Re: Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?

2023-12-15 Thread John Crawley

On 15/12/2023 13:39, John Crawley wrote:

If you don't want to wait for 6.1.67-1 to arrive in Bookworm stable, it is 
available in bookworm-proposed-updates [1][2], so one workaround would be to 
temporarily add that repository [3] to apt sources before upgrading. Debian 
point release 12.4 has just gone out, so right now there are relatively few 
other packages in bookworm-proposed-updates which might have complicated the 
situation.

[1] 
https://tracker.debian.org/news/1485406/accepted-linux-signed-amd64-61671-source-into-proposed-updates/

[2] https://wiki.debian.org/StableProposedUpdates

[3] deb https://deb.debian.org/debian stable-proposed-updates main contrib 
non-free non-free-firmware



6.1.67-1 is now available from stable-updates, a possibly better option than 
stable-proposed-updates.
https://lists.debian.org/debian-stable-announce/2023/12/msg2.html

--
John



Re: Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?

2023-12-14 Thread John Crawley

On 15/12/2023 02:48, Kevin Price wrote:


"The bug" (Bug#1057967 & Bug#1057969) occurs only in kernel version
6.1.66-1 (package -6.1.0-15, released with bookworm 12.4). No other
debian kernel version has this bug. It might not affect you, and it can
be remedied/worked around. If it does affect you, it won't fry your
filesystem, but the computer won't run properly under this kernel,
causing a lots of problems, making your computer largely unusable during
this runtime.
---
As soon as you've
updated to 6.1.67-1 (6.1.0-16, about to come), any remedies/workarounds
should be safe to be reverted.
---
Presumably some of the folks in this list/thread might come
up with even more possible remedies/workarounds.


If you don't want to wait for 6.1.67-1 to arrive in Bookworm stable, it is 
available in bookworm-proposed-updates [1][2], so one workaround would be to 
temporarily add that repository [3] to apt sources before upgrading. Debian 
point release 12.4 has just gone out, so right now there are relatively few 
other packages in bookworm-proposed-updates which might have complicated the 
situation.

That workaround seems to have worked for me today, FWIW.

[1] 
https://tracker.debian.org/news/1485406/accepted-linux-signed-amd64-61671-source-into-proposed-updates/

[2] https://wiki.debian.org/StableProposedUpdates

[3] deb https://deb.debian.org/debian stable-proposed-updates main contrib 
non-free non-free-firmware

--
John



Re: Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?

2023-12-14 Thread Kevin Price
Rick:

Am 13.12.23 um 02:47 schrieb Rick Thomas:
> Is there a netinst iso that I can use to safely install Bookworm (stable) on 
> a new PC?

Possibly yes, but please read on.

> If so, where can I download it from?

Please always use official sources: https://www.debian.org/CD/

> If not, how much longer is it likely to be before one exists?

My worst guess is 12.5, in a few months from now. But 12.4 might likely
work perfectly fine for you, out of the box. If not, you can make 12.4
work for you right now. Here are some of my findings, assumptions, and
educated guesses for you regarding "the bug". Hoping to help you, no
guarantees. Any risks are yours, as always.

"The bug" (Bug#1057967 & Bug#1057969) occurs only in kernel version
6.1.66-1 (package -6.1.0-15, released with bookworm 12.4). No other
debian kernel version has this bug. It might not affect you, and it can
be remedied/worked around. If it does affect you, it won't fry your
filesystem, but the computer won't run properly under this kernel,
causing a lots of problems, making your computer largely unusable during
this runtime. I don't see any great danger in giving it a shot, if
you're reasonably careful to understand, and prepare for what might go
wrong.

(The much more dangerous kernel would be its predecessor, 6.1.64-1,
package 6.1.0-14, which was briefly released in bookworm 12.3, and very
quickly retracted. It might toast your ext4 filesystem. (Bug#1057843)
For that very reason, no official 12.3 media were ever publically
released. See the latest messages at https://www.debian.org/News/2023/ )

"The bug" (Bug#1057967, Bug#1057969) is within the kernel module
cfg80211, which is used for Wifi in general, regardless of your
adapter's specific WiFi driver. If your computer has WiFi, even if you
don't intend to use it, debian (including installer) will by default try
to load the appropriate driver modules, which will pull in cfg80211.

