Upgrade to 4.3.0.12 Unstable Internet Connection - No Help From Jolla

General
#1

I really wish I didn’t have to post this but, I feel like I have been mistreated by Jolla.
I have been using an XA2 and recently every update has introduced more and more bugs.
The last version of Sailfish introduced a nasty connection bug, I was told to go and report it as a bug to Jolla, which I did.

I posted a video of the bug, I also uploaded to them lots of logs and other data from my phone.
Jolla have failed to take responsibility for this issue and have tried to blame me!
I have included the conversation I have had with their support team.

The thing is I have another XA2 device, and I would like to use it as my phone running Sailfish.
Can people please tell me which versions of Sailfish actually work on an XA2?

Bug report thread as follows:

Upgrade to 4.3.0.12 Unstable Internet Connection

nshiell:
Upgrading my phone to 4.3.0.12 results in an unstable internet connection that keeps on saying “connecting” and “Limited Connectivity” in a loop.
The internet connection is therefore unstable and I can’t browse the internet properly .
I thought this might be an issue with the setup of my device, so I reset my phone and upgraded it up to 4.3.0.12 without changing any settings or installing any apps.
I can confirm that the version prior to this doesn’t have this issue.
This issue has been seen after updating to latest version with my original software setup on the device and also after the reset.

Some other information:
Before updating to 4.3.0.12 I saw “Remove or revert the following packages, as they may cause problems during update”
This message was shown both times before I performed an update to 4.3.0.12.
I have attached a screenshot showing the message I received prior to upgrading (I’m not sure if this is relevant).
The list of software to remove was very long.
The mobile network is UK EE, I have tried this around several sites around London and Manchester.

The hardware is an Xperia XA2
A (blurry) video showing this fault can be seen here: https://youtu.be/qe6Rx6KYHDM
There is also common random vibrations that the phone does frequently

Screenshot_20211204_001
Screenshot_20211204_0011080×1920 425 KB

Jolla Care
December 07, 2021 15:54
Hey,

thanks for your detailed report. We are sorry for the trouble.

The screenshot indicates an incorrect and unnecessary warning which should be ignored, i.e., the OS update must be installed without removing or reverting any packages (which you obviously have done).

But, as it also lists the packages “gittin” and “git-minimal”, we know that you have been upgrading the OS over the air from the 3.1.0 release (or so).
In such a case, there is a reason to believe that the last leg of the update chain, to 4.3.0, has partially failed. This could explain those weird issues with the Internet connection and the vibrator.

There are two ways to correct the situation.

  1. The thorough way
    Re-install Sailfish release 4.3.0.12 to the phone by “flashing”. This is easier than the reset as the phone gets the final OS release immediately. However, as with reset, this action deletes all data, apps and accounts, again.
    On the positive side is that then the phone is definitely in a known and correct state.
    The following help article gives some guidance how to do it: https://jolla.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360002304714.

  2. The quick way
    Run the following commands at the phone Terminal app. This requires the developer mode [1].

devel-su ## you will need to type your SSH password here (see [1])​

rm -r /var/cache/ssu/ ## clear the update cache
ssu ur
​
pkcon install zypper ## type y to allow the installation

ssu re 4.3.0.12
zypper ref
zypper dup ## this will add the potentially missing packages
reboot ## the phone must be restarted to activate the changes

After the phone has booted up, it should work correctly, again.

If not, please come back to us. Well, we would also like to hear about the positive outcome!

[1]
This help article explains how to enable and disable the Developer mode.
Developer mode makes access deeper to Sailfish OS possible by allowing you to get the super-user rights (“root” rights). Also, it installs the Terminal app on the device.
Sincerely,
Jolla Customer Care

Operating hours: Monday to Friday from 9.00 to 16.30 (EET); closed on weekends and public holidays (Finland)*.

Our service is based on Zendesk tool, i.e. on written communication - we do not have any phone service.

Join the Movement @ https://www.jolla.com
Like us on Facebook @ Jolla
Follow on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/jollaHQ
Dive deeper into the Jolla world @ https://blog.jolla.com - check the news on Sailfish 4
Interested in Sailfish X, i.e. Sailfish OS for Sony Xperia X, XA2, and Xperia 10. Read more @ https://shop.jolla.com/.
Keeping your Sailfish device in good shape

nshiell:
December 08, 2021 18:57
Thanks, I have followed the first option posted above (that of re-flashing the device).

As this fault is intermittent I will need several days of real world usage of my phone to see if re-flashing the device has fixed the issue.

So therefore I can’t confirm if it’s fixed or not at this point.

