incompatibility of the "node identity restore" process with docker installed by snap

[oops10101]

Environment

OS: Ubuntu 22.04
Docker install method: Snap (docker snap)
Install flow: during installation / setup when asked to restore previous node identity

Issue

Hi, thank you truly for all the great work.

Here’s the issue I’m seeing when trying to restore node identity during the installation process on Ubuntu 22.04 with Docker installed using Snap.

When I choose yes to restore the node identity, it hits this error and the process fully stops:

Error: "docker: Error response from daemon: error while creating mount source path '/opt/conduit/backups': mkdir /opt/conduit: read-only file system"

I’m pretty sure this is caused by Docker being the Snap version.

More interestingly, if I choose no when asked to restore the node identity, the process stops again — but this time there are no errors. The last lines shown are:

Do you want to restore your previous node identity? (y/n): n

[INFO] Skipping restore. A new node identity will be generated.

Both the first and second problem don’t happen unless Docker is installed via Snap.

A fix isn’t fully necessary — I just wanted to mention it here in case anyone runs into the same thing, so they know what’s causing it.

[SamNet-dev]

Hi @oops10101, thanks for reporting this with such clear details!

This is a known limitation with Snap-installed Docker, it restricts bind-mount paths, so mounting /opt/conduit/backups into a container fails.

Good news: this is already fixed in v1.1 (releasing now). The restore logic now tries the bind-mount first, and if it fails (Snap Docker), it automatically falls back to docker cp which bypasses the mount restriction entirely:

1. Attempt bind-mount restore (works with standard Docker)
2. If that fails → fall back to docker cp (works with Snap Docker)

The second issue you mentioned (process stopping after choosing "no" to restore) was related to set -e causing the script to exit on a non-zero return. That's also been addressed in the new flow.

To update:

curl -sL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/SamNet-dev/conduit-manager/main/conduit.sh | sudo bash

That said, I'd still recommend using the official Docker apt repository instead of Snap if possible, since Snap's confinement causes various other edge cases with volume mounts. But v1.1 should handle it either way.

Thanks again for the detailed report!