How to undo completely GUI domain?

User Support General
1

Hi,

On 4.2.4 (still), I have been retrying without success the procedure described in:

The part ‘Reverting sys-gui’ however seems incomplete to me because even after it, and after manually deleting /etc/qubes/policy.d/50-gui-sys-gui*, I still see quite a few remnants:

# grep -r sys-gui /etc
...
/etc/lvm/archive/qubes_dom0_252268-650472166.vg:		vm-sys-gui-gpu-private {
/etc/lvm/archive/qubes_dom0_252268-650472166.vg:				origin = "vm-sys-gui-gpu-private-1766930309-back"
# Many like the above lines
...
/etc/qubes/input-proxy-target:TARGET_DOMAIN=sys-gui-gpu
/etc/qubes/policy.d/include/admin-global-rwx:sys-gui @adminvm allow target=dom0
/etc/qubes/policy.d/include/admin-global-rwx:sys-gui @tag:guivm-sys-gui allow target=dom0
/etc/qubes/policy.d/include/admin-global-rwx:sys-gui sys-gui allow target=dom0
/etc/qubes/policy.d/include/admin-global-rwx:sys-gui-gpu @adminvm allow target=dom0
/etc/qubes/policy.d/include/admin-global-rwx:sys-gui-gpu @tag:guivm-sys-gui-gpu allow target=dom0
/etc/qubes/policy.d/include/admin-global-rwx:sys-gui-gpu sys-gui-gpu allow target=dom0
/etc/qubes/policy.d/include/admin-local-rwx:sys-gui @tag:guivm-sys-gui allow target=dom0
/etc/qubes/policy.d/include/admin-local-rwx:sys-gui sys-gui allow target=dom0
/etc/qubes/policy.d/include/admin-local-rwx:sys-gui-gpu @tag:guivm-sys-gui-gpu allow target=dom0
/etc/qubes/policy.d/include/admin-local-rwx:sys-gui-gpu sys-gui-gpu allow target=dom0
/etc/qubes/policy.d/30-qubesctl-salt.policy:qubes.Filecopy * disp-mgmt-sys-gui-gpu sys-gui-gpu allow user=root
/etc/qubes/policy.d/30-qubesctl-salt.policy:qubes.VMShell * disp-mgmt-sys-gui-gpu sys-gui-gpu allow user=root
/etc/qubes/policy.d/30-qubesctl-salt.policy:qubes.VMRootShell * disp-mgmt-sys-gui-gpu sys-gui-gpu allow user=root

Looking e.g. at the content of 30-qubesctl-salt.policy, I see initial warning that the file must not be edited manually. Strangely, there are way too many lines mentioning qubes that don’t even exist (sys-gui-gui only one of them). Etc.

So, is there a more up-to-date correct and complete cleanup procedure?

2

“Reinstall” is the solution that worked for me.
Good backup of the relevant parts of the Qubes install, and reinstall, to be precise.

3

@barto

Sure, that’s possible but it is not an undo :slight_smile:

4

sys-gui-gpu didn’t work for me either and had to do a fresh install.

It seems to me that to revert all those changes made by the salt scripts, you’ll have to go through the .sls files at /srv/formulas/base/qubes/.
You should be able to see which qubes were created, which features were set, and which configuration files were modified.

It’s easier for me to just re-install and not waste a day trying to fix everything.

5

Just for information, were there problems of things not working when using a “standard” Dom0 guivm, after following the removal instructions?

…or is it more a problem of residual cruft, referencing deleted gui qubes? (which isn’t desirable, but would only cause problems if the qube name(s) get used again)

6

If that question was to me, the answer is I don’t know. I haven’t tried it myself. It’s just a suggestion that makes sense to me. I hope it helps.

1 Like
7

Thanks @Privacc . Did you only do “fresh install” because it was easy, and not because Dom0 gui got broken?

I was asking anyone who tried it, because I did not remember seeing any problems after removing the guivm (sys-gui, not sys-gui-gpu)… but it was not recently.

8

I had to reinstall because after setting up sys-gui-gpu, the desktop was crashing on startup.
I troubleshooted for several hours unsuccessfully, and then reinstalled.

2 Likes
9

That is helpful to know. Thank you!

10

@phceac

Just for information, were there problems of things not working when using a standard Dom0 guivm, after following the removal instructions?

None for me, at least nothing visible, except the annoying reminder that I must update the Fedora template of the GUIVM.

…or is it more a problem of residual cruft, referencing deleted gui qubes? (which isn’t desirable, but would only cause problems if the qube name(s) get used again)

This.

1 Like