[LCDProc] - Could not read config file

stephenw10

Ok, I upgraded my test X550e to todays snapshot (32bit obviously) 1G NanoBSD.

[2.2-BETA][root@pfSense.localdomain]/root: uname -a
FreeBSD pfSense.localdomain 10.1-RELEASE FreeBSD 10.1-RELEASE #0 29f4af5(releng/10.1)-dirty: Thu Nov 27 01:06:40 CST 2014     root@pfsense-22-i386-builder:/usr/obj.i386/usr/pfSensesrc/src/sys/pfSense_wrap.10.i386  i386

After the upgrade the lcdproc-dev package was not re-installed installed because it's not signed. I set the allow unsigned packages check and installed lcdproc-dev and rebooted. It came back up no problem. I did nothing else. That's suing the same LCDd.conf file and Shellcmd instructions that were carried across the upgrade from 2.1.5.

It's working fine for me both 32 and 64bit.

Are you still seeing this problem?

Steve

jjstecchino

Still having the problem. In my case the package was reinstalled after upgrade from 2.1 (after that deleted and reinstalled numerous times). Where do you set to allow unsigned packages? I didn't have to do that and maybe this is the problem.
I am upgrading to Nov 27 snapshot so we are on the same version

stephenw10

It's in System: Advanced: Miscellaneous:
If you don't have that checked it should fail the install in a pretty obvious way with authentication errors. The fact that yours didn't must surely be clue, or maybe that mine did. Perhaps you have a cached pbi? That shouldn't be possible on Nano though. Are you running Nano?

Steve

Edit: an obvious fail

jjstecchino

Yes, I had the install unsigned package already checked. I guess it carried over from the upgrade.
I am running nano 4gb i386.
At this point I guess the only thing left is to try a fresh install. Don't know if it is going to help. My understanding is that all of the freebsd comes with the new nano image, configuration file get upgraded to the new version and packages get reinstalled during upgrade. No system software other than what is in cf/media get carried over. I am puzzled to say the least.

cmb

@jjstecchino:

Where do you set to allow unsigned packages? I didn't have to do that and maybe this is the problem.

Don't change that, the packages are signed. The installation would completely fail with a signature error if that were the issue.

There is definitely some kind of issue with that package. I'm getting the same error that it can't find the config file, though it's there and permissions are such that it's readable by that process. I don't have anything with a LCD, not something I use.

stephenw10

Hmm, something very odd happening here. It definitely failed to install with an authentication error and then installed fine after I allowed unsigned packages. That was a few days ago though.
It's definitely running fine now using whatever binary was installed by the update process when I went to todays snapshot.
Both the machines I've tested this on were upgraded from 2.1.X so I don't know if I've got some hangover. I've never set a different package server but I guess that would do it.
Further investigation required. :-\

Steve

cmb

Oh, some time back it could have. All PBIs were rebuilt within the past 3-4 days, there were some stragglers that hadn't been updated recently until then, and hence weren't signed. At this point, every PBI should be signed. I haven't found any that aren't.

jjstecchino

lcdproc-dev is not signed. Maybe since it is a dev version it will never be.

cmb

Oh, sorry, indeed the dev version isn't signed.

Is there a reason the dev version is an older lcdproc than the stable version? Seems odd.

stephenw10

When the dev version was created it was to add new drivers and update the lcdproc base version. At the time the existing package hadn't been updated for a while and was way behind the current lcdproc.
If the original package has been updated it may be time to consolidate the two. The sdeclcd driver has been included upstream so it may already be in the original package. There were some changes made in the -dev package which seemed like a good idea at the time but in retrospect may not have helped.

Steve

jjstecchino

Well, did a fresh reinstall using today snapshot of nano 1gb on the x-core-e 550. setup lcdproc screen to use parallel interface, whatcguard sdeclcd driver, 2x20char line, lpt 4 bit wiring, setup a few screens, rebooted and service will not start. from command line same error. cannot read config file which is present and has correct permissions.
I am scratching my head here.
Stephenw10 did you do have any ideas? yours is working and I tried to duplicate your setup, down to the same size nano image.

