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Ubuntu headless install not working
I'm trying to do the Linux headless install as described at https://www.dropbox.com/install on an Ubuntu 16.04 workstation. It works until I get to the point in the instructions that say "If you're...
Assuming that this is not caused by an antivirus, firewall or VPN/proxy setting on this specific machine, I'll need to ask: have you downloaded the Python script from that page as well tn3?
If possible, could you change your default browser and try again too?
PS: For a list of all the system requirements take a look below:
https://www.dropbox.com/help/desktop-web/system-requirements
Submitted this yesterday but it was rejected because of an 'HTML error' which has been removed. Something in this must be seen as HTLM and so missing when you get it.
The reason Dropbox cannot open the default web browser is that there isn't one. It's a headless server accessed via an xterm over ssh. I'm not running on a GUI session, just an xterm shell session on the remote server displaying back to my Ubuntu laptop. Dropbox may 'think' I'm using a GUI session, but I'm not. Trying the 'dropbox start -i' you suggested gives me:
david@ivdweb:/home/bitnami$ dropbox start -i
Starting Dropbox...dropbox: locating interpreter
dropbox: logging to /tmp/dropbox-antifreeze-WYMNgP
dropbox: initializing
dropbox: initializing python 3.7.5
dropbox: setting program path '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/dropbox'
dropbox: setting python path '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273:/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/python-packages.zip'
dropbox: python initialized
dropbox: running dropbox
dropbox: setting args
dropbox: applying overrides
dropbox: running main script
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._constant_time.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._openssl.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._padding.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/psutil._psutil_linux.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/psutil._psutil_posix.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/apex._apex.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/tornado.speedups.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtCore.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtGui.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtNetwork.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtWidgets.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
Dropbox isn't running!
Done!
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtDBus.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
david@ivdweb:/home/bitnami$
I have a personal paid-for account.:
David Ledger | September 13, 2019 9:47 AM GMT | Y5XP5338FHL4 |
| PayPal Payment | 13/9/2019 | £95.88 | DRQTYJZTFLW4
|
I ran out of hosts last year and had to start a paid account. I share across three Macs, one Ubuntu, one iPad and one Android phone. I am running genealogy s/w on this AWS host but rsearch from the laptop. I want to be able to easily move downloaded images into the Media area of the genealogy s/w, which can be under a Dropbox directory.
I still don't understand how software running on an AWS server knows what link to generate for me to use on a laptop at home to allow connection to the Dropbox server. All it has to go on is possibly the IP address of the ssh login and the fact that that IP is used to access that Dropbox account.
I don't have a 'browser window representing the remote display'. It's just an xterm window on the laptop desktop. So no status icon.
Thanks for persevering with this.
David
Hi DavidLedger,
DavidLedger wrote:Submitted this yesterday but it was rejected because of an 'HTML error' which has been removed. Something in this must be seen as HTLM and so missing when you get it.
Yes, that's something usual. Sometimes seen as a HTML, sometimes seen as a Spam - one of the forum bugs.
DavidLedger wrote:
...The reason Dropbox cannot open the default web browser is that there isn't one. It's a headless server accessed via an xterm over ssh. I'm not running on a GUI session, just an xterm shell session on the remote server displaying back to my Ubuntu laptop. Dropbox may 'think' I'm using a GUI session, but I'm not. ...
Ok... If you say so. My comments are based on your description, nothing more. Just one clarification here: even headless server can have installed web browser and could participate in GUI session! Be careful, don't make conclusion: because my server is headless, then GUI isn't possible; that's not true, X-session could be remote - i.e. your AWS session could use your local X-server (real or emulated)! Of course, I don't state it's so. To make clearer, what the session type is, post the result from:
lsb_release -d; echo "Shell: $SHELL"; echo "Display: $DISPLAY"; echo "User: $USER"; echo "Home: $HOME"; echo "Installed: $(dpkg -s dropbox | grep Package)"; ps -C dropbox
DavidLedger wrote:... Trying the 'dropbox start -i' you suggested gives me:
david@ivdweb:/home/bitnami$ dropbox start -i
Starting Dropbox...dropbox: locating interpreter
dropbox: logging to /tmp/dropbox-antifreeze-WYMNgP
...
