[Bug 1850943] [NEW] GUI X session crash during update from 19.04 to 19.10

[Andreas Jung]

Public bug reported:

I was prompted that an update to 19.10 is available so I clicked continue.
Halfway through the update the whole GUI session crashed and I was left with a white blinking cursor and nothing more.
Forcibly restarting in this state was a bad idea because this broke the install completely. A kernel panic very early in the boot process appeared. Recovery mode did not work, too.

Luckily the installation is a VM, so I could easily revert to a working state.
(VirtualBox 6.0.14 on Windows 10 Home 18.09)

I decided to try again after uninstalling the VirtualBox Guest Additions
but no luck - same problem.

This worked to recover / complete the upgrade:
ctrl+alt+f3 (in a VM [Host-Key] + f3, by default [right ctrl] + f3)
login into the tty3 console
sudo killall dpkg
sudo dpkg --configure --pending
ctrl+alt+f1
login to the GUI session
restart

If it wasn't a VM it would probably have required a complete reinstall
which is the worst possible upgrade experience.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 19.10
Package: ubuntu-release-upgrader-core 1:19.10.15
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 5.3.0-19.20-generic 5.3.1
Uname: Linux 5.3.0-19-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.20.11-0ubuntu8.1
Architecture: amd64
CrashDB: ubuntu
CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME
Date: Fri Nov  1 15:41:42 2019
InstallationDate: Installed on 2019-06-08 (145 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 19.04 "Disco Dingo" - Release amd64 (20190416)
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 TERM=xterm-256color
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=<set>
 LANG=de_DE.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: ubuntu-release-upgrader
Symptom: ubuntu-release-upgrader
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to eoan on 2019-11-01 (0 days ago)
VarLogDistupgradeTermlog:

** Affects: ubuntu-release-upgrader (Ubuntu)
     Importance: Undecided
         Status: New


** Tags: amd64 apport-bug dist-upgrade eoan

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1850943

Title:
  GUI X session crash during update from 19.04 to 19.10

Status in ubuntu-release-upgrader package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  I was prompted that an update to 19.10 is available so I clicked continue.
  Halfway through the update the whole GUI session crashed and I was left with a white blinking cursor and nothing more.
  Forcibly restarting in this state was a bad idea because this broke the install completely. A kernel panic very early in the boot process appeared. Recovery mode did not work, too.

  Luckily the installation is a VM, so I could easily revert to a working state.
  (VirtualBox 6.0.14 on Windows 10 Home 18.09)

  I decided to try again after uninstalling the VirtualBox Guest
  Additions but no luck - same problem.

  This worked to recover / complete the upgrade:
  ctrl+alt+f3 (in a VM [Host-Key] + f3, by default [right ctrl] + f3)
  login into the tty3 console
  sudo killall dpkg
  sudo dpkg --configure --pending
  ctrl+alt+f1
  login to the GUI session
  restart

  If it wasn't a VM it would probably have required a complete reinstall
  which is the worst possible upgrade experience.

  ProblemType: Bug
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 19.10
  Package: ubuntu-release-upgrader-core 1:19.10.15
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 5.3.0-19.20-generic 5.3.1
  Uname: Linux 5.3.0-19-generic x86_64
  ApportVersion: 2.20.11-0ubuntu8.1
  Architecture: amd64
  CrashDB: ubuntu
  CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME
  Date: Fri Nov  1 15:41:42 2019
  InstallationDate: Installed on 2019-06-08 (145 days ago)
  InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 19.04 "Disco Dingo" - Release amd64 (20190416)
  PackageArchitecture: all
  ProcEnviron:
   TERM=xterm-256color
   PATH=(custom, no user)
   XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=<set>
   LANG=de_DE.UTF-8
   SHELL=/bin/bash
  SourcePackage: ubuntu-release-upgrader
  Symptom: ubuntu-release-upgrader
  UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to eoan on 2019-11-01 (0 days ago)
  VarLogDistupgradeTermlog:

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