this post was submitted on 26 Nov 2023
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I broke some packages and I need help figuring out how to fix it.
I run Nobara and usually update via "Nobara Package Manager", however it ran into a problem:

Could not depsolve transaction; 1 problem detected:
Problem: The operation would result in removing the following protected packages: nobara-amdgpu-config

I found the solution on Nobara projects site: sudo dnf update --exclude=nobara-login --refresh && sudo dnf update --refresh
That did result in several packages begin updated, I just skimmed through the list but I remember some mesa stuff. After a reboot some apps render like in the picture - missing characters or missing text all together and flickering artefacts. I run things pretty out-of-the-box so not sure what I've done that has lead up to this, just care about gaming.

How can I troubleshoot this? Thanks in advance

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[–] [email protected] 32 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Oof. You uninstalled Mesa's AMD config because a troll on the internet tried to partial upgrade your system. You're kinda fucked.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 11 months ago (3 children)

Yeah I kind of realised that the instructions assumed I had already upgraded, will try to keep track of new updates better in the future. So for sake of completion here's how I solved it in the end:

  • Ran upgrade from Nobara 37->38 following their guide: https://nobaraproject.org/docs/upgrade-troubleshooting/how-do-i-upgrade-to-a-new-nobara-version/
  • Ran into conflicts: file /usr/lib64/libopenh264.so.2.3.1 conflicts between attempted installs of openh264-2.3.1-2.fc38.x86_64 and noopenh264-0.1.0~openh264_2.3.1-2.fc38.x86_64
  • Solved it with exclusion: sudo dnf -v system-upgrade download --releasever=38 --allowerasing --exclude=openh264.x86_64
  • Fonts and glitches are gone, got some broken deps instead. So if anyone got a suggestion for that instead let me know. Otherwise I'll do as it suggest --best --allowerasing' and see what else breaks:
Problem: The operation would result in removing the following protected packages: plasma-desktop
================================================================================
 Package                 Arch   Version         Repository                 Size
================================================================================
Skipping packages with conflicts:
(add '--best --allowerasing' to command line to force their upgrade):
 kde-settings            noarch 38.2-5.fc38     nobara-baseos-38           33 k
 libkworkspace5          x86_64 5.27.8-1.fc38   nobara-baseos-38          115 k
 libkworkspace5          x86_64 5.27.9.1-3.fc38 nobara-baseos-38          115 k
 plasma-workspace-common x86_64 5.27.8-1.fc38   nobara-baseos-38           41 k
 plasma-workspace-common x86_64 5.27.9.1-3.fc38 nobara-baseos-38           40 k
 plasma-workspace-libs   x86_64 5.27.8-1.fc38   nobara-baseos-38          2.2 M
 plasma-workspace-libs   x86_64 5.27.9.1-3.fc38 nobara-baseos-38          2.2 M
 plasma-workspace-wayland
                         x86_64 5.27.8-1.fc38   nobara-baseos-38           70 k
 plasma-workspace-wayland
                         x86_64 5.27.9.1-3.fc38 nobara-baseos-38           70 k
Skipping packages with broken dependencies:
 kde-settings-plasma     noarch 38.2-5.fc38     nobara-baseos-38           13 k
 plasma-lookandfeel-fedora
                         noarch 5.27.8-1.fc38   nobara-baseos-38          403 k
 plasma-workspace        i686   5.27.8-1.fc38   nobara-baseos-multilib-38  15 M
 plasma-workspace        x86_64 5.27.8-1.fc38   nobara-baseos-38           15 M
 plasma-workspace        i686   5.27.9.1-2.fc38 nobara-baseos-multilib-38  15 M
 plasma-workspace        i686   5.27.9.1-3.fc38 nobara-baseos-multilib-38  15 M
 plasma-workspace        x86_64 5.27.9.1-3.fc38 nobara-baseos-38           15 M
 plasma-workspace-x11    x86_64 5.27.9.1-3.fc38 nobara-baseos-38           68 k
 sddm-breeze             noarch 5.27.9.1-3.fc38 nobara-baseos-38          440 k