N.b.
There is a decision to be made when flashing and installing Sailfish, specifically which Kernel version should be used.
The Sailfish guide suggests not installing V7 as it can affect 5G Wifi, I have used V6, I wounder if this is a factor in this issue?

Jolla Care:
December 09, 2021 07:31
Hi,

thanks for the status update.

Yes, there are two Sony binary images intended for XA2 phones, v. 16 and v. 17.
Neither of these is known to cause the issues reported by you. I am using v. 16 on my XA2 test phones (2) and I recommend selecting it.
Sincerely,
Jolla Customer Care

Operating hours: Monday to Friday from 9.00 to 16.30 (EET); closed on weekends and public holidays (Finland)*.

Our service is based on Zendesk tool, i.e. on written communication - we do not have any phone service.

Join the Movement @ https://www.jolla.com
Like us on Facebook @ Jolla
Follow on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/jollaHQ
Dive deeper into the Jolla world @ https://blog.jolla.com - check the news on Sailfish 4
Interested in Sailfish X, i.e. Sailfish OS for Sony Xperia X, XA2, and Xperia 10. Read more @ https://shop.jolla.com/.
Keeping your Sailfish device in good shape

nshiell
December 10, 2021 16:28
I have done some more testing and I can confirem that this issue still appears.
This is with an XA2 ruinning a fresh install of the lastest version of SailfishOS.

(It might be the case that the 4G internet can connect if the Wifi is also connected at the same time.)

Jolla Care:

December 10, 2021 16:49
The help article below gives instructions for collecting all basic logs from a Sailfish OS device. There is a script that you need to execute. It collects some logs into one container file. Please send that file to us.

Instructions here

Please do not forget to indicate the data & time when the issue happened. That makes reading the logs easier.
Sincerely,
Jolla Customer Care

Operating hours: Monday to Friday from 9.00 to 16.30 (EET); closed on weekends and public holidays (Finland)*.

Our service is based on Zendesk tool, i.e. on written communication - we do not have any phone service.

Join the Movement @ https://www.jolla.com
Like us on Facebook @ Jolla
Follow on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/jollaHQ
Dive deeper into the Jolla world @ https://blog.jolla.com - check the news on Sailfish 4
Interested in Sailfish X, i.e. Sailfish OS for Sony Xperia X, XA2, and Xperia 10. Read more @ https://shop.jolla.com/.
Keeping your Sailfish device in good shape

nshiell:

December 10, 2021 17:03
Password:

Collecting some logs from a Sailfish OS device

Creating a temporary directory for the logs.
/tmp/tmp.wUfDEr

  1. HW and SW
  • device details
  • software release details
  1. RAM usage by top processes
  • free RAM in the system
  • top 20 processes by RAM usage
  1. Storage usage
  • biggest folders in device storage in root partition
  • biggest folders in device storage in home partition
  1. Ifconfig
  • interface configurations: currently active
  • interface configurations: all
  1. Journal
  • journal log
  1. Repositories and SSU status
  • ssu repositories
  • ssu status
  1. Binary code packages
  • all rpm’s
  • pkcon: all packages (installed and available)
  1. Traces from OS updates
  • systemboot.log
  • systemupdate.log
    cp: can’t stat ‘/var/log/systemupdate.log’: No such file or directory
  • history
  1. Android logs
  • vendor binary blob
  • logcat log
  • status of Android App Support

All logs collected.
Compressing them to a container named ‘basic-logs-2021-12-10-1656.tar’.
tar: removing leading ‘/’ from member names
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/AAA-readme.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/aliendalvik-status.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/android-logcat.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/folders-gt-100MB-in-home.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/folders-gt-100MB-in-root.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/free-m-ram.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/history.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/hw-release.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/ifconfig-active.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/ifconfig-all.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/journal.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/pkcon-all.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/rpm-all.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/ssu-lr.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/ssu-s.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/sw-release.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/systemboot.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/top-20-proc-by-ram-usage.txt
tmp/tmp.wUfDEr/vendor-binary-blob.txt

Get the file 'basic-logs-2021-12-10-1656.tar' from /home/defaultuser.

DONE.

basic-logs-2021-12-10-1656.tar (2 MB)

nshiell
December 10, 2021 17:03
^ Find attached the logs tar

Jolla Care:
December 14, 2021 15:27
Hi,

thanks for the logs.

Included in the logs is the output from the repository listing (ssu lr) [1]. That contains some serious deviations from the standard Sailfish setup:

The global section should not be touched at all. All user-specific changes should be in the User section or else the normal Sailfish OS updates do not work correctly, leading to strange issues.