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtWidgets.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
Dropbox isn't running!
Done!
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtDBus.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'david@ivdweb:/home/bitnami$
....
That's exactly what has to be! From that moment on, your Dropbox is running. Don't be confused from: "Dropbox isn't running!"; that means it's not running to that moment. The next "Done!" shows everything is Ok. 🙂
About your plan - seems I misunderstood "one false start because URL suggestion replaced with previous version". Anyway... doesn't matter.
About "how software running on an AWS server knows what link to generate for me"... I don't know what else can say. You can take a look, for some more info, here or if you want to know more in deep, take a look here.
The Dropbox folder on the remote server hasn't updated since 21st March even though six items were knowingly added on the 23rd and one today. 'dropbox status' still says it isn't running, and the process shown in .dropbox/dropbox.pid doesn't exist.
There is no conventional browser installed on the server, just wget and curl, and the dropbox app itself in that it makes HTTP calls to the Dropbox servers (according to that OAuth page). AWS Linux servers are just virtual machines with a base Linux installation. If you want a browser you have to install one, and I haven't.
My point about the authentication/authorisation is that I haven't claimed to be anybody on the server.
Thanks again
David
Ok, the clarifications, you just made, are important. You haven't mentioned anything about the commands result. I gonna expand them little-bit:
dropbox start lsb_release -d; echo "Shell: $SHELL"; echo "Display: $DISPLAY"; echo "User: $USER"; echo "Home: $HOME"; echo "Installed: $(dpkg -s dropbox | grep Package)"; cat ~/.dropbox/dropbox.pid; echo; ps -C dropbox; dropbox status; dropbox filestatus ~/Dropbox
Execute the two lines in sequence. What is the result?
david@ivdweb:18$: lsb_release -d; echo "Shell: $SHELL"; echo "Display: $DISPLAY"; echo "User: $USER"; echo "Home: $HOME"; echo "Installed: $(dpkg -s dropbox | grep Package)"; ps -C dropbox
Description: Ubuntu 16.04.6 LTS
Shell: /bin/bash
Display: localhost:10.0
User: david
Home: /home/david
Installed: Package: dropbox
PID TTY TIME CMD
david@ivdweb:19$:I might get confused again. Where you launch that on? Again we are talking for AWS, not your local machine. Am I right? What's the result from my "expanded" variant (launched on the AWS!)?
Created shell script on the AWS server, while connected to it from an xterm on the Ubuntu laptop via ssh.
david@ivdweb:11$: cat bin/droptest
#!/bin/bash
# @(#) test Dropbox on AWS Lightsail Linux
dropbox start
lsb_release -d; echo "Shell: $SHELL"; echo "Display: $DISPLAY"; echo "User: $USER"; echo "Home: $HOME"; echo "Installed: $(dpkg -s dropbox | grep Package)"; cat ~/.dropbox/dropbox.pid; echo; ps -C dropbox; dropbox status; dropbox filestatus ~/Dropbox
pid="$(cat .dropbox/dropbox.pid)"
while ps -fp $pid; do sleep 1; doneRan it on the AWS server, connected from an xterm on the Ubuntu laptop via ssh.
and got:
david@ivdweb:10$: droptest
Starting Dropbox...dropbox: locating interpreter
dropbox: logging to /tmp/dropbox-antifreeze-gTnSE0
dropbox: initializing
dropbox: initializing python 3.7.5
dropbox: setting program path '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/dropbox'
dropbox: setting python path '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273:/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/python-packages.zip'
dropbox: python initialized
dropbox: running dropbox
dropbox: setting args
dropbox: applying overrides
dropbox: running main script
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._constant_time.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._openssl.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/cryptography.hazmat.bindings._padding.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/psutil._psutil_linux.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/psutil._psutil_posix.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/apex._apex.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/tornado.speedups.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtCore.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtGui.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtNetwork.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtWidgets.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
Dropbox isn't running!
Done!
dropbox: load fq extension '/home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/PyQt5.QtDBus.cpython-37m-x86_64-linux-gnu.so'
Description: Ubuntu 16.04.6 LTS
Shell: /bin/bash
Display: localhost:10.0
User: david
Home: /home/david
Installed: Package: dropbox
30309
PID TTY TIME CMD
30309 ? 00:00:03 dropbox
Dropbox isn't running!Dropbox isn't running!
