[Bug 1799785] Re: Upgrade to 18.04 fails because tcsh has changed location

[Xiaolin Zang]

Before the upgrade, my shell spec in /etc/passwd was

/usr/bin/tcsh

But after the upgrade, the tcsh binary was moved to /bin/tcsh and my
login was failing because binary couldn't be found.  Only after I used
another account to login and changed my shell spec in /etc/passwd to

/bin/tcsh

I could login to the console.

However, when I further investigate the login failure upon your prompt,
I found a sym-link

/usr/bin/tcsh -> /bin/tcsh

created several minutes before I changed the /etc/passwd file.  It seems
to be create by Ubuntu's upgrade postscript.  So I'm puzzled why I
couldn't log in with this sym-link in place.

With that question in mind I try to reproduce the bug.  I use a VM to
repeat the upgrade from Ubuntu 16 to 18 with the account using
/usr/bin/tcsh.  But the upgrade is successful without any intervention.
I also observe the sym-link /usr/bin/tcsh -> /bin/tcsh created by the
upgrader.  Because I can't reproduce the bug, I'll withdraw it.

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1799785

Title:
  Upgrade to 18.04 fails because tcsh has changed location

Status in ubuntu-release-upgrader package in Ubuntu:
  Incomplete

Bug description:
  After upgrading to 18.04, I can't login anymore because tcsh's assumed
  location has been changed.  This makes my login repeatedly fail
  because my login shell tcsh can't be found.  Fortunately there is
  another account on my computer which uses bash shell with super user
  capability.  I'm able to login that way and fix the problem.  Then I
  have other problems that must be fixed using dpkg --configure -a.  But
  those are minor comparing to the tcsh problem.  If I had only one
  account which used tcsh, my machine would be dead in water needing a
  complete reinstall.  I suggest this problem be fixed ASAP.

  ProblemType: Bug
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 18.04
  Package: ubuntu-release-upgrader-core 1:18.04.27
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.15.0-38.41-generic 4.15.18
  Uname: Linux 4.15.0-38-generic x86_64
  ApportVersion: 2.20.9-0ubuntu7.4
  Architecture: amd64
  CrashDB: ubuntu
  CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME
  Date: Wed Oct 24 16:04:26 2018
  InstallationDate: Installed on 2017-06-02 (509 days ago)
  InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 16.04.2 LTS "Xenial Xerus" - Release amd64 (20170215.2)
  PackageArchitecture: all
  SourcePackage: ubuntu-release-upgrader
  Symptom: ubuntu-release-upgrader
  UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to bionic on 2018-10-23 (1 days ago)
  VarLogDistupgradeTermlog:

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