ezjail update error

[James B. Byrne]

We upgraded one of our hosts to FreeBSD-11.2p8.  When we updated the
jails on that host using "ezjail-admin update -u" we received these
messages:

The following files will be added as part of updating to 11.2-RELEASE-p8:
/usr/share/zoneinfo/Asia/Qostanay

Installing updates...mkdir: /usr/jails/newjail//boot: No such file or
directory

mtree: mtree: /usr/jails/newjail//boot/kernel.old: No such file or
directory

/usr/jails/newjail//boot/kernel: No such file or directory

touch: /usr/jails/newjail//boot/kernel.old/.freebsd-update: No such
file or directory

Could not create kernel backup directory

However, ls shows this:

lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel    14 May 28  2018 /usr/jails/newjail/boot
-> /basejail/boot

This appears to me to be an error.  Either the soft link should be

/usr/jails/newjail/boot -> ../basejail/boot

or

/usr/jails/newjail/boot -> /usr/jails/basejail/boot

The directory of /basejail has never existed on this system insofar as
I can determine.

However, examination of other hosts with ezjail installed have
identical entries in /usr/


The version of ezjail on this system is:

Name           : ezjail
Version        : 3.4.2_1
Installed on   : Thu Nov  8 09:15:24 2018 EST

The last time we ran an ezjail update, on January 7, we did not get
this error.  There is no history of anything ever being done directly
to /usr/jails/newjail or to /usr/jails/basejails. Further, the find
utility shows this:

find /usr/jails -name kernel.old
/usr/jails/basejail/boot/kernel.old
/usr/jails/mx31/basejail/boot/kernel.old

My questions are:

1. What does the error message mean?

2. Why is it reported now and not before?

3. How can it be eliminated or corrected?

Thanks,

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James B. Byrne                mailto:ByrneJB at Harte-Lyne.ca
Harte & Lyne Limited          http://www.harte-lyne.ca
9 Brockley Drive              vox: +1 905 561 1241
Hamilton, Ontario             fax: +1 905 561 0757
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