In case of the non-free broadcom-sta driver, binary "wl.ko" is known to
trigger the bug in cfg80211 in 6.1.66-1/6.1.0-15, which then causes lots
of problems during runtime. Whether any other WiFi drivers trigger this
bug as well, IDK. The _free_ broadcom driver (see
https://wiki.debian.org/bcm43xx ) doesn't seem to trigger this for me, YMMV.

Non-free drivers are not shipped in official bookworm media, but if you
actively choose non-free during the installation process or later,
broadcom-sta might then be installed, triggering "the bug". Don't
confuse this with non-free firmware. This is indeed shipped in official
bookworm media, but most likely won't trigger "the bug".

In your case, I'd try the bookworm 12.4 installer straight. By chance,
everything might turn out well.

If promblems occur that look like "the bug", I'd try one or more of the
following possible remedies/workarounds, each of which _might_ suffice,
but might cause some error messages or other issues. As soon as you've
updated to 6.1.67-1 (6.1.0-16, about to come), any remedies/workarounds
should be safe to be reverted. Maybe try the least inconvenient ones
first. I haven't tested all of them.

* Avoid "non-free". "non-free-firmware" should be O. K.
* Turn off your physical RF kill switch.
* Physically remove your WiFi adapter.
* Blacklist "cfg80211".
* Blacklist "wl".
* Use bookworm 12.2 installer media, but not netinst, without internet
access. Do not allow kernel updates, until 6.1.67-1/6.1.0-16 is
available. Presumably some of the folks in this list/thread might come
up with even more possible remedies/workarounds.

Again: no guarantees. Some of the above is not confirmed or tested. All
you do is at your own risk. But I hope I could help you understand "the
bug" and how to possibly avoid it, giving you more confidence in what
you're attempting to do. Please feel free to ask any further questions
to this list, and any reports I'd welcome here.
-- 
Kevin Price



Re: The bug (was: Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?)

2023-12-12 Thread Geert Stappers
On Wed, Dec 13, 2023 at 06:35:08AM +0100, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:
> On Tue, Dec 12, 2023 at 10:39:55PM -0600, David Wright wrote:
> > On Tue 12 Dec 2023 at 23:05:49 (-0500), Stefan Monnier wrote:
> > > > Well, the machine in question has a wi-fi but I don't plan on using it.
> > > > Though unless I'm misunderstanding, just having a wi-fi (used or not) is
> > > > enough to trigger the bug.  Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> > > 
> > > "the bug"?
> > > 
> > > What's this bug you're referring to?
> > 
> > Perhaps:
> > 
> >   https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2023/12/msg00680.html
> > 
> >   https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2023/12/msg00682.html
> 
> Might be this:
> 
>   https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1057967
> 

An attempt to get beyond FUD

|Debian Bug report logs - #1057967
|linux-image-6.1.0-15-amd64 renders my physical bookworm/gnome computer largely 
unusable version graph
|Package: src:linux; Maintainer for src:linux is Debian Kernel Team 
;
|Affects: src:broadcom-sta, src:linux, linux-image-6.1.0-15-amd64
|Reported by: Kevin Price
|Date: Mon, 11 Dec 2023 02:03:01 UTC
|Severity: serious
|Tags: confirmed
|Found in version linux/6.1.66-1
|Fixed in version linux/6.1.67-1
|Done: Salvatore Bonaccorso 

> Cheers
> t

Groeten
Geert Stappers
-- 
Silence is hard to parse



Re: The bug (was: Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?)

2023-12-12 Thread tomas
On Tue, Dec 12, 2023 at 10:39:55PM -0600, David Wright wrote:
> On Tue 12 Dec 2023 at 23:05:49 (-0500), Stefan Monnier wrote:
> > > Well, the machine in question has a wi-fi but I don't plan on using it.
> > > Though unless I'm misunderstanding, just having a wi-fi (used or not) is
> > > enough to trigger the bug.  Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> > 
> > "the bug"?
> > 
> > What's this bug you're referring to?
> 
> Perhaps:
> 
>   https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2023/12/msg00680.html
> 
>   https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2023/12/msg00682.html

Might be this:

  https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=1057967

Cheers
-- 
t


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Re: The bug (was: Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?)

