canonical / canonical/multipass

Unable to launch locally built multipass, without installing it first.

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linux needs triage
Dominant language
C++
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Description

**Describe the bug**
After following the steps in [BUILD.linux.md](https://github.com/canonical/multipass/blob/main/BUILD.linux.md), I was unable to successfully launch `multipass`, and was getting the following error:
```sh
[error] [client] Caught an unhandled exception: failed to open file '/usr/local/etc/multipassd/multipass_root_cert.pem': No such file or directory(2)
```
Note that after installing the official snap of `multipass`, the error was not occurring again (even after uninstalling it).

**To Reproduce**
How, and what happened?
1. Either use a whole new Ubuntu, or use `multipass` to start a fresh Ubuntu machine, with enough RAM and disk space to be able to build the project (--memory=8gb --disk=40gb did it for me).
2. Clone the `multipass` repository on the machine.
3. Follow the steps inside [BUILD.linux.md](https://github.com/canonical/multipass/blob/main/BUILD.linux.md).
Note 1: I ended up with 3 build errors, that I either fixed by adding = 0 after uninitialized variables, or discarded by commenting the `gtk_window_set_icon` call.
Note 2: I explicitly put --parallel 2 or 1, in order for the process to not get killed because of OOM issues.
4. Start the daemon with: `sudo ./build/bin/multipassd`.
5. Then start the client with: `./build/bin/multipass`.
=> You should get the error mentioned above.

**Expected behavior**
If properly following the indicated steps, Multipass should be able to launch without any issue.

**Logs**
Unable to provide the logs at the moment, I've uninstalled `multipass` from my host again.

**Additional info**
- OS: Ubuntu 26.04
- CPU architecture or model: x64
- `https://github.com/canonical/multipass/commit/c74afa86b062ed64439afbadc4dc45fefe754c5b`

Contributor guide

Open the contributing guide

Research direction

Start with BUILD.linux.md and reproduce the documented build and launch sequence using ./build/bin/multipassd and ./build/bin/multipass. Trace how the locally built client expects /usr/local/etc/multipassd/multipass_root_cert.pem to be provided, then verify the fix by launching Multipass without installing the official snap.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
cpp, linux, ubuntu
Domain
build-system, operating-systems
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
4/5
Estimated time
3-5 days
Activity status
Active
Clarity
Mostly clear
Newbie friendliness
52/100

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