Cant upgrade to WSL2 "bsdtar: Write error"

[mabdelfattah]

Describe the bug

PS C:\Users\username> wsl --set-version WLinux 2
Conversion in progress, this may take a few minutes...
For information on key differences with WSL 2 please visit https://aka.ms/wsl2
Exporting the distribution failed.
bsdtar: Write error

Basic Troubleshooting Checklist

• [x] I have searched Google for the error message.
• [x] I have checked official WSL troubleshooting documentation: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/wsl/troubleshooting#confirm-wsl-is-enabled.
• [x] I have searched the official Microsoft WSL issues page: https://github.com/Microsoft/WSL/issues.
• [x] I have searched the Pengwin issues page: https://github.com/WhitewaterFoundry/Pengwin/issues. [ ] I have reset Pengwin: Settings->Apps->Apps & features->Pengwin->Advanced Options->Reset. [ ] I have disabled and re-enabled WSL in Windows Features. [x] I have run Windows 10 updates and restarted.

*What other troubleshooting have you attempted? Made sure that WSL is not running, restarted multiple times and kept re-trying but failed.

Pengwin Version 1.2.7.0

Windows Build 10.0.18947 N/A Build 18947

[sirredbeard]

I have seen this too.

I found that resetting back to factory Pengwin, reducing the size of the installed application helps.

I wonder if this is a bug in the conversion process that affects installs over a certain size.

More investigation is needed and possible upstream bug report.

[mabdelfattah]

I found that resetting back to factory Pengwin, reducing the size of the installed application helps.

But resting back to factory Pengwin, will remove all installed apps, right? If so, I don't think this is an easy step for me now :) !

I wonder if this is a bug in the conversion process that affects installs over a certain size.

How can I get you my installation size?

[Biswa96]

Some questions:

• Did you see too much memory usage during conversion?
• Is the size of rootfs folder greater than 3-4 GB?
• Did you try to convert other distribution 1) form Windows store 2) from manually installed/imported?

[wkrea]

Hi @Biswa96

What do you think?

I just manually install Ubuntu 18.04

Windows Build

10.Pro N Build 18956.rs_prerelease 190803-1414

[wkrea]

Hi @mabdelfattah @Biswa96

Ok, now it's works like a Charm!!!

It's a messy procedure an d i donk know, but some tips from this post did the magic.

1. I disable all options from Windows security system
2. Install Arch WSL like this post
3. So, I decide reinstall my ubuntu manually, Again!!!
4. Final, only carry on two distros (Arch and Ubuntu), to WSL 2, as you can see in this picture ]()

Now, anyone can explain what is the charm?

[sirredbeard]

The fact we can reproduce this issue across multiple distros leads me to think it is an upstream issue.

Has anyone reported this upstream or something similar?

[mabdelfattah]

@sirredbeard any idea where can we "report this upstream"?

[sirredbeard]

I have submitted the issue upstream to the WSL team here https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/4394.

Lets try to land a hand there tracking this down as it affects all distros.

[Biswa96]

Has anyone got strace -ff output or event trace logs as provided here?

[sirredbeard]

@Biswa96 I was actually working on that last night for this issue and got distracted. Trying to make it consistently fail. Stand by.

[mabdelfattah]

I have just disabled Windows Security, re-tried and the command completed successfully this time but neither bash.exe nor Pengwin app work :(

[sirredbeard]

@mabdelfattah

Are you running on a build 18945 or higher? https://github.com/WhitewaterFoundry/Pengwin/issues/497

[mabdelfattah]

I'm running 18963, and it is working now (with some weird lagging) after I edited 00-pengwin.sh

[PSzczepanski1996]

Same here...

[sirredbeard]

@HoshiYamazaki Please subscribe to https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/4394 for more details on this.

[rsk25]

I had the same error, too. Since the error was related to 'bsdtar', my intuition was to do the following

1. open linux distro
2. sudo apt-get update
3. sudo apt-get install libarchive-tools I'm a linux novice, so I don't really know what 'libarchive-tools' does exactly, but it was the first thing that popped-up when I googled 'bsdtar'.

Currently, I'm running wsl2 without a problem (for now)

[sirredbeard]

@KaraxThePhaseSmith That's interesting. I don't think it's calling bsdtar in the distro, I think it's calling a bsdtar binary in the WSL layer. It might have worked then because this bug is sporadic at times. But I will pass it along.

[Dvbnhbq]

For those who is interested, disabling real-time protection of Windows Defender did the thing for me. Disgusting!

[twocs]

@KaraxThePhaseSmith That's interesting. I don't think it's calling bsdtar in the distro, I think it's calling a bsdtar binary in the WSL layer. It might have worked then because this bug is sporadic at times. But I will pass it along.

It worked for me.

In Windows:

PS C:\WINDOWS\system32> wsl --set-version Ubuntu 2
Conversion in progress, this may take a few minutes...
For information on key differences with WSL 2 please visit https://aka.ms/wsl2
Exporting the distribution failed.
bsdtar: Write error

open linux distro (Ubuntu)

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install libarchive-tools
close linux distro

In Windows (didn't even close Powershell in between):

PS C:\WINDOWS\system32> wsl --set-version Ubuntu 2
Conversion in progress, this may take a few minutes...
For information on key differences with WSL 2 please visit https://aka.ms/wsl2
Conversion complete.

[Mehdi13k8]

Hi Ryzen 5 3600X 4.10ghz 16 GB* DDR3 Win 10 edu on build 19042.330 (20h2)

the only fix that worked for me was to limit the ram usage etc...

[wsl2] memory=3GB swap=0 localhostForwarding=true

sirredbeard was maybe in the right when he said it could be "random" bugs, I still had plenty of ram free like 60%, but yet it crashed when I limited it, ram allocation was stuck to 3064~72 MB and it was successfull on first call.

(I tried every tips on this page and my wsl install is fresh)

---

edit : I did a fresh install (same pc) and the bug didn't repeat (2004), I guess it happen when we do weird stuff on our pc ?

[OheneAsare]

@KaraxThePhaseSmith That's interesting. I don't think it's calling bsdtar in the distro, I think it's calling a bsdtar binary in the WSL layer. It might have worked then because this bug is sporadic at times. But I will pass it along.

It worked for me.

In Windows:

PS C:\WINDOWS\system32> wsl --set-version Ubuntu 2
Conversion in progress, this may take a few minutes...
For information on key differences with WSL 2 please visit https://aka.ms/wsl2
Exporting the distribution failed.
bsdtar: Write error

open linux distro (Ubuntu)

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install libarchive-tools
close linux distro

In Windows (didn't even close Powershell in between):

PS C:\WINDOWS\system32> wsl --set-version Ubuntu 2
Conversion in progress, this may take a few minutes...
For information on key differences with WSL 2 please visit https://aka.ms/wsl2
Conversion complete.

I had a brokenpipe error when crackmapexec was being installed how can i fix that

[crramirez]

Hello,

I don't thing this is the same error. Could you elaborate more what you did and the result?

Regards

[OheneAsare]

Yes yes ... It's not an error when trying to upgrade to wsl-2 This happens when I try to install libarchive tools(sudo apt-get install libarchive-tools) which is part of the solution you gave

[crramirez]

The most probable issue is due to a problem in internet connection. I tried now to install this package and it installed without problems. Try to issue an apt update and try again.

[CompSciMaj13]

I ran into quite a few issues when converting from WSL 1 to WSL 2 that relates to this ticket. I detailed my environment and the journey I took to work around them in the following comment.

https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/4102#issuecomment-673145649

[crramirez]

@CompSciMaj13 Thanks for sharing