Yum bootstrap fails on el8 & el9 "while copying pseudo devices" with "operation not permitted"

[DrDaveD]

Version of Apptainer

1.3.1-1.el8

Expected behavior

Expected to be able to build from a yum bootstrap

Actual behavior

FATAL:   While performing build: conveyor failed to get: while copying pseudo devices: while creating /tmp/build-temp-69317083/rootfs/dev/null: operation not permitted

Steps to reproduce this behavior

On el8 or el9, using the following definition file:

BootStrap: yum
OSVersion: 8
MirrorURL: https://download.rockylinux.org/pub/rocky/%{OSVERSION}/BaseOS/$basearch/os/
Include: yum

and the build command

apptainer build rocky-yum-bootstrap.sif rocky-yum-bootstrap.def

the output is

INFO:    User not listed in /etc/subuid, trying root-mapped namespace
INFO:    The %post section will be run under fakeroot
INFO:    Starting build...
INFO:    Skipping GPG Key Import
FATAL:   While performing build: conveyor failed to get: while copying pseudo devices: while creating /tmp/build-temp-69317083/rootfs/dev/null: operation not permitted

It works OK on el7.

What OS/distro are you running

el8 or el9

How did you install Apptainer

yum install apptainer from epel.

[GodloveD]

I don't have any problem building on my Rocky 9 (bare metal) laptop:

$ apptainer build rocky.sif rocky.def 
WARNING: 'nodev' mount option set on /tmp, it could be a source of failure during build process
INFO:    Starting build...
WARNING: Your host system is using the sqlite RPM database backend.
WARNING: Bootstrapping of older distributions that use the bdb backend will fail.
INFO:    Skipping GPG Key Import
INFO:    Adding owner write permission to build path: /tmp/build-temp-964844263/rootfs
INFO:    Creating SIF file...
INFO:    Build complete: rocky.sif

$ cat /etc/os-release 
NAME="Rocky Linux"
VERSION="9.3 (Blue Onyx)"
ID="rocky"
ID_LIKE="rhel centos fedora"
VERSION_ID="9.3"
PLATFORM_ID="platform:el9"
PRETTY_NAME="Rocky Linux 9.3 (Blue Onyx)"
ANSI_COLOR="0;32"
LOGO="fedora-logo-icon"
CPE_NAME="cpe:/o:rocky:rocky:9::baseos"
HOME_URL="https://rockylinux.org/"
BUG_REPORT_URL="https://bugs.rockylinux.org/"
SUPPORT_END="2032-05-31"
ROCKY_SUPPORT_PRODUCT="Rocky-Linux-9"
ROCKY_SUPPORT_PRODUCT_VERSION="9.3"
REDHAT_SUPPORT_PRODUCT="Rocky Linux"
REDHAT_SUPPORT_PRODUCT_VERSION="9.3"

I'm not sure what is causing the discrepancy.

[DrDaveD]

Today it's not failing for me on an el9 host either. I'm sure it was failing last week so I don't know what changed. My machine had a kernel update but I tried an older kernel and it still didn't fail.

It does still fail for me on el8.

[DrDaveD]

Oh, no, the key is whether or not /etc/subuid mapping is used. It fails if /etc/subuid mapping is not set up, or if the hidden build option --ignore-subuid is used. This is probably a fundamental limitation with the yum bootstrap and we should insert a warning.