It took me over an hour to figure out why it was failing like this:

An error has occurred:
exceptions.TypeError
See /var/log/up2date for more information

In the log you would get this explaination:

[Tue Mar 23 11:30:43 2010] rhn_register There was an error while reading the hardware info from the bios. Traceback:

[Tue Mar 23 11:30:43 2010] rhn_register
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “/usr/share/rhn/up2date_client/tui.py”, line 1510, in _activate_hardware
hardwareInfo = hardware.get_hal_system_and_smbios()
File “/usr/share/rhn/up2date_client/hardware.py”, line 863, in get_hal_system_and_smbios
props = computer.GetAllProperties()
File “/usr/lib64/python2.4/site-packages/dbus/proxies.py”, line 25, in __call__
ret = self._proxy_method (*args, **keywords)
File “/usr/lib64/python2.4/site-packages/dbus/proxies.py”, line 102, in __call__
reply_message = self._connection.send_with_reply_and_block(message, timeout)
File “dbus_bindings.pyx”, line 455, in dbus_bindings.Connection.send_with_reply_and_block
dbus_bindings.DBusException: The name org.freedesktop.Hal was not provided by any .service files

[Tue Mar 23 11:30:43 2010] rhn_register
Traceback (most recent call last):
File “/usr/sbin/rhn_register”, line 82, in ?
app.run()
File “/usr/share/rhn/up2date_client/rhncli.py”, line 65, in run
sys.exit(self.main() or 0)
File “/usr/sbin/rhn_register”, line 64, in main
ui.main()
File “/usr/share/rhn/up2date_client/tui.py”, line 1721, in main
tui.run()
File “/usr/share/rhn/up2date_client/tui.py”, line 1608, in run
if self._show_subscription_window() == False:
File “/usr/share/rhn/up2date_client/tui.py”, line 1562, in _show_subscription_window
self.password)
File “/usr/share/rhn/up2date_client/rhnreg.py”, line 588, in getRemainingSubscriptions
smbios)
File “/usr/share/rhn/up2date_client/rhnserver.py”, line 50, in __call__
return rpcServer.doCall(method, *args, **kwargs)
File “/usr/share/rhn/up2date_client/rpcServer.py”, line 199, in doCall
ret = method(*args, **kwargs)
File “/usr/lib64/python2.4/xmlrpclib.py”, line 1096, in __call__
return self.__send(self.__name, args)
File “/usr/share/rhn/up2date_client/rpcServer.py”, line 38, in _request1
ret = self._request(methodname, params)
File “/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/rhn/rpclib.py”, line 314, in _request
request = self._req_body(params, methodname)
File “/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/rhn/rpclib.py”, line 222, in _req_body
return xmlrpclib.dumps(params, methodname, encoding=self._encoding)
File “/usr/lib64/python2.4/xmlrpclib.py”, line 1029, in dumps
data = m.dumps(params)
File “/usr/lib64/python2.4/xmlrpclib.py”, line 603, in dumps
dump(v, write)
File “/usr/lib64/python2.4/xmlrpclib.py”, line 615, in __dump
f(self, value, write)
File “/usr/lib64/python2.4/xmlrpclib.py”, line 619, in dump_nil
raise TypeError, “cannot marshal None unless allow_none is enabled”
exceptions.TypeError: cannot marshal None unless allow_none is enabled

I also tried the rhnreg_ks utility with the –nohardware argument and that is when it gave me more information about the error:

[Tue Mar 23 15:18:39 2010] up2date Warning: haldaemon or messagebus service not running. Cannot probe hardware and DMI information.

I started the haldaemon process and I could then rhn_register my host.

Why did we disable the haldaemon process? It is part of the CIS recommendation to disable that startup service.

You learn the side effect of security as you go try things.

Posted on March 23