2023-12-12 Thread Gareth Evans
Can anyone please explain:

1. Why upgrades of stable into a potentially seriously compromised state were 
allowed to continue, twice, rather than pulling the upgrades? or...

2. Why the best temporary solution isn't to revert the kernel to the last known 
good version so upgrades-other-than-kernel can continue?  There may be some 
versioning jiggery-pokery needed, but doesn't the +deb12xxx (or other) naming 
convention take care of that?  I'm sure I've seen packages previously with 
names like foo-1.3-really-1.2

This really doesn't seem to have been handled well from an official 
mitigation/communication pov.  There only seems to have been a debian-announce 
announcement re 12.3 issues.

I'm inclined to think there must be reasons why things that seem obvious have 
not been done, and keen to understand why, if so.  

Do 1 or 2 above involve disproportionate effort?  Were there 
backwards-incompatible changes to other things (such as filesystems) in the 
latest kernel(s), so reversion = breakage for some upgraded systems unaffected 
by recent issues?

Thanks,
Gareth



Re: The bug (was: Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?)

2023-12-12 Thread David Wright
On Tue 12 Dec 2023 at 23:05:49 (-0500), Stefan Monnier wrote:
> > Well, the machine in question has a wi-fi but I don't plan on using it.
> > Though unless I'm misunderstanding, just having a wi-fi (used or not) is
> > enough to trigger the bug.  Please correct me if I'm wrong.
> 
> "the bug"?
> 
> What's this bug you're referring to?

Perhaps:

  https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2023/12/msg00680.html

  https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2023/12/msg00682.html

Cheers,
David.



The bug (was: Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?)

2023-12-12 Thread Stefan Monnier
> Well, the machine in question has a wi-fi but I don't plan on using it.
> Though unless I'm misunderstanding, just having a wi-fi (used or not) is
> enough to trigger the bug.  Please correct me if I'm wrong.

"the bug"?

What's this bug you're referring to?


Stefan



Re: Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?

2023-12-12 Thread Rick Thomas



On Tue, Dec 12, 2023, at 6:22 PM, Greg Wooledge wrote:
> On Tue, Dec 12, 2023 at 05:47:48PM -0800, Rick Thomas wrote:
>> Is there a netinst iso that I can use to safely install Bookworm (stable) on 
>> a new PC?
>
> Well, with a netinst, the issue isn't what's on the netinst medium.  It's
> what's on the Debian mirrors, which the installer will use for most of
> your packages.
>
> Even if you were to use a Debian 12.2 installer image, you'd still end
> up bringing in packages for Debian 12.4 during the installation.
>
> If your machine has no wifi interface, you *might* be safe to install
> now.  But if in doubt, I'd wait.

Well, the machine in question has a wi-fi but I don't plan on using it.  Though 
unless I'm misunderstanding, just having a wi-fi (used or not) is enough to 
trigger the bug.  Please correct me if I'm wrong.

So, is there an ETA for the fix?

Thanks!
Rick





Re: Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?

2023-12-12 Thread Greg Wooledge
On Tue, Dec 12, 2023 at 05:47:48PM -0800, Rick Thomas wrote:
> Is there a netinst iso that I can use to safely install Bookworm (stable) on 
> a new PC?

Well, with a netinst, the issue isn't what's on the netinst medium.  It's
what's on the Debian mirrors, which the installer will use for most of
your packages.

Even if you were to use a Debian 12.2 installer image, you'd still end
up bringing in packages for Debian 12.4 during the installation.

If your machine has no wifi interface, you *might* be safe to install
now.  But if in doubt, I'd wait.



Is it safe to install Bookworm on a new machine now?

2023-12-12 Thread Rick Thomas
Is there a netinst iso that I can use to safely install Bookworm (stable) on a 
new PC?
If so, where can I download it from?
If not, how much longer is it likely to be before one exists?

Thanks!
Rick