[Bug 1852368] [NEW] 19.10 live image has persistence enabled by default

[Olivier Robert]

Public bug reported:

I'm not sure it's the correct place to report this...

When I boot from the 19.10 live image on a USB stick (at least my USB
stick, on my computer), the live system creates and formats an
additional partition on my stick, labeled "casper-rw" that's mounted
read-write on /var/crash and /var/log.

Passing the "nopersistent" parameter prevents that behaviour. I tried on
a specially crafted disk image on qemu comprising the unmodified live
image, followed by 1 GiB of zeroes, to simulate a USB stick with some
remaining space.

I didn't have that problem with the 19.04 live image, on the exact same
hardware.

Could it be that the system now interprets my USB stick as non-removable
media, hence assuming persistence as the default, or is everyone else
affected ?

Defaulting to persistence poses problems :
- integrity checks on the USB stick fail, since it the partition table has been modified
- Despite passing the "toram" parameter, the USB stick can't be ejected without performing additional operations

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 19.10
Package: casper (not installed)
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 5.3.0-19.20-generic 5.3.1
Uname: Linux 5.3.0-19-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.20.11-0ubuntu8.2
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME
Date: Wed Nov 13 03:38:19 2019
InstallationDate: Installed on 2019-09-22 (51 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 19.04 "Disco Dingo" - Release amd64 (20190416)
SourcePackage: casper
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to eoan on 2019-11-01 (11 days ago)

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


** Tags: amd64 apport-bug eoan

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1852368

Title:
  19.10 live image has persistence enabled by default

Status in casper package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  I'm not sure it's the correct place to report this...

  When I boot from the 19.10 live image on a USB stick (at least my USB
  stick, on my computer), the live system creates and formats an
  additional partition on my stick, labeled "casper-rw" that's mounted
  read-write on /var/crash and /var/log.

  Passing the "nopersistent" parameter prevents that behaviour. I tried
  on a specially crafted disk image on qemu comprising the unmodified
  live image, followed by 1 GiB of zeroes, to simulate a USB stick with
  some remaining space.

  I didn't have that problem with the 19.04 live image, on the exact
  same hardware.

  Could it be that the system now interprets my USB stick as non-
  removable media, hence assuming persistence as the default, or is
  everyone else affected ?

  Defaulting to persistence poses problems :
  - integrity checks on the USB stick fail, since it the partition table has been modified
  - Despite passing the "toram" parameter, the USB stick can't be ejected without performing additional operations

  ProblemType: Bug
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 19.10
  Package: casper (not installed)
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 5.3.0-19.20-generic 5.3.1
  Uname: Linux 5.3.0-19-generic x86_64
  ApportVersion: 2.20.11-0ubuntu8.2
  Architecture: amd64
  CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME
  Date: Wed Nov 13 03:38:19 2019
  InstallationDate: Installed on 2019-09-22 (51 days ago)
  InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 19.04 "Disco Dingo" - Release amd64 (20190416)
  SourcePackage: casper
  UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to eoan on 2019-11-01 (11 days ago)

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