Comment 3 for bug 390563

It's reproducible for me running that same command. I have an hpss trace for it:

Mon 2009-06-22 20:48:07 +1000
0.026 bzr arguments: [u'-Dhpss', u'branch', u'lp:~mbp/bzr/progress', u'progress']
0.043 looking for plugins in /home/mbp/.bazaar/plugins
[32345] 2009-06-22 20:48:07.761 WARNING: Unable to load plugin 'gtk'. It requested API version (1, 15, 0) of module <module 'bzrlib' from '/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/__init__.pyc'> but the minimum exported version is (1, 17, 0), and the maximum is (1, 17, 0)
0.119 looking for plugins in /home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/plugins
0.137 looking for plugins in /usr/lib/python2.6/dist-packages/bzrlib/plugins
0.138 Plugin name netrc_credential_store already loaded
0.138 Plugin name launchpad already loaded
0.141 encoding stdout as sys.stdout encoding 'UTF-8'
2.426 hpss: Built a new medium: SmartSSHClientMedium
2.428 hpss call: 'BzrDir.open', '~mbp/bzr/progress/'
2.428 (to bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/)
2.473 ssh implementation is OpenSSH
8.555 result: ('yes',)
8.556 hpss call: 'BzrDir.open_branchV2', '~mbp/bzr/progress/'
8.556 (to bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/)
8.930 result: ('branch', 'Bazaar Branch Format 7 (needs bzr 1.6)\n')
8.930 hpss call: 'BzrDir.find_repositoryV3', '~mbp/bzr/progress/'
8.930 (to bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/)
9.478 result: ('ok', '', 'no', 'no', 'yes', 'Bazaar RepositoryFormatKnitPack6 (bzr 1.9)\n')
9.483 hpss call: 'Branch.get_stacked_on_url', '~mbp/bzr/progress/'
9.484 (to bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/)
9.871 result: ('ok', '/~bzr/bzr/trunk')
9.872 hpss call: 'BzrDir.open', '~bzr/bzr/trunk/'
9.872 (to bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/)
10.311 result: ('yes',)
10.311 hpss call: 'BzrDir.open_branchV2', '~bzr/bzr/trunk/'
10.311 (to bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/)
10.763 result: ('branch', 'Bazaar Branch Format 7 (needs bzr 1.6)\n')
10.763 hpss call: 'BzrDir.find_repositoryV3', '~bzr/bzr/trunk/'
10.763 (to bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/)
11.405 result: ('ok', '', 'no', 'no', 'yes', 'Bazaar RepositoryFormatKnitPack6 (bzr 1.9)\n')
11.405 hpss call: 'Branch.get_stacked_on_url', '~bzr/bzr/trunk/'
11.405 (to bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/)
11.831 result: ('NotStacked',)
11.832 hpss call: 'Branch.last_revision_info', '~mbp/bzr/progress/'
11.832 (to bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/)
12.212 result: ('ok', '4148', '<email address hidden>')
12.216 hpss call: 'BzrDir.cloning_metadir', '~mbp/bzr/progress/', 'False'
12.216 (to bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/)
12.613 result: ('Bazaar-NG meta directory, format 1\n', 'Bazaar RepositoryFormatKnitPack6 (bzr 1.9)\n', ('branch', 'Bazaar Branch Format 7 (needs bzr 1.6)\n'))
12.644 Using fetch logic to copy between RemoteRepository(bzr+ssh://bazaar.launchpad.net/%7Embp/bzr/progress/.bzr/)(<RemoteRepositoryFormat>) and KnitPackRepository('file:///home/mbp/bzr/.bzr/repository/')(<RepositoryFormatKnitPack6>)
12.645 fetch up to rev {<email address hidden>}
12.645 hpss call w/body: 'Repository.get_parent_map', '~mbp/bzr/progress/', 'include-missing:', '<email address hidden>' ('\n\n0'...)
12.645 3 bytes
13.051 result: ('ok',)
13.051 258 body bytes read
13.052 hpss call w/body: 'Repository.get_parent_map', '~bzr/bzr/trunk/', 'include-missing:', '<email address hidden>' ('\n\n0'...)
13.052 3 bytes
14.239 result: ('ok',)
16.168 59084 body bytes read
16.191 hpss call w/body: 'Repository.get_parent_map', '~mbp/bzr/progress/', 'include-missing:', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>' ('<email address hidden>'...)
16.191 53 bytes
16.607 result: ('ok',)
16.607 2381 body bytes read
16.609 hpss call w/body: 'Repository.get_parent_map', '~mbp/bzr/progress/', 'include-missing:', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>' ('<email address hidden>'...)
16.609 105 bytes
17.126 result: ('ok',)
17.127 164 body bytes read
17.127 hpss call w/body: 'Repository.get_parent_map', '~mbp/bzr/progress/', 'include-missing:', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>' ('<email address hidden>'...)
17.127 105 bytes
17.596 result: ('ok',)
17.596 205 body bytes read
17.597 hpss call w/body: 'Repository.get_parent_map', '~mbp/bzr/progress/', 'include-missing:', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>', '<email address hidden>' ('<email address hidden>'...)
17.597 105 bytes
18.045 result: ('ok',)
18.046 274 body bytes read
18.077 hpss call w/body: 'Repository.get_stream', '~mbp/bzr/progress/', 'Bazaar RepositoryFormatKnitPack6 (bzr 1.9)\n' ('search\nmbp@sourcefro'...)
18.077 2710 bytes
18.635 result: ('ok',)
18.636 42 byte part read
18.636 48 byte part read
18.647 Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/commands.py", line 831, in exception_to_return_code
    return the_callable(*args, **kwargs)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/commands.py", line 1026, in run_bzr
    ret = run(*run_argv)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/commands.py", line 643, in run_argv_aliases
    return self.run(**all_cmd_args)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/builtins.py", line 1173, in run
    source_branch=br_from)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/bzrdir.py", line 1176, in sprout
    result_repo.fetch(source_repository, revision_id=revision_id)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/repository.py", line 1552, in fetch
    find_ghosts=find_ghosts, fetch_spec=fetch_spec)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/decorators.py", line 192, in write_locked
    result = unbound(self, *args, **kwargs)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/repository.py", line 3184, in fetch
    pb=pb, find_ghosts=find_ghosts)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/fetch.py", line 79, in __init__
    self.__fetch()
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/fetch.py", line 105, in __fetch
    self._fetch_everything_for_search(search)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/fetch.py", line 133, in _fetch_everything_for_search
    stream, from_format, [])
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/repository.py", line 3948, in insert_stream
    return self._locked_insert_stream(stream, src_format, is_resume)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/repository.py", line 3977, in _locked_insert_stream
    for substream_type, substream in stream:
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/remote.py", line 1783, in missing_parents_chain
    for kind, substream in stream:
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/smart/repository.py", line 491, in record_stream
    for bytes in byte_stream:
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/smart/message.py", line 336, in read_streamed_body
    _translate_error(self._body_error_args)
  File "/home/mbp/bzr/trunk/bzrlib/smart/message.py", line 359, in _translate_error
    raise errors.ErrorFromSmartServer(error_tuple)
ErrorFromSmartServer: Error received from smart server: ('error', "Absent factory for ('ostools.py-20060731163025-npjffm46rgnkl50d-1', '<email address hidden>')")