for a kernel update to regenerate the images again? [I am really scared about this, since I suppose that if I now turn off the laptop, later I won't be able to boot it].
Just do:
mkinitcpio -PIt would regenerate all initramfs images for you.
Last edited by freedomd1v3 (2025-05-08 01:32:34)
Offline
Thanks for your help @freedomd1v3
Just do:
mkinitcpio -PIt would regenerate all initramfs images for you.
As I don't like to execute commands without knowing first what they are for and what they do, I looked for information about mkinitcpio, and finally I executed it, but with the -p option to regenerate only one of the images and test it. So I turned off the computer and restarted it (not without crossing my fingers first) and it did work (not that I doubted your advice, but rather the beginner's fear of not messing things up even more, especially when it comes to the core of the system). But despite the initial fear, I am happy to have learned and understood one more thing about the ins and outs of the system.
So if anyone comes to this post looking for a solution to a similar problem, the steps to follow are (1) rebuild/update dwarFS with the latest version of boost-libs installed on our system and (2) regenerate the system images manually with mkinitcpio (using the '-P' option to regenerate all the images at once, or the '-p <name-of-image-preset-without-extension-found-in-/etc/mkinitcpio.d/>' option to regenerate a specific image).
Regarding dwarFS, the command...
pacman -Qi dwarfs...generates the same output as given by Pamac or Pacseek - that is: installed as a dependency for another package, but not required by any package (?)
Name : dwarfs
Version : 0.12.3-2
Description : A fast high compression read-only file system
Architecture : x86_64
URL : https://github.com/mhx/dwarfs
Licenses : GPL-3.0-only
Groups : None
Provides : None
Depends On : fuse3 openssl boost-libs jemalloc xxhash fmt lz4 xz zstd brotli libarchive flac libunwind google-glog fmt gflags double-conversion
Optional Deps : None
Required By : None (?)
Optional For : None (?)
Conflicts With : None
Replaces : None
Installed Size : 9.91 MiB
Packager : Unknown Packager
Build Date : Wed May 7 12:00:47 2025
Install Date : Wed May 7 12:14:43 2025
Install Reason : Installed as a dependency for another package (?)
Install Script : No
Validated By : None
Anyway...
About dwarfs - if it's known that a newer version of boost-libs may break the package and you use that filesystem,
The thing is that I am not using this file system by own decision (I didn't install it explicitly), but it was installed about a week ago during the update of some AUR packages, and the system seems to have “adopted” it without any problem.
Now from what I understand from what I have read about dwarFS, it is a super optimized read-only filesystem image creation tool. Even so, the whole subject generates in me a series of questions that maybe you (or someone else) can answer me so that I can understand the whole subject perfectly.
1. If before (supposedly) I didn't have dwarFS installed, who was in charge of the whole boot image/filesystem creation process before dwarFS?
2. I have tried to find information on how dwarFS is integrated now into the boot image creation process and found nothing (also no reference to it in the mkinitcpio configuration file). So any information about it, or link to any resource on the internet that explains it would be greatly appreciated.
3. I understand that dwarFS is used now on my system only for the boot image generation issue. If this is not the case, and it turns out that it affects other parts of the system as well, I would also appreciate any information about it.
4. Is there any other way to know why, or which application installed dwarFS as a dependency?
5. Any clarification/correction on any misunderstanding about this whole matter that anyone can detect in me would also be greatly appreciated.
then you should probably specify "boost-libs=REQUIRED_VERSION" in the PKGBUILD so that pacman doesn't accidentally upgrade it again. Partial upgrades are not supported, but this is at least some kind of a solution.
Thanks for the advice, but I think I will leave it as it is, first because now I know what to do if it happens again, and second because, at least for me, system errors, even if they initially scare me, help me to go deeper into the system and understand even more how it works. And also, because as you mention, it is not recommended to do partial upgrades. Anyway, as I said, I really appreciate your advice.
Thanks again for your help!
Last edited by JosepF (2025-05-08 21:22:59)
Offline