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   JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:40 JST JavAlps

   So, I'm facing a weird issue with my #fedora workstation. The filesystem goes "read-only" at random times and I dont know why. I've do a reboot to fix it. Do you have any idea about this and how to fix it ?

   #linux #fedora #Fedora42 #gnome #mastodon #fediverse #btrfs

   • Embed this notice
     Rich Felker (dalias@hachyderm.io)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:32 JST Rich Felker

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • Lutz G.
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @tokyo_0 @javalps @abhijith @fossunleashed @llutz @zenbrowser Most likely there's a file that has subtly corrupt data structures in the browser profile directory. Accessing it trips kernel to throw read only switch.

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     Tokyo Outsider (337ppm) (tokyo_0@mas.to)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:33 JST Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)

     in reply to

     • Lutz G.
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @javalps Wow, that's crazy. I'm really glad you found what's triggering the problem, and that it wasn't a drive failure. Seems odd that a piece of software would be able to do that to your filesystem — maybe it's calling some function in the operating system that has a problem and isn't used much by other software 🤔 It might be worth flagging it with Fedora as an issue, too (not sure how you'd do that, but there must be a way). @abhijith @fossunleashed @llutz @zenbrowser

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     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:34 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • Lutz G.
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed @llutz @zenbrowser (4/5)

     But, the moment I opened Zen Browser suddenly the filesystem went read-only. Coincidence, I think not. This also happened when I was offline. I opened Zen it showed me the webpage, all good. I reloaded it, it showed me the classic thing "something unexpected happened". All good. But when I closed the #browser, suddenly the FS went read-only.

     #ZenBrowser #linux #fedora #fedora42 #gnome #mastodon #fediverse #btrfs

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     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:34 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • Lutz G.
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed @llutz @zenbrowser (5/5)

     It can't be a fluke right if it happened twice.

     #ZenBrowser #linux #fedora #fedora42 #gnome #mastodon #fediverse #btrfs

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     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:35 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith

     @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed So its not the nvme ?

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     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:35 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • Lutz G.
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed
     @llutz (1/5)

     I now think that I can pinpoint the problem of the filesystem going read-only and it's (probably) neither the FS itself nor the nvme drive. And definitely not the RAM.

     The problem is a single app that's causing this or that's what I found and its the @zenbrowser browser.

     #ZenBrowser #linux #fedora #fedora42 #gnome #mastodon #fediverse #btrfs

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     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:35 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • Lutz G.
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed @llutz @zenbrowser (2/5)

     So, today morning I opened the laptop with #wifi turned off and checked the system. It was going alright. The filesystem was behaving normally like it should. I also double-checked it using `mount | grep "btrfs"` and `fastfetch`. To check the nvme drive, I used `sudo smartctl --xall /dev/nvme0n1p3` + the diagnostics tool in the bios menu.

     #ZenBrowser #linux #fedora #fedora42 #gnome #mastodon #fediverse #btrfs

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     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:35 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • Lutz G.
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed @llutz @zenbrowser (3/5)

     To check the memory I used `sudo memtester 1024 5`. And EVERYTHING was fine. Even when I turned on the #wifi nothing changed. I opened the #gnomesoftware app, I also opened #firefox to browse #youtube and log in to this instance. Everything was fine.

     #ZenBrowser #linux #fedora #fedora42 #gnome #mastodon #btrfs #fediverse

   • Embed this notice
     Tokyo Outsider (337ppm) (tokyo_0@mas.to)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:36 JST Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)

     in reply to

     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith

     @javalps @abhijith @fossunleashed ... quite clearly indicated. Nothing you've written here in the SMART test output screams disk failure to me (the test would fail rather than pass, for starters). I'm not a disk expert, though. You could try the extended test but some hard drives abort them... western digital I think.

     In short, I've never had a failing disk look in SMART like there's nothing wrong with it — with the symptoms you're describing a SMART failure should be obvious.

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     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:37 JST JavAlps

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     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith

     @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed

     (2/2)
     Data Units Read: 5,746,241 [2.94 TB]
     Data Units Written: 9,246,806 [4.73 TB]
     Host Read Commands: 86,356,172
     Host Write Commands: 202,068,936
     Controller Busy Time:412
     Power Cycles:422
     Power On Hours: 2,470
     Unsafe Shutdowns:8
     Media and Data Integrity Errors: 0
     Error Information Log Entries: 1
     Warning Comp. Temperature Time: 0
     Critical Comp. Temperature Time: 0
     Temperature Sensor 1: 37 Celsius

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     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:37 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith

     @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed Just want to get the confirmation, after this do I need to do the BIOS one ? Or is it enough ?

