update manager doesn't find 12.10 upgrade

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Specified the package (update-manager-core) as requested. I thought I had done that when I submitted the bug, but apparently I didn't succeed.

See also bug 1080131, which was reported for update-manager.

Sorry, that should have been bug 1024131.

Could you please also add the contents of /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades.conf? Thanks in advance.

This is very interesting!!

pa@morchella:~$ cat /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades.conf
cat: /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades.conf: No such file or directory
pa@morchella:~$ ls -R /etc/update-manager
/etc/update-manager:
meta-release release-upgrades release-upgrades.d

/etc/update-manager/release-upgrades.d:
pa@morchella:~$

What program is responsible for installing release-upgrades.conf? It wasn't in any package that I thought to look at.

On Mon, Nov 19, 2012 at 10:42:53PM -0000, Paul Abrahams wrote:
> This is very interesting!!
>
> pa@morchella:~$ cat /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades.conf
> cat: /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades.conf: No such file or directory
> pa@morchella:~$ ls -R /etc/update-manager
> /etc/update-manager:
> meta-release release-upgrades release-upgrades.d

Ah, my mistake. The contents of /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades is
what we want.

Here it is, but I don't think you'll find any gold in them thar' hills:

root@morchella:/home/pa# cat /etc/update-manager/release-upgrades
# Default behavior for the release upgrader.

[DEFAULT]
# Default prompting behavior, valid options:
#
# never - Never check for a new release.
# normal - Check to see if a new release is available. If more than one new
# release is found, the release upgrader will attempt to upgrade to
# the release that immediately succeeds the currently-running
# release.
# lts - Check to see if a new LTS release is available. The upgrader
# will attempt to upgrade to the first LTS release available after
# the currently-running one. Note that this option should not be
# used if the currently-running release is not itself an LTS
# release, since in that case the upgrader won't be able to
# determine if a newer release is available.
prompt=normal

This is what I should have put into the report:

root@morchella:/home/pa# do-release-upgrade
Checking for a new Ubuntu release
No new release found

The -c confused the issue.

I wonder -- is do-release-upgrade even affected by the prompt? Or is that effect limited to the programs that actually display the prompt choice, such as synaptic and muon-updater?

On Tue, Nov 20, 2012 at 03:28:19PM -0000, Paul Abrahams wrote:
> I wonder -- is do-release-upgrade even affected by the prompt? Or is
> that effect limited to the programs that actually display the prompt
> choice, such as synaptic and muon-updater?

Try 'do-release-upgrade -d'.

Voila!

pa@morchella:~$ do-release-upgrade -d
Checking for a new Ubuntu release
No new release found

I also tried removing update-manager-core completely and reinstalling it in the hope that some troublesome file might be replaced. No luck with that either.

I think the solution lies in understanding how update-manager-core goes about deciding if there is indeed a new release available, and I haven't been able to find that out.

A clue:

The file /usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/UpdateManager/Core/DistUpgradeFetcherCore.py seems to be where the decision-making happens. And it seems to depend in very particular ways on the contents of /etc/apt/sources.list. Unfortunately I just don't know enough about the context to analyze this any further.

It does seem that if /etc/apt/sources.list is not quite in the form that this program is expecting, the upgrade won't be found. But I can't tell just what it's looking for.

if it helps, here's the contents of my /etc/apt/sources.list:

#############################################################
################### OFFICIAL UBUNTU REPOS ###################
#############################################################

###### Ubuntu Main Repos
deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise main restricted universe multiverse
deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise main restricted universe multiverse

###### Ubuntu Update Repos
deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-security main restricted universe multiverse
deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates main restricted universe multiverse
deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-backports main restricted universe multiverse
deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-security main restricted universe multiverse
deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-updates main restricted universe multiverse
deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise-backports main restricted universe multiverse

###### Ubuntu Partner Repo
deb http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu precise partner
deb-src http://archive.canonical.com/ubuntu precise partner

###### Ubuntu Extras Repo
deb http://extras.ubuntu.com/ubuntu precise main
deb-src http://extras.ubuntu.com/ubuntu precise main

##############################################################
##################### UNOFFICIAL REPOS ######################
##############################################################

###### 3rd Party Binary Repos

#### Audacity - http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
## Run this command: sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys BB901940
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/audacity-team/daily/ubuntu precise main

#### Flacon - http://kde-apps.org/content/show.php?content=113388
## Run this command: sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys F2A61FE5
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/flacon/ppa/ubuntu precise main

#### GetDeb - http://www.getdeb.net
## Run this command: wget -q -O- http://archive.getdeb.net/getdeb-archive.key | sudo apt-key add -
deb http://archive.getdeb.net/ubuntu precise-getdeb apps

#### Gimp - https://launchpad.net/~otto-kesselgulasch/+archive/gimp
## Run this command: sudo apt-key adv --recv-keys --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com 614C4B38
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/otto-kesselgulasch/gimp/ubuntu precise main

#### GNOME3 extra apps - https://launchpad.net/~gnome3-team/+archive/gnome3
## Run this command: sudo apt-key adv --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com --recv-keys 3B1510FD
deb http://ppa.launchpad.net/gnome3-team/gnome3/ubuntu precise main

#### GNUzilla and IceCat - http://www.gnu.org/software/gnuzill...

I think I might have been looking at the wrong function to isolate the bug. I now think the problem lies in this:

/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/DistUpgrade/MetaRelease.py

but unfortunately I can't figure out how it works.

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.