On a different note as I reinstalled fresh, the nano image does not have a config.xml in /conf and pf sense web gui will not start. I had to use the serial console, and manually copy config frpm /config.default to /config

stephenw10

Left the box at what passes for an office. ;) So I can't check right now. I'll get the md5 sum on the binaries tomorrow.
The only thing I can think is that on my 64bit box I have the filesystem set to permanently read-write. This was a hang over from a much earlier snapshot where remounting it RO was causing a huge delay. However i'd dismissed that as a cause because the 32bit box is not set to RW. However whilst checking something else out I found that it's actually leaving the filesystem mounted RW for some reason. Now I don't know why it should make any difference. LCDd shouldn't be writing anything. I could just about imagine it's trying to copy the config file but I don't know why. Anyway it's easy to test it by setting the filesystem permanently RW in Diagnostics: Nanobsd:

Steve

jjstecchino

Tryied filesystem rw permanent does not make any difference. I am about to give up on this.

jjstecchino

SOLVED (sort of)

lcdproc-dev needs to be updated.
installed lcdproc 0.5.7_1 on top of lcdproc-dev and now it works flawlessly.

For whoever is interested in a step by step temporary solution until lcdproc-dev is up to date:

Install lcdproc-dev 0.5.6 from pakages
drop to freebsd console
mount -uw /
pkg install sysutils/lcdproc
go to GUI status/services and start lcdproc

it should work

In /usr/local/sbin and /usr/loca/bin there are symbolic links to /usr/pbi/lcdproc/sbin and bin pointing to LCDd, lcdexec and lcdproc. installing the freebsd package overwrite these links with the downloaded executables. The php file handling lcdproc fortunately refers to the standard location in /usr/local/… so it is pointing to the new files. So just installing the freebsd package on top of the old pfsense lcdproc-dev pakage works flawlessly.

Yeah! Working firebox with PFSense 2.2, IPV6 and working LCD. Cant be happier.

Now time to learn the intricacies of ipv6.

stephenw10

Nice discovery. Leaves me puzzled as to why my install is working though. I don't remember them being symlinks. I'll check tomorrow. Maybe if you had copied the older version it would have also worked. :-\

Steve

jjstecchino

@stephenw10:

Nice discovery. Leaves me puzzled as to why my install is working though. I don't remember them being symlinks. I'll check tomorrow. Maybe if you had copied the older version it would have also worked. :-\

Steve

I think I tried that a couple of days ago when I was playing with permissions. I think I copied the lcdproc executables from the pbi dir to usr/local and it was a no go. At this point I believe it may be a problem with LCDd using libraries maybe incompatible with FreeBSD 10.
Maybe on your install you are using other plugins that have updated some of the common libraries and that's why lcdproc works for you.

Well isn't it time to upgrade lcdproc to the latest release anyway? How do we contact the lcdproc-dev maintainer? It should be a simple upgrade to do as the php code works untouched.

stephenw10

If this is just a matter of updating the lcdproc version then just try installing the original lcdproc package which is now at 0.5.7-1. Even if the sdeclcd driver isn't there (it might be since it's in lcdproc upstream now) you should still be able to set a driver and start LCDd. It should be able to open the conf file. However I'm back here at my test box this morning and I misremembered, I do have symlinks to the lcdproc binaries. All three point to /usr/pbi/lcdproc-i386/bin though. Don't know if that's relevant , probably not since the sbin directory is a symlink to bin.
Anyway I'm still at a loss to explain why my box is running it just fine. :-\

[2.2-BETA][root@pfSense.localdomain]/usr/pbi/lcdproc-i386/bin: ./LCDd -h
LCDd - LCDproc Server Daemon, 0.5.6

Copyright (c) 1998-2012 Selene Scriven, William Ferrell, and misc. contributors.
This program is released under the terms of the GNU General Public License.

