[Bug 1980519] Re: flash-kernel fails on QEMU

[Dave Jones]

I'm a bit concerned that we're squashing an error case that seems
legitimate to me? There's several cases of "dummy" entries in flash-
kernel's all.db for QEMU instances under various architectures. For
example:

  https://git.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/flash-kernel/tree/db/all.db#n407
  ## qemu instance on armhf
  Machine: Dummy Virtual Machine

  https://git.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/flash-kernel/tree/db/all.db#n983
  ## qemu instance on arm64
  Machine: linux,dummy-virt

I'd be happy to add one of these for the QEMU RISC-V machine (which,
from our mm conversation would be "Machine: riscv-virtio,qemu".

However, to change "functions" so that, in the case flash-kernel doesn't
recognize the machine type, it stops but *doesn't* stop apt upgrade
seems too invasive to me. It is indeed serious that flash-kernel breaks
apt upgrade in this case, but it seems justified to me: the new kernel
and initrd will be installed in the boot directory by this point, and
the kernel (or initramfs-tools) packaging will have triggered flash-
kernel with the expectation it flashes the new kernel+initrd(+bootloader
machinery) to wherever it needs to be for this particular board. If
flash-kernel *can't* do that (because it doesn't recognize the board),
is that not legitimate grounds to stop apt so the user knows they're in
a pretty serious situation?

To put it another way, I'd be happy to sponsor a change adding a dummy
entry to all.db (I'm also happy to just add that diff myself and push it
right away), but I'm concerned that the proposed diff affects more than
just QEMU RISC-V instances, and does so in ways that change error
behaviour in situations which seem like they should remain error
situations to me.

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1980519

Title:
  flash-kernel fails on QEMU

Status in flash-kernel package in Ubuntu:
  Confirmed

Bug description:
  http://cloud-images.ubuntu.com/kinetic/current/kinetic-server-
  cloudimg-riscv64.img contains package flash-kernel. When running on
  QEMU updating the initramfs leads to an error:

  
  Processing triggers for initramfs-tools (0.140ubuntu13) ...
  update-initramfs: Generating /boot/initrd.img-5.17.0-1003-starfive
  Unsupported platform 'riscv-virtio,qemu'.
  run-parts: /etc/initramfs/post-update.d//flash-kernel exited with return code 1
  dpkg: error processing package initramfs-tools (--configure):
   installed initramfs-tools package post-installation script subprocess returned error exit status 1
  Errors were encountered while processing:
   initramfs-tools
  needrestart is being skipped since dpkg has failed

  
  Either flash-kernel should be removed from the image or flash kernel should be changed to ignore the unsupported platform.

  Patching flash-kernel seems preferable.

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