Transaction Summary
================================================================================
Skip  18 Packages
[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Now it's trying to either partial upgrade OR delete your desktop. Your system is fucked.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

It un-fucked itself thankfully, I haven't done anything to resolve that issue. But when I ran the update today it went well with several new packages. Which means Nobara or Fedora pushed some changes to packages in the repos.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Every time you're excluding something you're excluding updating a package, while updating all the others. Then if the new packages depend on the newer version of the package you didn't upgrade by excluding it, things break. That's what's happened here. Every time you use exclude to upgrade something you're essentially breaking your system worse. That's what the other person means by "partial upgrading"

And now that message says it's going to completely remove your desktop environment so you're gonna have no desktop, just a cli shell.

At this point the easiest thing would probably be to back up your home directory and whatever else you want to keep and just reinstall the system. Any other process to try and fix it is going to require more trouble and time than it would take to just reinstall unfortunately. There may not even be a way to successfully unbreak your system.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I saw that error when I first installed nobara. Googled it, and the solution was just to not use dnf to update, but nobara-sync instead.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

Yeah I forgot to mention that I'll not be using dnf manually but rely on nobara-sync. But I must stress that I already did that before this issue, BUT I followed advice on nobaras own website where the solution was to use dnfand I still ended up with this problem. The real issue was still my own though, I should have upgraded to Nobara 38 before trying the workarounds, since 37 isn't supported any more.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 11 months ago

Reboot and see if it still happens. If it does, is it always the same characters that are missing?

A quick search for "Linux missing characters" says it could be the font that you're using.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I don't use Fedora/Nobara, but seems like you can see the update history with: dnf history list

I've found this guide for rollback here: https://www.baeldung.com/linux/dnf-history-rollback-vs-undo

[–] [email protected] 5 points 11 months ago

That is helpful, I'm not sure what I'm looking for yet though. But another comment lead me into antialiasing and this line in the history seems plausible.
install -y /tmp/zenity/nobara-amdgpu-config/fedora-amdgpu-pro/packages/amdamf-pro-runtime-5.4.3-4.fc37.x86_64.rpm /tmp/zenity/nobara-amdgpu-config/fedora-amdgpu-pro/packages/amd-gpu | 2023-04-25 20:11 | I, O | 11

Undo didn't work though:

sudo dnf history undo 11
Error: The following problems occurred while running a transaction:
Cannot find rpm nevra "amd-gpu-firmware-20230404-149.fc37.noarch".

So I made a rollback to my last know stable point: sudo dnf history rollback 2
It didn't exactly workout either unfortunately:

Transaction history is incomplete, before 73.
ransaction history is incomplete, before 72.
Transaction history is incomplete, after 71.
Transaction history is incomplete, before 61.
Transaction history is incomplete, after 60.
Transaction history is incomplete, before 8.
Transaction history is incomplete, before 7.
Transaction history is incomplete, after 6.
Error: The following problems occurred while running a transaction:
Cannot find rpm nevra "ImageMagick-c++-1:6.9.12.82-1.fc37.x86_64".
... many lines more about pkgs not found

I'll do a reboot and see what actually took effect. Atleast I'm learning something, maybe I should do all my upgrades via dnf instead of the manager in the future, easier to know whats going on.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I had something like this and if I remember correctly it had to do with antialiasing. Try changing that settings

[–] [email protected] 6 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Turning AA off for fonts solved the missing characters, downside it doesn't look very good. I still have glitchy artefacts in some menus and the package manager doesn't display any text for buttons which is a bit problematic. Guessing disabling some more AA settings would remove more of the problems. But it doesn't solve my main problem - why did AA break in the first place

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

I'm not familiar with your package manager, but some have logs detailing what exactly they did in chronological order.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I get the same error when trying to update. What's the correct way to fix it?!

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

Don't use "dnf update", just "sudo nobara-sync".

It's not a problem because the update script automatically skips the other GPU packages. Uninstalling it would be an issue because some nobara packages depend on it.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago

I used the commands OP provided, which is also what's been posted on the official page and it seemed to have worked without issues for me. At least in regards to me not having any graphical issues.