The global section of your phone contains some extra repositories (they should not be there):
– mentaljam-obs … Index of /obs/home:/mentaljam/4.3.0.12_aarch64
– hotfixes … https://releases.jolla.com/releases/4.3.0.12/hotfixes/aarch64/
Hotfixes used to be in the disabled repositories. It is a relic from the past that has been removed from the recent OS releases. It can still appear on phones flashed a long time ago. It is unnecessary and useless.
We do not know what Mentaljam is.

Missing from the Global section are:
– oss repository
– non-oss repository
The two repositories above cover the vast majority of the Sailfish code packages! Without them, OS updates are doomed to go wrong if not totally fail.

WHAT TO DO NOW

We have just this advice for you at this point:

Install/flash OS release 4.3.0.12 to your phone.

There is no other way to fix the phone. This help article may be of help when flashing the phone: https://jolla.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360002304714

We are closing this ticket now as there is no other help we could possibly give to you.

Best of luck!

[1]
Enabled repositories (global):

Enabled repositories (user):

Disabled repositories (global, might be overridden by user config):

Disabled repositories (user):

Sincerely,
Jolla Customer Care

Operating hours: Monday to Friday from 9.00 to 16.30 (EET); closed on weekends and public holidays (Finland)*.

Our service is based on Zendesk tool, i.e. on written communication - we do not have any phone service.

Join the Movement @ https://www.jolla.com
Like us on Facebook @ Jolla
Follow on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/jollaHQ
Dive deeper into the Jolla world @ https://blog.jolla.com - check the news on Sailfish 4
Interested in Sailfish X, i.e. Sailfish OS for Sony Xperia X, XA2, and Xperia 10. Read more @ https://shop.jolla.com/.
Keeping your Sailfish device in good shape

nshiell:

December 14, 2021 16:11
Hi thanks for the reply
So it seems that after I installed Sailfish as per the link https://jolla.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360002304714 and Installing Sailfish X on XA2 using Linux - Jolla it didn’t include the repositories needed?

Can you confirm that the repositories specified in the XA2 image (4.3) are all there?

This was broken after a clean install - although I have since instaled Storeman for adding in the OKBoard keyboard and Pure Maps.

I don’t think this issue can be closed as I have not altered the repositories!

Jolla Care:

December 15, 2021 06:07
Hi,

So it seems that after I installed Sailfish as per the link https://jolla.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360002304714 and Installing Sailfish X on XA2 using Linux - Jolla it didn’t include the repositories needed?

Installing Sailfish OS with these instructions does not bring the repository deviations to the phone, listed in the previous message. Something has been done after the installation was complete.

Can you confirm that the repositories specified in the XA2 image (4.3) are all there?

See [1] for the expected repository setup, copied from a just-reflashed XA2.

This was broken after a clean install - although I have since instaled Storeman for adding in the OKBoard keyboard and Pure Maps.

This was not broken by the Sailfish install but by what was done afterwards.

I don’t think this issue can be closed as I have not altered the repositories!

At least, the repositories have been indirectly altered. After flashing Sailfish 4.3.0.12 to an XA2, the repositories are those listed in [1].

We do not know what has been done to your phone.
What you should do next is to reinstall Sailfish 4.3.0.12. This would correct the repositories and everything else. Check them with “ssu lr” just after the install is over, please.

If you must install something from OpenRepos (or elsewhere) please check “ssu lr” every now and then. All changes should go to the User section of the repository listing while the Global section must remain unchanged.

[1]

[defaultuser@XperiaXA2-DualSIM ~]$ ssu lr
WARNING: ssu.ini does not seem to be writable. Setting values might not work.
Enabled repositories (global):

Enabled repositories (user):

Disabled repositories (global, might be overridden by user config):

Disabled repositories (user):

Sincerely,
Jolla Customer Care

Operating hours: Monday to Friday from 9.00 to 16.30 (EET); closed on weekends and public holidays (Finland)*.

Our service is based on Zendesk tool, i.e. on written communication - we do not have any phone service.

Join the Movement @ https://www.jolla.com
Like us on Facebook @ Jolla
Follow on Twitter @ https://twitter.com/jollaHQ
Dive deeper into the Jolla world @ https://blog.jolla.com - check the news on Sailfish 4
Interested in Sailfish X, i.e. Sailfish OS for Sony Xperia X, XA2, and Xperia 10. Read more @ https://shop.jolla.com/.
Keeping your Sailfish device in good shape

#2

If your connection issue occurs when you move between a mobile data connection and a wifi connection or vice versa, and is particularly affecting Android apps (although it often affects native apps as well, for me it is mainly email synchronisation issues to to connection problems) then it is a very well known and widely reported bug in Sailfish that has been present in 4.3 and many earlier releases. There is no fix available but various workarounds do work - these vary from rebooting the phone to using Sailfish utilities in Settings to restart the network sub-system. There are other command line workarounds as well, if you’re into that type of thing - which I’m sure others will jump in and advise on - but I believe they all still just restart the network sub- system to get the connection back. Its a huge frustration for many who get this bug, but in the absence of a fix from Jolla there’s not much else we can do.