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     Tokyo Outsider (337ppm) (tokyo_0@mas.to)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:37 JST Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)

     in reply to

     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith

     @javalps @abhijith @fossunleashed It sounds like you've done the test so you don't need to do it through the BIOS as well (it would be the same). With SMART you can do a short test or an extended test. There's also data you can pull from the drive (like the number of times it has ever failed reads in its lifetime, stuff like that). When I had a problem like this recently I ended up using a GUI tool that highlighted the problems, and before that when I used a BIOS test myself the failure was...

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     Tokyo Outsider (337ppm) (tokyo_0@mas.to)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:38 JST Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)

     in reply to

     @javalps If the BIOS doesn't have it you could try installing smartmontools or similar (while the disk is working) and try to run them. I think you can run them off a USB too if needed.

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     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:38 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith

     @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed

     So I used this command to get the SMART info about the drive -> `sudo smartctl -a /dev/nvme0n1p3`.

     (1/2)
     === START OF SMART DATA SECTION ===
     SMART overall-health self-assessment test result: PASSED

     SMART/Health Information (NVMe Log 0x02, NSID 0xffffffff)
     Critical Warning: 0x00
     Temperature: 37 Celsius
     Available Spare: 100%
     Available Spare Threshold: 50%
     Percentage Used: 1%

   • Embed this notice
     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:39 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)

     @tokyo_0 Can you guide me on that ? I've never done that before.

   • Embed this notice
     Tokyo Outsider (337ppm) (tokyo_0@mas.to)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:39 JST Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)

     in reply to

     @javalps See if you can check online which keypress will open up the BIOS menu on your workstation (it's different by manufacturer — sometimes a notice is shown during boot telling you which key to press, but it's best to check to be sure). Once you reboot the machine and use the keypress to get into the BIOS menu, you'll be able to navigate the options (via the keyboard). The exact menu structure varies. Look for something to do with disks or devices, or SMART in particular.

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     Tokyo Outsider (337ppm) (tokyo_0@mas.to)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 13:35:40 JST Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)

     in reply to

     @javalps Can you run a SMART test on your disk from the BIOS?

   • Embed this notice
     Rich Felker (dalias@hachyderm.io)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 19:46:46 JST Rich Felker

     in reply to

     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • Lutz G.
     • nen
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @javalps @nen @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed @llutz @zenbrowser It goes read only upon accessing one of the files in the profile dir.

     BTW if you don't want to deal with the problems of using an experimental wacky filesystem, use something normal & stable like ext4 if you reinstall.

   • Embed this notice
     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 19:46:47 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Rich Felker
     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • Lutz G.
     • nen
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @nen @dalias @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed @llutz @zenbrowser The FS goes read-only, only when I open #ZenBrowser. I'm also looking forward to reinstall #fedora once I get my hand on an external HDD or SSD for backup.

     #linux

   • Embed this notice
     nen (nen@mementomori.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 19:46:48 JST nen

     in reply to

     • Rich Felker
     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • Lutz G.
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @javalps @dalias @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed @llutz @zenbrowser Your logs say the filesystem is corrupted. It can't be a browser bug. Backup all important data as soon as possible and do a clean Fedora reinstall.

     It's possible corruption was caused by some kind of physical failure even if it doesn't show up in SMART reports. You can run `btrfs scrub start /` and `btrfs scrub status /` frequently to monitor data integrity in the future (and keep important backups constantly up-to-date!). Or add another drive to your (new) btrfs filesystem and set up RAID1, if you can. It can automatically repair corrupted data using healthy copies on the other drive so you'd be less likely to lose data in case your current drive fails. If the drive is encrypted, using DUP profile on a single drive instead of RAID1 on two might also protect from some minor failures (encryption should prevent the hardware from detecting and deduplicating identical data).

   • Embed this notice
     JavAlps (javalps@mastodon.social)'s status on Saturday, 17-May-2025 19:46:49 JST JavAlps

     in reply to

     • Rich Felker
     • Tokyo Outsider (337ppm)
     • Lutz G.
     • FOSS Unleashed
     • abhijith
     • Zen

     @dalias @tokyo_0 @abhijith @fossunleashed @llutz @zenbrowser Should I file a github issue ?