cpio failing during update

[Suvayu Ali]

Hello again,

On Mon, Feb 09, 2015 at 10:57:36AM +0100, Suvayu Ali wrote:
> 
> While updating today, cpio failed on me randomly, twice!  I see errors
> like this:
> 
> Scriptlet output:
>    1 error: unpacking of archive failed on file /usr/share/doc/ffmpeg/COPYING.LGPLv3;54d881f2: cpio: open
>    2 error: ffmpeg-2.4.6-2.fc21.x86_64: install failed
> 
> Scriptlet output:
>    1 error: unpacking of archive failed on file /usr/src/kernels/3.18.5-201.fc21.x86_64/arch/arm/mach-mv78xx0/Kconfig;54d8814e: cpio: open
>    2 error: kernel-devel-3.18.5-201.fc21.x86_64: install failed
> 
> When I tried updating those two packages again, they succeeded.  I am
> wondering if there is a problem that needs fixing, or is this just
> chance.

I'm seeing this more and more often.  Is something wrong with my system?
How do I debug this?  Increasing the verbosity of dnf does no good.
Here is a sample output:

$ sudo dnf update xscreensaver\*
Dependencies resolved.
===================================================================================================================================
 Package                               Arch                     Version                            Repository                 Size
===================================================================================================================================
Upgrading:
 xscreensaver-base                     x86_64                   1:5.32-7.fc21                      updates                   424 k
 xscreensaver-extras                   x86_64                   1:5.32-7.fc21                      updates                   1.7 M

Transaction Summary
===================================================================================================================================
Upgrade  2 Packages

Total download size: 2.1 M
Is this ok [y/N]: y
Downloading Packages:
(1/2): xscreensaver-base-5.32-7.fc21.x86_64.rpm                                                 12 MB/s | 424 kB     00:00
(2/2): xscreensaver-extras-5.32-7.fc21.x86_64.rpm                                               30 MB/s | 1.7 MB     00:00
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total                                                                                          1.2 MB/s | 2.1 MB     00:01
Running transaction check
Transaction check succeeded.
Running transaction test
Transaction test succeeded.
Running transaction
  Upgrading   : xscreensaver-base-1:5.32-7.fc21.x86_64                                                                        1/4
Error unpacking rpm package xscreensaver-base-1:5.32-7.fc21.x86_64
error: unpacking of archive failed on file /usr/share/locale/de/LC_MESSAGES/xscreensaver.mo;54e611cb: cpio: open
  Upgrading   : xscreensaver-extras-1:5.32-7.fc21.x86_64                                                                      2/4
Error unpacking rpm package xscreensaver-extras-1:5.32-7.fc21.x86_64
error: xscreensaver-base-1:5.32-7.fc21.x86_64: install failed
error: unpacking of archive failed on file /usr/libexec/xscreensaver/bsod;54e611cb: cpio: open
xscreensaver-base-1:5.32-7.fc21.x86_64 was supposed to be installed but is not!
  Verifying   : xscreensaver-base-1:5.32-7.fc21.x86_64                                                                        1/4
xscreensaver-extras-1:5.32-7.fc21.x86_64 was supposed to be installed but is not!
  Verifying   : xscreensaver-extras-1:5.32-7.fc21.x86_64                                                                      2/4
xscreensaver-base-1:5.32-4.fc21.x86_64 was supposed to be removed but is not!
  Verifying   : xscreensaver-base-1:5.32-4.fc21.x86_64                                                                        3/4
xscreensaver-extras-1:5.32-4.fc21.x86_64 was supposed to be removed but is not!
  Verifying   : xscreensaver-extras-1:5.32-4.fc21.x86_64                                                                      4/4

Upgraded:
  xscreensaver-base.x86_64 1:5.32-7.fc21                            xscreensaver-extras.x86_64 1:5.32-7.fc21

Complete!

I don't know why cpio is failing, but dnf should not be completing with
a success.  It even reports it successfully upgraded the packages!

Any thoughts?

-- 
Suvayu

Open source is the future. It sets us free.