RPi4 After update to Umbrel 1.7.3 any change on SD card is flushed by any restart

On RPi4 after update to Umbrel 1.7.3 any change on SD card is flushed by the restart.

This is a problem for several reasons.

1. argonone software is wiped = no fan control and default is fan off

2. Linux links are wiped, and the root dir gets filled by kopia logs soon (the link is a workaround for a too-small root)

3. Any additional packages i.e. crontab, python needed for fan control are wiped every time!

All this was working well before, and such a drastic change in Umbrel OS behaviour is frustrating and should be on the top list of release notes.

I will rollback and stay on the obsolete and vulnerable version until I find a solution for my node.

I know this is not what you want to read, but this is in the notes for all updates. Make sure you keep good notes of all OS changes. It’s painful, I know.

Thank you @stinger32. I think you are missing my point. I have very detailed notes of all adjustments done by me, but it’s not feasible to script that and execute after each node restart. I am not complaining that the upgrade wipes them; I am complaining that every restart wipes everything. If that’s not a bug and it is how Umbrel now works, I can’t work with Umbrel OS.

IC, I missed the mark. That is unusual for it to happen every time you restart.

I did some reading. I think if you SSH in and make changes, they do not persist. As you experienced, the changes reset when restarting. Try the Umbrel terminal through the web Interface. I feel this should work. Maybe I still have it wrong. Let me know.

Yes, you got it right, I am making changes via SSH as the umbrel user, and these are not persistent in version 1.7.3 of Umbrel OS,when you restart the node. In the previous version 1.5, everything I did was persistent, so it looks to me like either the system files are replaced each start, or all the changes I make are not written to the SD card and are only in memory in v 1.7.3. As this “production” node is my private bank, I couldn’t dig or troubleshoot further and rolled back to v 1.5 immediately. I wish I had a spare non-prod RPi4 to play with that, but I don’t have one. The v1.5 is based on Trixie Debian, so I can easily patch via apt and stay on this version for some time. However, that means I would need to replace Umbrel OS with another OS in the future. That would be a pity, as I have been using Umbrel for years, since v0.5 to v1.5; it is great for my use case, and I like the app store and community.

the following command will disable the readonly state

sudo rugix-ctrl state overlay force-persist true

Awesome, this is exactly what I needed. I will make this a part of the upgrade procedure. Many thanks @xrulescu !