topgrade fails to initiate remote connection to FreeBSD host/tcsh/sh shell

[Kreeblah]

Erroneous Behavior

I added a FreeBSD host to the remote_topgrades option on my Mac, and it fails to connect with the following error:

Connecting to myhost.domain.com...
Illegal option -l
Connection to myhost.domain.com closed.
Remote (bigwhoop.home.kreeblah.com) failed: 
   0: Command failed: `/usr/bin/ssh -t myhost.domain.com env 'TOPGRADE_PREFIX=myhost.domain.com' '$SHELL' -lc topgrade`
   1: `/usr/bin/ssh` failed: exit status: 2

Location:
   src/steps/remote/ssh.rs:53

Expected Behavior

I'd expect the remote connection to work, like it does when I connect to Linux hosts.

Steps to reproduce

Add a FreeBSD 14.2-RELEASE host to remote_topgrades. Attempt to run topgrade.

Possible Cause (Optional)

FreeBSD doesn't use bash or dash as the default shell. Instead, the shell at /bin/sh is a different Bourne-like shell. So, it works a little differently. In this case, if the first argument begins with -, then it runs the shell as though it's a login shell (in other words, -l isn't necessary if you're using -c).

Problem persists without calling from topgrade

• Yes
• No
  Running /bin/sh -lc topgrade locally on the FreeBSD host still exhibits the issue.

Did you run topgrade through Remote Execution

• Yes
• No

If yes, does the issue still occur when you run topgrade directly in your
remote host

• Yes
• No
  Running /bin/sh -lc topgrade locally on the FreeBSD host still exhibits the issue.

Additional Details

• Operation System/Version
  FreeBSD 14.2-RELEASE - Remote system
  macOS 15.1.1 - Local system

• Installation
  Installed from Homebrew for local copy and installed from FreeBSD packages for remote copy.

• Topgrade version (topgrade -V)
  Local - topgrade 16.0.2
  Remote - topgrade 16.0.1

Verbose Output (topgrade -v)

Connecting to myhost.domain.com...
DEBUG Executing command `/usr/bin/ssh -t myhost.domain.com env 'TOPGRADE_PREFIX=myhost.domain.com' '$SHELL' -lc topgrade`
Illegal option -l
Connection to myhost.domain.com closed.
DEBUG Command failed: Err(
   0: Command failed: `/usr/bin/ssh -t myhost.domain.com env 'TOPGRADE_PREFIX=myhost.domain.com' '$SHELL' -lc topgrade`
   1: `/usr/bin/ssh` failed: exit status: 2
Location:

src/steps/remote/ssh.rs:53)

DEBUG Step "Remote (myhost.domain.com)" failed:

0: Command failed: /usr/bin/ssh -t myhost.domain.com env 'TOPGRADE_PREFIX=myhost.domain.com' '$SHELL' -lc topgrade

1: /usr/bin/ssh failed: exit status: 2
Location:

src/steps/remote/ssh.rs:53

Remote (myhost.domain.com) failed:

0: Command failed: /usr/bin/ssh -t myhost.domain.com env 'TOPGRADE_PREFIX=myhost.domain.com' '$SHELL' -lc topgrade

1: /usr/bin/ssh failed: exit status: 2
Location:

src/steps/remote/ssh.rs:53

[SteveLauC]

if the first argument begins with -, then it runs the shell as though it's a login shell (in other words, -l isn't necessary if you're using -c).

Thanks for explaining it, the man page I found also verifies this:

If the first argument (argument 0) to the shell is '-' then it is a login shell. A login shell can be also specified by invoking the shell with the -l flag as the only argument.

[Kreeblah]

So, that man page is relevant, but I should probably mention that only FreeBSD 13 and below uses tcsh as the default shell, whereas FreeBSD 14 and up use sh instead. The man page for sh has the full details on this.

In this case, the main difference is that although both act the same way if the first argument begins with -, shexplicitly doesn't support a -l parameter (which is what's causing the error there).

[SteveLauC]

Thanks for the explanation, then I have another case to deal with 😄