#3

Hi @Steve_Everett, thanks for your response - I am aware of that bug too!
The bug above isn’t that

#4

While I understand your frustration, and Jolla massively contributes to the overall situation (lack of quality assurance for SailfishOS releases, unattractive Jolla Store for developers drives users to OpenRepos / SailfishOS:Chum, known flaws in SailfishOS are not fixed for years etc.), the answers provided by Jolla’s support are technically mostly correct:

  1. The feature How to interpret “Uninstall the following …” in the SailfishOS-updater? does not work as intended since its inception and does more harm than good, see the many analog messages, e.g. just for 4.3.0: Packages need to be deleted in order to update to 4.3, Upgrading to 4.3: How/why to remove the “ofono-alien-binder-plugin” …, Problems with installing the OS update 4.3.0 - #14 by sanginteret, [Release notes] Suomenlinna 4.3.0 - #284 by NodaUK etc.
    Jolla’s way to handle that has been the usual one: Do nothing … for years.
    The general advice is to ignore this message, meanwhile also provided by “sailors” (i.e., Jolla employees).
  2. Yes, it was really you adding the three repositories by installing three pieces of software!
  3. That “mentaljam-obs … Index of /obs/home:/mentaljam/4.3.0.12_armv7hl” ended up in the global repository section (instead of the user one) might be something you want to report to @mentaljam at https://github.com/mentaljam/harbour-storeman-installer/issues
  4. Some things are denoted inconsistently (¿by Jolla’s support?):

I wondered more than once how people manage to fundamentally mess up their repository configuration, as described here and which I have seen before.
Mind that you are an administrator of a Unix computer by using SailfishOS, thus take this job responsibly. If you feel that you are not capable of doing that properly, SailfishOS is likely not the right mobile OS for you.

5 Likes
#5

I’m really sorry it’s not been possible to get this resolved yet. @Steve_Everett and @olf have already made useful points. I’d add that the repository issue may be unrelated to the connection issue. What Jolla support were (I think) trying to emphasise is that you really must get the repositories set up correctly, otherwise you’re likely to hit more trouble in the future.

My advice would be to flash the phone again. Immediately collect the logs as you did before to check the repos are all correctly configured. After that, avoid installing additional software* and test the connection again over a period of time.

If you still experience the issue after that, then Jolla Support will be in a much better position to help.

Even if you prefer to resolve this on the forum rather than through Jolla Support, I’d recommend reflashing your phone anyway, as if your repos are messed up, all sorts of bad things may happen in the future.

* Installing software from the Jolla Store should be fine, it’s installing software from outside the store that tends to cause repo issues.

1 Like
#6

Whilst I agree that installing SFOS software from the Jolla store will be safer, the problems with only using this approach is that (a) there are minimal ‘official’ Jolla provided apps covering a very narrow range of functionality areas, (b) a lot of the community apps there are old, unmaintained and in a lot of cases don’t even work anymore, and (c) a lot of the community developers who are filling the ‘app gap’ with the apps that users of SFOS phones need to make them viable everyday phones prefer to use either Openrepos or Chum, and not the Jolla store.

Whilst I believe that latter decision in some cases is driven by the fact that some community developers ‘cheat’ and use non-official stuff to make their apps work, and that is not allowed for apps in the official store, this seems to be a bit of a self defeating restriction if users just go to one of the unofficial community stores to get those must have apps anyway.

Ok, so it may allow Jolla to say ‘Not my fault mate’ when a user goes to an unofficial store to get their apps and this then causes a problem, but if this is the only place in the world that users can get needed Sailfish apps for their phones …

So, at some point this really does need to be looked at - having a pretty much ‘statically dead’ official app store for Sailfish does Jolla no favours - and it really should be the single, reliable, inviting ‘go to’ place for Sailfish apps. Especially for non technical users and others who just want a no worries click and install.

3 Likes
#7

We should try to avoid getting sidetracked away from solving @nshiell’s problem. To clarify, I was only suggesting he should avoid installing apps from outside the Jolla Store while he/we/Jolla Support help address the repo and connection issues he’s experiencing. Otherwise the two problems are likely to get conflated.