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 77 12:19 ? 00:00:03 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 61 12:19 ? 00:00:03 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 52 12:19 ? 00:00:03 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 47 12:19 ? 00:00:03 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 51 12:19 ? 00:00:04 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 56 12:19 ? 00:00:05 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 60 12:19 ? 00:00:06 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 55 12:19 ? 00:00:06 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 51 12:19 ? 00:00:06 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 53 12:19 ? 00:00:06 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 54 12:19 ? 00:00:07 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 56 12:19 ? 00:00:08 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 57 12:19 ? 00:00:09 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 55 12:19 ? 00:00:10 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 56 12:19 ? 00:00:10 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 47 12:19 ? 00:00:10 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 44 12:19 ? 00:00:11 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david 30309 1 41 12:19 ? 00:00:11 /home/bitnami/.dropbox-dist/dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273/
UID PID PPID C STIME TTY TIME CMD
david@ivdweb:11$:That's 18 x 1 second loops before the process dies. Sometimes more, sometimes less. The file entries added recently on the laptop have not arrived at the AWS server.
The only things that I have done on the local laptop are (i) visit the URL specified during the Dropbox install on the AWS server. (ii) start xterms and ssh into the AWS server. (iii) take part in this discussion.
Thanks,
David
Hi DavidLedger,
One last test, just to confirm my suspicions. 🙂 What is the result from:
ls -l1 ~/.dropbox-*
🤔
david@ivdweb:1$: ls -l1 ~/.dropbox-*
total 12
-rw-rw-r-- 1 david david 8 Mar 19 17:58 VERSION
drwxrwxr-x 6 david david 4096 Mar 19 17:58 dropbox-lnx.x86_64-93.4.273
-rwxr-xr-x 1 david david 101 Mar 19 17:58 dropboxd
david@ivdweb:2$:Waw... To be honest, that wasn't expected. I thought, you has made alias of your Dropbox install. Seems this isn't the case. The only possibility, I can think of, is home directory alias (error prone choice for setup). Let's try:
echo "Declared home: $HOME"; echo "Real home: $(readlink -e $HOME)"
What's the result? Are the two paths different?
david@ivdweb:5$: echo "Declared home: $HOME"; echo "Real home: $(readlink -e $HOME)"
Declared home: /home/david
Real home: /home/bitnami
david@ivdweb:6$:The HOME for david is a symlink to the system generated /home/bitnami to make some of the Lightsail setup easier. Wouldn't expect it to cause a problem. Been doing things like that for years - and I've been a Unix sysadmin since 1983. I would expect software to find $HOME once at startup and then just use the inode.
Do I assume Dropbox doesn't like this?
David
DavidLedger wrote:
... I would expect software to find $HOME once at startup and then just use the inode.Do I assume Dropbox doesn't like this?
...Don't make assumptions, which are not confirmed! As a sysadmin you have to know that! 😱 Seems you have known the problem in advance. I suppose you know what follows (as a sysadmin). 😜
Be more careful in future. Have a nice evening!
As a sysadmin with an understanding of system internals I'm surprised that it causes a problem. There's no reason why it should. Obviously I was aware of the link, but not that Dropbox would object. I'll flip the link and see if that fixes it.
Flipped the link, but still the same problem. This time 15 loops of the sleep script.
david@ivdweb:3$: echo "Declared home: $HOME"; echo "Real home: $(readlink -e $HOME)"
Declared home: /home/david
Real home: /home/david
david@ivdweb:4$:Would Dropbox have to be re-installed from scratch to complete the fix (assuming that was the problem)?
DavidLedger wrote:
...Would Dropbox have to be re-installed from scratch to complete the fix (assuming that was the problem)?
Could be? Or re-link, at least. Try. Using following, for example:
dropbox stop rm -rf ~/.dropbox dropbox start
If no joy, try following:
dropbox stop rm -rf ~/.dropbox ~/.dropbox-dist dropbox start -i
As a last resort, remove the Dropbox directory too.
Good luck.
