[Bug 1689227] [NEW] systemd power functions do not send broadcast (wall) message

[dana]

Public bug reported:

Running on Xenial, i've found that none of the methods of interacting
with systemd's power functions send the wall message as they're supposed
to. I have tried all of the following and none of them produce the
message:

reboot
shutdown -r
shutdown -r +1
shutdown -r +1 'testing'
shutdown -r 1
shutdown -r now
shutdown -r now 'testing'
systemctl reboot
systemctl reboot --message 'testing'

There are no errors displayed on the screen after running the command.
If i check the journal after the system comes back up i can find no
errors there either. A message DOES appear in the journal, if i use
`systemctl reboot --message`:

May 07 23:11:18 mysrv sudo[1244]: dana : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/home/dana ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/bin/systemctl reboot --message testing
May 07 23:11:18 mysrv sudo[1244]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session opened for user root by dana(uid=0)
May 07 23:11:18 mysrv systemd-logind[634]: System is rebooting (testing).

I noticed that if i ran these commands without `sudo`, it'd complain
about PolicyKit, so i installed that, thinking maybe it'd help. It did
not.

As another experiment, i added a call to `wall` to `systemd-
reboot.service` via drop-in as below. It works, but i don't consider it
an acceptable solution, because it's a hard-coded message and it doesn't
show the name of the user that triggered the reboot.

[Service]
ExecStartPre=-/usr/bin/wall testing

It's also worth pointing out that i'm running these commands over SSH; i
don't have access to the physical machine right now.

OS version:

Ubuntu 16.04.2 (Xenial) server

Relevant packages (i hope):

dbus                    1.10.6-1ubuntu3.3
libdbus-1-3:amd64       1.10.6-1ubuntu3.3
libdbus-glib-1-2:amd64  0.106-1
libqt5dbus5:amd64       5.5.1+dfsg-16ubuntu7.2
libsystemd0:amd64       229-4ubuntu17
python3-systemd         231-2build1
systemd                 229-4ubuntu17
systemd-sysv            229-4ubuntu17

PS: There are some related tickets in the system already, but none of
them seemed to describe the exact behaviour i was seeing (they were
missing wall messages only in certain circumstances — mine are ALWAYS
missing). I'm linking them here for completeness, feel free to close
this obv if you consider it a duplicate of one of them:

Bug # 1448070
Bug # 1512235

There is also this Debian bug, which might be the same, though i have
confirmed that this affects not just the SysV-style commands but even
`systemctl` itself:

https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=810608

** Affects: systemd (Ubuntu)
     Importance: Undecided
         Status: New

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1689227

Title:
  systemd power functions do not send broadcast (wall) message

Status in systemd package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  Running on Xenial, i've found that none of the methods of interacting
  with systemd's power functions send the wall message as they're
  supposed to. I have tried all of the following and none of them
  produce the message:

  reboot
  shutdown -r
  shutdown -r +1
  shutdown -r +1 'testing'
  shutdown -r 1
  shutdown -r now
  shutdown -r now 'testing'
  systemctl reboot
  systemctl reboot --message 'testing'

  There are no errors displayed on the screen after running the command.
  If i check the journal after the system comes back up i can find no
  errors there either. A message DOES appear in the journal, if i use
  `systemctl reboot --message`:

  May 07 23:11:18 mysrv sudo[1244]: dana : TTY=pts/0 ; PWD=/home/dana ; USER=root ; COMMAND=/bin/systemctl reboot --message testing
  May 07 23:11:18 mysrv sudo[1244]: pam_unix(sudo:session): session opened for user root by dana(uid=0)
  May 07 23:11:18 mysrv systemd-logind[634]: System is rebooting (testing).

  I noticed that if i ran these commands without `sudo`, it'd complain
  about PolicyKit, so i installed that, thinking maybe it'd help. It did
  not.

  As another experiment, i added a call to `wall` to `systemd-
  reboot.service` via drop-in as below. It works, but i don't consider
  it an acceptable solution, because it's a hard-coded message and it
  doesn't show the name of the user that triggered the reboot.

  [Service]
  ExecStartPre=-/usr/bin/wall testing

  It's also worth pointing out that i'm running these commands over SSH;
  i don't have access to the physical machine right now.

  OS version:

  Ubuntu 16.04.2 (Xenial) server

  Relevant packages (i hope):

  dbus                    1.10.6-1ubuntu3.3
  libdbus-1-3:amd64       1.10.6-1ubuntu3.3
  libdbus-glib-1-2:amd64  0.106-1
  libqt5dbus5:amd64       5.5.1+dfsg-16ubuntu7.2
  libsystemd0:amd64       229-4ubuntu17
  python3-systemd         231-2build1
  systemd                 229-4ubuntu17
  systemd-sysv            229-4ubuntu17

  PS: There are some related tickets in the system already, but none of
  them seemed to describe the exact behaviour i was seeing (they were
  missing wall messages only in certain circumstances — mine are ALWAYS
  missing). I'm linking them here for completeness, feel free to close
  this obv if you consider it a duplicate of one of them:

  Bug # 1448070
  Bug # 1512235

  There is also this Debian bug, which might be the same, though i have
  confirmed that this affects not just the SysV-style commands but even
  `systemctl` itself:

  https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=810608

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