Also, I can see that my comment might look like I’m saying that installing apps from outside the official Store is likely to mess up your repositories. That’s not what I meant (my mistake). I only meant that installing apps from the Jolla Store is very unlikely to.

1 Like
#8

My post wasn’t meant to sidetrack the issue at hand, but more to point out a ‘cause and effect’ chain that had resulted in at least part of @nshiell 's problem. As @olf pointed out above, it was the installation of problematic repositories that seem to have caused at least some of the issues.

But that is pretty much the first thing nearly everybody does after installing Sailfish - go to whatever app store they need to obtain the apps they need to make their Sailfish phone usable for what they need it to do - and if it is a community app store then that involves the use of unofficial repositories which can then cause problems - yes? I would imagine very few people use Sailfish purely in its Jolla released/installed form only with no additional apps whatsoever.

So by solving the Jolla app store issues, by making it the first ‘go-to’ place to obtain the up-to-date, maintained, reliable apps that the are popular with the vast majority of users, rather than multiple community app stores which often cause these compatibility issues, doesn’t this at least solve some of the problem?

1 Like
Minimising the need for users to install custom repos
#9

@nshiell: we’ve discussed this internally with both our Customer Care and developer teams. They think this may be an issue related to changes introduced in 4.3.0 to fix dual IPv4 and IPv6 usage on mobile networks. Unfortunately this caused unexpected issues with some mobile operators.

If this is the same issue, then the temporary workaround is to disable DUAL mode in the settings:

Settings → Mobile network → Data access point → Protocol

Set it to either IP or IPv6. Would you mind please giving this a go to see if it fixes things?

If it is this, then there will also be a permanent fix for it in the next release. I’m sorry that you weren’t given this info earlier. It looks like there may have been a crossover between you requesting help and the fix being worked on. Unfortunately this can be difficult to avoid.

3 Likes
#10

Hi all, thank you for your responses to my problem.
To @olf I do agree that the OpenRepos situation is a little unsettling, I don’t like the idea of mucking about with the operating system’s software repository fetch locations either.
I only installed OpenRepos as the normal software store seems to be a bit stale, broken apps are not being pruned.
I don’t mind tinkering with a Linux server or my desktop, but being at a party or pub and having to fire up a TTy isn’t appropriate, Jolla need to keep in mind that the OS needs to be user focused, it’s not an old GNOME desktop.

@flypig I just made the change you said and it might have solved the issue, I will need to spend some more time seeing if it has fixed the issue or not.
As mentioned above the operator is UK EE - I think they are the largest operator here.

#11

Understood. In due course please do tell us what you find as it will be useful to know for the future.

Not everyone tells us which operator they’re using, so unfortunately I can’t say whether it’s been experienced by others on EE (I’m on Three UK myself but haven’t experienced it). Thanks for making it clear as it’s also helpful to know for the future.

1 Like
#12

Ok, so I am on EE in the UK and upgrading to 4.3 definitely screwed up my internet connection, but obviously only when the phone was trying to connect to the internet via EE mobile data; wifi connectivity at home, in the office, etc was fine. Setting Dual to IP fixed the mobile data problem. My problem manifested itself as a never ending loop, whick you could see in the settings app of connecting, connected, immediate disconnection, connecting … And so on.

#13

@Steve_Everett do you have the issue: SailfishOS update to 4.3.0.12 unstable Internet - YouTube ?
Has changing the IP address setting @flypig desctibed fixed your issue?
What device are you using?

#14

Yes, yes, XA2 on 4.3.

#15

So after a few days of usage, making that IP setting change seems to have fixed the issue in the video link.
There are a few other issues, such as Android apps not connecting to the internet, random vibrations, phone OS crashes that I didn’t see on earlier versions though.

#16

Great, I’m happy to hear your connection’s now working correctly, and thanks for coming back to report on it.

It sounds like the Android app connectivity issue you’re experiencing is one of the known issues with 4.3.0 (there’s some advice behind this link).

Random vibrations is new to me and I don’t see discussion about it on the forum. Similarly
for the random crashes; you shouldn’t be experiencing those. If they continue, I’d recommend posting a bug report separately (if we continue the discussion here, it’s liable to get lost in the earlier discussion).

#17

Random vibrations could be because of some (android) app pushing and retracting notifications. I have this issue with Signal (android), trying to tell me it it connecting, but then connects and removes the notification.

#18

Unfortunately limiting mobile network to IPv4 only doesn’t improve the situation on my XA2+.
On the Wifi settings I cannot limit configuration to IPv4 only, so that switch from Wifi/Dual Stack to mobile/IPv4 may confuse AlienDalvik, however I haven’t investgated on that.