Usage: LCDd [<options>]
  where <options>are:
    -h                  Display this help screen
    -c <config>Use a configuration file other than /usr/local/etc/LCDd.conf
    -d <driver>Add a driver to use (overrides drivers in config file) [curses]
    -f                  Run in the foreground
    -a <addr>Network (IP) address to bind to [127.0.0.1]
    -p <port>Network port to listen for connections on [13666]
    -u <user>User to run as [nobody]
    -w <waittime>Time to pause at each screen (in seconds) [4]
    -s <bool>If set, reporting will be done using syslog
    -r <level>Report level [2]
    -i <bool>Whether to rotate the server info screen
Critical error while processing settings, abort.
[2.2-BETA][root@pfSense.localdomain]/usr/pbi/lcdproc-i386/bin: md5 LCDd
MD5 (LCDd) = 7417069cc4304f776d9c64e12c55ec97
[2.2-BETA][root@pfSense.localdomain]/usr/pbi/lcdproc-i386/bin: md5 lcdproc
MD5 (lcdproc) = 7417069cc4304f776d9c64e12c55ec97</bool></level></bool></waittime></user></port></addr></driver></config></options></options>

Are you running a clean install? Both my boxes are updates from 2.1.X.

Steve

stephenw10

Theory: LCDd cannot read the conf file because it is somehow locked by a previously run instance of LCDd. Your box is setup to run LCDd using the package rc script which is notoriously bad at starting cleanly. I am using Shellcmd scripts.
Try running with report level 5 (-r 5) at the CLI.

This doesn't explain why updating the binary solves the issue though.

jjstecchino

OK the mystery gets thicker…..at least for me. somebody more knowledgeable may shed some light.

removed freebsd package, then removed pfsense lcdproc-dev. Clean slate now.

Installed pfsense lcdproc wich is 0.5.7_1, same version as freebsd pkg.

setup driver to curses, setup some screens ----> no go.

Start LCDd from console: /usr/local/sbin/LCDd -c /usr/local/etc/LCDd.conf --> bombs saying cannot read config file.
Starting LCDd executable from pbi/..../bin directory --> same result as above.

Install freebsd lcdproc pkg. symlinks on /usr/local/sbin and bin get overwritten by pkg executables.

Start freebsd LCDd executable from /usr/local/sbin/LCDd -c /usr/local/etc/LCDd.conf --> All OK. reads config and just work.

Now are the 2 executables same?

MD5 (/usr/pbi/lcdproc-i386/bin/LCDd) = ebbd43300381f0291d6deddc9e4c97b9 (pfsense)
MD5 (/usr/local/sbin/LCDd) = 4061ed254181a5a518bcafcbc8695810 (freebsd)

No they are not. Now is it a library problem?

Overwrite /usr/local/sbin/LCDd (freebsd) with /usr/pbi/lcdproc.../bin/LCDd and keep everything else equal
Run LCDd from /usr/local/sbin/LCDd --> complains it cannot find LCDd.pbiopt
copy LCDd.pbiopt from /usr/pbi/lcdproc.../bin to /usr/local/sbin
Try to run LCDd again --> original error that cannot read config file in /usr/local/etc/LCDd.conf

So we have come full circle.

My conclusions at this point (probably flawed by my lack of knowledge about the pbi package system)

Not a library problem, don't think LCDd uses any special library other than the different drivers

freebsd and pfsense LCDd same version but compiled with different compiler options or code to support pbi (probably same compiler options/code used on lcdproc-dev and this is why they are suffering from the same problem)

Now I dont know anything about PBI and I dont know the function of the pbiopt file. My has the following lines.

cat LCDd.pbiopt
PROGDIR: /usr/pbi/lcdproc-i386
TARGET: sbin/LCDd

It would seem something describing the location of the executable. in my PBI installation of lcdproc /usr/pbi/lcdproc.../sbin is a symbolic link to the bin directory.
I wonder if the pbi version of lcdproc uses the information from pbiopt and in some ways screws up the relative path to the config file even if it is specified by the c option.

Just speculations on my end at this point as I will have to read about building pbi packages and experiment. My understanding is that to build packages you need access to the super secret tool repository which I dont have. Otherwise I would take a stab at playing with the package to make it work.

Back to the freebsd package for now

jjstecchino

Still cant understand why Stephen install works. Mine did not work after an upgrade from 2.1.5 and did not work after a fresh install of the Nov30 2gb nanobsd version. Maybe there is an issue with pbi permissions that in some way are different between my install and Stephen