Category Archives: Opensuse

Opensuse Leap 15.5 – YaST2 bug – no repositories can be added via YaST2

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In one of the last posts I have said that upgrades of running Opensuse Leap 15.4-systems to Leap 15.5 are a smooth business. However, a major bug in the present Leap 15.5 did not appear on my radar until now.

During the upgrades of most of my systems I just continued using a system-specific bunch of active Opensuse repositories – like the “graphics” and the “security” repositories. I used the ${releasever}-mechanism during the upgrades to point zypper to the new versions of the repositories. This all went well and after the upgrade I found the 15.5-versions of those repositories, which I had used on Leap 15.4 before, integrated into the YaST2-software and package management of Leap 15.5.

But, two days ago, I installed Leap 15.5 on a laptop from an ISO-image on a DVD. Such an installation only sets up basic Leap 15.5 repositories. So, after the installation I wanted to add further repositories via YaST2’s software-management. This did not work at all. The repositories simply did not appear in the list of managed repositories afterwards.

I fiddled around for about an hour. It became clear by switching views on repos and so called “services” that the requested new repositories were handled by YaST as SW-services, instead as standard repositories. Whatever “services” are going to be good for in the future. I could find some information at
https://news.opensuse.org/ 2023/07/31/ try-out-cdn-with-opensuse-repos/.

I moved in the end to zypper on the command line to add repositories. Which worked …. A good reason to suspect a bug.

Bug: Adding repositories with YaST2 does not work presently

Indeed: The following two links showed that other Opensuse users had the same problem and that there is a related bug-entry at Opensuse’s bugzilla:
https://forums.opensuse.org/ t/ cant-add-repos/ 171641
https://bugzilla.opensuse.org/ show_bug.cgi?id=1218399

Well, YaST2 is a central tool-box for Opensuse systems. And who would deny that the package manager is one of the most important tools on any Linux system? So, old kinds of questions regarding quality assurance came to my mind: Are changes to central Leap components tested thoroughly at Opensuse? In particular as also SLES is affected …. Unbelievable …

The affected package is yas2-packager 4.5.17-150500.3.3.1.

Workaround

Adding repositories directly via zypper (which is used by YaST2) still works. So, you can add add repositories like the security repository, with command analogous to the following: 

mytux:~ # zypper ar -f https://download.opensuse.org/repositories/security/15.5 security
Adding repository 'security' 
..................................................................................[done]
Repository 'security' successfully added

URI         : https://download.opensuse.org/repositories/security/15.5
Enabled     : Yes
GPG Check   : Yes
Autorefresh : Yes
Priority    : 99 (default priority)

Repository priorities are without effect. All enabled repositories share the same priority.

These repos afterward appear in the YaST2 packet manger and are fully usable to install RPM packages.

Weird aspect of the YaST2 packet manager: Opensuse and Nvidia services cannot be deleted via YaST2

After some updates of leap 15.5 you may find that all basic repositories have been switched to “services” at “cdn.opensuse.org”. What is disturbing: A fresh installation of Leap 15.5 from an ISO-image does not show any of the services displayed in the image above.

Once you got the “services” in your Leap 15.5 installation you may want to delete them and restrict your system to the standard repositories at “download.opensuse.org”. But this does not work with YaST2. Which appears as an additional bug. You may switch to “services” and delete them in the views coming up. And everything afterward gives you the impression that they are gone. But no: After a restart of YaST2 and the packet manager all Opensuse services appear restored again.

Conclusion

YaST2’s present packet manager for Leap 15.5 has a major bug: Repositories can not be added. In addition one cannot get rid of the new Opensuse services. Let us hope that we get a new and error free version of YaST2’s packet manager soon.

Upgrade of PCs and laptops from Opensuse Leap 15.4 to 15.5

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The last days I have upgraded multiple PC- and laptop-systems from Leap 15.4 to Leap 15.5. This was one of the smoothest upgrades ever. Despite Nvidia cards, Optimus etc.

In contrast to upgrades in the last years I just kept all special repositories (Nvidia, Packman, Graphics, Security, Print, etc.) active during the upgrade. This worked perfectly.

Suse’s prime-select on an Optimus system just continued working.

To better support Rocca mice on my PC I eliminated old drivers from Rocca and instead used “piper” to set the buttons. My Rocca EMP is basically also well supported by the generic Linux USB mouse driver.

The older I get the more it becomes true:

Linux just works. Why someone uses Windows remains a big mystery to me …

One of the next tasks is to upgrade server systems.

Opensuse Leap 15.4 – Problems with Optimus and prime-select after updates of SW packages

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Presently, I work a lot on an old laptop which has a so called Optimus combination of a dedicated Nvidia GPU and an Intel GPU coming with the main CPU-processor. “prime-select” is a tool which Opensuse includes with Leap 15.4 to provide an efficient way of controlling which GPU shall be used. As good as prime-select has worked for me on Leap 15.3 and also some time with Leap 15.4 recent updates of a variety of SW packages lead into trouble.

I had the Nvidia card active before the SW updates. After a cold restart of the system it did no longer start the SDDM display manager on the default systemd target. This happened even when the updates did not directly affect the kernel or the Nvidia kernel modules.

The problem always had to do with bbswitch turning off the Nvidia device when the system switched to the default graphical target. And with a turned off Nvidia graphics device the Nvidia drivers can not be loaded.

So some SW updates lead to a change of the configuration prime-select had set up before the updates. The stupid thing is that it is not quite so simple to get things back to work. To try to us “init 3” to go to a console interface on a non-graphical target and then use “prime-select nvidia” plus a subsequent “init 5” on the command line does not work. You do not change the wrong bbswitch actions that way. You can also turn bbswitch off by “tee /proc/acpi/bbswitch <<< OFF". And then load the Nvidia driver successfully. But trying to afterward switch to the standard graphical target invokes bbswitch again in the wrong way. It is a bit of a mess. The following steps seem to work to get back to normal operation again:

  • Step 1: Use “init 3” on a console terminal.
  • Step 2: Use the command “prime-select intel”.
  • Step 3: Restart your system. It should boot now into the graphical target based on the i915 intel GPU driver.
  • Step 4: Ignore any information from a prime-select icon. It shows you a plainly wrong info that you are using Nvidia.
  • Step 5: Log in as root on a root terminal window. Switch bbswitch off (e.g. by the command given above). Load the Nvidia module by “modprobe nvidia”. Check via lsmod that it is successfully loaded.
  • Step 6: Type in “prime-select nvidia”.
  • Step 7: Log out from your graphical interface.
  • Step 8: Check that SDDM or whatever display manager is started with bbswitch not shutting down the Nvidia card. Log inn with the Nvidia card active.
  • Step 9: Check that the Nvidia driver is still loaded on a root terminal window. Then issue “mkinitrd” and restart your Leap 15.4 system.

Afterward using the “prime-select intel” or “prime-select nvidia” commands at the command line of a root terminal window, a logout from the graphical desktop and a login again via the restarted graphical display manager switches correctly between the cards.

However, the prime-select applet gives you wrong information when the intel card is active. And it does not give you the chance to switch back to the Nvidia card again. Its stupid, but no major problem as long as the basic prime-select command does its job on the command line.

Hope this helps people having to work with Opensuse on an Optimus system.