That addresses my concern. I'd assumed that it would occur as part of
an RPM update, rather than as a triggered out of band event. It makes
rebooting mandatory and slightly risky, especially if /usr overflows
halfway through, the process, but that becomes far, far less likely
with systemd doing it at boot time running at the same time other RPM
updates. I do hope the scripting will exit gracefully if /usr
overflows or is unwriteable for other reasons, such as being part of
the "immutable" Linux concept.

Nico Kadel-Garcia

On Sat, Jan 8, 2022 at 8:30 PM Chris Murphy <li...@colorremedies.com> wrote:
>
> On Sat, Jan 8, 2022 at 6:07 PM Nico Kadel-Garcia <nka...@gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > On Sat, Jan 8, 2022 at 7:53 PM Chris Murphy <li...@colorremedies.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > On Sat, Jan 8, 2022 at 7:53 AM Fabio Valentini <decatho...@gmail.com> 
> > > wrote:
> > > >
> > > > On Sat, Jan 8, 2022 at 3:39 PM Neal Gompa <ngomp...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > On Sat, Jan 8, 2022 at 8:58 AM Fabio Valentini <decatho...@gmail.com> 
> > > > > wrote:
> > > > > >
> > > > > > On Wed, Dec 29, 2021 at 4:03 PM Ben Cotton <bcot...@redhat.com> 
> > > > > > wrote:
> > > > > > >
> > > > > >
> > > > > > (snip)
> > > > > >
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > == Detailed Description ==
> > > > > > > === Current location ===
> > > > > > > <pre>/var/lib/rpm</pre>
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > === New location ===
> > > > > > > <pre>/usr/lib/sysimage/rpm</pre>
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > <code>/var/lib/rpm</code> will be a symlink pointing to
> > > > > > > <code>/usr/lib/sysimage/rpm</code>
> > > > > >
> > > > > > I did not find a mention of this in the thread or in the Change
> > > > > > proposal, so I'll ask:
> > > > > > How do you plan to handle the directory -> symlink replacement on 
> > > > > > upgrade?
> > > > > >
> > > > > > As far as I can tell, those always required special treatment via
> > > > > > %pretrans scriptlets or something, and even the method currently
> > > > > > recommended by the Packaging Guidelines seems to be broken due to 
> > > > > > the
> > > > > > way dnf / RPM verifies validity of transactions.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > Additionally, that "special" handling will probably need to stay in
> > > > > > the RPM package's .spec file for years, given that upgrades from
> > > > > > Fedora 34 to 36 will need to be supported.
> > > > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > This is documented in the Change:
> > > > > https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/RelocateRPMToUsr#Upgrade.2Fcompatibility_impact
> > > > >
> > > > > The part that's probably missing there is that the upgraded package
> > > > > will release ownership of /var/lib/rpm and own the
> > > > > /usr/lib/sysimage/rpm directory.
> > > > >
> > > > > The configuration will change in the upgrade, and then an rpmdb
> > > > > rebuild on reboot will finalize the transition, as rpmdb rebuilds are
> > > > > done by loading the rpmdb in memory, renaming the directory,
> > > > > recreating it, and re-initializing the database files from memory.
> > > > >
> > > > > This avoids the pitfalls you've described with the pretrans stuff.
> > > >
> > > > Oh, great. Looks like I'm ~tired~ and missed that this is in the
> > > > Change proposal after all ...
> > > > Thanks for confirming that you found a way to handle upgrades.
> > >
> > > I did a manual proof of concept with the pseudo-sequence in the change
> > > proposal on a Fedora Rawhide VM. And it did work, and continues to do
> > > both GNOME Software and dnf updates OK. This is a sample size of 1, so
> > > there's more work to do to make sure it can be done safely, using the
> > > rpm sqlite upgrade as a guide. But I can write up the steps I used, so
> > > that anyone can test before we have it wired up.
> > >
> > > We have considered not applying the change to upgrades. Strictly
> > > speaking the release criterion say we only support upgrades from
> > > *clean installs* of the current two releases. But in practice quite a
> > > lot of users depend on reliable upgrades for *many* releases, and they
> > > get mad when things break even when it's been 10+ releases since they
> > > did a clean install. And also, Workstation edition PRD  "upgrade
> > > process should give a result that is the same as an original install".
> > > That is a tall order, but so long as it's safe, it's probably better
> > > to apply this change to upgrades. If we run into issues or establish
> > > the risk is too high, it's not such a big deal to apply the change to
> > > only new clean installs.
> >
> > I'm personally concerned that the RPM transactions may not be handled
> > atomically if the /var/lib/rpm/ is migrated in the midst of an RPM
> > update. I'm not personally sure if RPM and Berkeley DB will handle
> > that correctly if there's any issues with the migration, particularly
> > if /usr/ overflows in the process of other bulky updates such as
> > libreoffice. Part of my work involves looking for where multiple
> > things can go wrong at once.
>
> Sqlite applies here, not bdb.
>
> But also note from that change, the rpmdb conversion to sqlite was not
> done during the system upgrade, but by a systemd unit.
> https://fedoraproject.org/wiki/Changes/Sqlite_Rpmdb
>
> Same for this change proposal.
>
>
> --
> Chris Murphy
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