Ubuntu
oem-config package

remind customiser on every boot to run oem-config-prepare

Bug #41698 reported by Nicholas Furgiuele
8
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
Baltix
New
Undecided
Unassigned
oem-config (Ubuntu)
Fix Released
High
Colin Watson

Bug Description

I have a copy of Dapper Flight 3, it's been installed for quite a while, but I've been keeping it up to date, and when I encountered this problem I had all available updates installed.

I'm going to explain what I did from an end user point of view.

I was installing Morrowind on Cedega (which takes forever to install) I didn't want someone to interrupt the installation (I'd already tried 4 times) so I selected "System > Lock screen" to ensure that nobody would interfere.

Out of interest I clicked the switch user button to see that a list appeared with "OEM User" in it. Being paranoid that someone might try and switch to OEM rather than mind their own business I decided to delete the OEM user.

I unlocked the system and proceeded to use the "Users and groups" control panel to remove the OEM user, I then re-locked the system and went about my business.

Upon returning I found that I couldn't play Morrowind because the resolution was being set to a mode that my monitor couldn't handle, so I proceeded to reconfigure xorg.

Opens terminal, types "sudo dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg" and nothing happened. I then tried to launch synaptic, all the config tools were gone.

Somehow my user account must be tied into the OEM user account, and when I deleted the OEM user it removed my ability to use sudo for anything. It also removed "Synaptic", "Add / remove software" and just about any tool that requires root access.

I can still reboot and log in using my normal user account, I can run installed software, etc, but I can't use sound, and any tools that require root access.

In KDE i get told "Conversation with su failed" when I try to run any admin tools.

Rebooting and loading the "recovery mode" option from the grub boot menu allowed me to get root access and run tools like synaptic, etc.

Synaptic seems to tell me that all the packages like "ubuntu-desktop" etc have been uninstalled, they're all still accessible if I use the terminal.

After re-creating an OEM user account using the "adduser" command and re-installing all the packages that seem to be missing using synaptic, when I boot into Linux normally I still get no "sudo" access, no configuration tools and no sound, etc

Related branches

lp:ubuntu/karmic/oem-config
Revision history for this message
Dennis Kaarsemaker (dennis) wrote : Re: [Bug 41698] Deleting OEM user disables system

The OEM user is only created with an OEM install and removed on the
first reboot that user makes. Moreover, when flight3 was released the
OEM install was quite broken and may have caused this. Please try with
beta 1 or later.

Revision history for this message
Nicholas Furgiuele (nicholas-distinctive) wrote : Re: Deleting OEM user disables system

I tried downloading and installing Dapper Beta in OEM mode last night specifically just to test this.

The OEM user was NOT removed on first boot, in fact if anything the problem is worse.

1) I had to log in using the OEM user account on first boot
2) Created a new user using Gnome's add user tool, and gave the user all permissions except for "Allow to perform administration tasks"
3) Logged in with the new user and the same problem was there, using "sudo" did nothing, and there were no admin tools (that require sudo) available.

I logged in as OEM again and checked what groups that my new user was assigned to. I was not the "sudo" group, I added the user to the sudo group and retried.

When I logged in, the admin tools were still not available, and sudo still did not work.

Logged back in using OEM again, added the user to the admin group and tried again. Now the tools are available but I am not asked to "Grant administrative rights" when launching an admin tool.

Logged in as OEM again and I removed my user from the "admin" group. Opened up the user preferences dialogue and on the permissions tab I selected "Allow the user to perform administrative tasks".

I logged back in, the admin tools were available but and I was still able to perform admin tasks without being asked for a password.

Now that I knew that I had all the admin tools available so I tried another experiment and deleted the OEM user, logged out and back in to my user account. Big surprise when I discovered that all the admin tools were once again gone and I could not use "sudo" again.

I had to use "recovery mode" to get root access, I started the X server and was surprised to see that root had no admin tools available as well. I was able to run the admin tools by the terminal, but they didnt show up in the menus.

I had to re-add my user account to the "sudo" and "admin" groups all over again.

My system seems to function properly at the moment but it was a real drama to get it working as I would have expected.

Revision history for this message
Tollef Fog Heen (tfheen) wrote :

If you needed to manually delete the oem user, I suspect you forgot to run oem-config-prepare (as the installer instructs you to) after the customisation was done (on the first graphical boot). I suspect this is the root cause of your other problems as well.

The sudo group is not used, so adding users to that group won't help you a bit.

Changed in oem-config:
status: Unconfirmed → Rejected
Revision history for this message
Nicholas Furgiuele (nicholas-distinctive) wrote :

Should'nt the way that the user is informed of this re-considered then?

Perhaps a window could pop up when you boot, saying something like:

[OEM INSTALL]
[Your system is in OEM mode, when you have finished preparing the system run *oem-config-prepare*.]
[Run now] [Run later]

I know that you SHOULD read the instructions on the installer, but I have installed Linux so many times that I just sit there in zombie mode and hit Next, Next, Next, Next.

If something is required, a single warning on a text based installer somehow doesn't seem sufficient.

Revision history for this message
Colin Watson (cjwatson) wrote :

Quite possibly - but we're locking down for the Dapper release in about two or three days, so I think it's too late now.

Changed in oem-config:
status: Rejected → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
Colin Watson (cjwatson) wrote :

We should address this by adding a desktop icon, I think.

Changed in oem-config:
importance: Medium → High
Revision history for this message
Colin Watson (cjwatson) wrote :

oem-config (1.14) gutsy; urgency=low

  * Add an apport hook to attach /var/log/oem-config.log.
  * Strip binaries.
  * Print usage message and exit if any non-option arguments are supplied to
    oem-config; suggest oem-config-prepare (LP: #105940).
  * Update Japanese keyboard layout handling to match console-setup
    1.7ubuntu18, which uses jp(latin),jp by default (LP: #63915).
  * Teach oem-config-prepare to escalate privileges itself using gksudo,
    kdesu, etc. as appropriate, rather than requiring it to be invoked using
    sudo.
  * Add a desktop icon to the oem user's desktop to run oem-config-prepare
    (LP: #41698).
  * Display an error dialog and exit if running as non-root (LP: #99211).
  * Automatic update of included source packages: console-setup 1.15ubuntu1,
    localechooser 1.38ubuntu1, tzsetup 1:0.17, user-setup 1.14ubuntu1.

 -- Colin Watson <email address hidden> Thu, 17 May 2007 11:43:03 +0100

Changed in oem-config:
assignee: nobody → kamion
status: Confirmed → Fix Released
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