Fix edgecase in Meterpreter job persistence

[adfoster-r7]

closes #18995

Verification

1. Verify jobs can be persisted

use exploit/multi/handler
set payload linux/x64/meterpreter/reverse_tcp
setg lhost ip
run -j
jobs -p job_id
exit
msfconsole
jobs

Ensure the job is available on console boot jobs

2. Verify that jobs -v correctly detects when a job is persisted
3. Verify that the job is removed from being persisted when using jobs -k 1 and with a negative index jobs -k -1

[adfoster-r7]

This allows persisted jobs to still be loaded correctly, i.e. the scenario of Options being a string instead of hash

[adfoster-r7]

Serializing payload.datastore as JSON led to a string being saved, this allows a hash to be persisted instead

[adfoster-r7]

Wiring up init_ui allows the user to have the job startup error messages logged to the console instead of them silently being ignored - which immediately showed the original hidden error

Before: No errors logged

After: Errors logged

bundle exec ruby ./msfconsole --quiet
[*] Using configured payload linux/x64/meterpreter/reverse_tcp
[*] Starting persistent handler(s)...
[-] Msf::OptionValidateError One or more options failed to validate: MeterpreterDebugLogging.
[*] Failed to start persistent payload handler #0 (exploit/multi/handler)
[-] Msf::OptionValidateError One or more options failed to validate: MeterpreterDebugLogging.
[*] Failed to start persistent payload handler #1 (exploit/multi/handler)
msf6 exploit(multi/handler) >

[adfoster-r7]

Tests to verify the handling of MeterpreterDebugLogging being set to an empty string and causing validation errors is fixed, because the to_h method persists nil as the empty string "":

metasploit-framework/lib/msf/core/data_store_with_fallbacks.rb

Lines 263 to 272 in 685a2e9

	# Override Hash's to_h method so we can include the original case of each key
	# (failing to do this breaks a number of places in framework and pro that use
	# serialized datastores)
	def to_h
	datastore_hash = {}
	self.keys.each do |k|
	datastore_hash[k.to_s] = self[k].to_s
	end
	datastore_hash
	end

[adfoster-r7]

Pattern from: #15492

[sjanusz-r7]

I followed the setup instructions with setting up a multi/handler.

Before

Job does not survive a reboot of Console

bundle exec './msfconsole -q'
[*] New in Metasploit 6.4 - This module can target a SESSION or an RHOST
[*] Starting persistent handler(s)...
msf6 auxiliary(scanner/smb/smb_lookupsid) > jobs

Jobs
====

No active jobs.

After

Job persists

bundle exec './msfconsole -q'
[*] New in Metasploit 6.4 - This module can target a SESSION or an RHOST
[*] Starting persistent handler(s)...
[*] Persistent payload handler started as Job 0
[*] Started reverse TCP handler on 192.168.112.1:4444 
msf6 auxiliary(scanner/smb/smb_lookupsid) > jobs

Jobs
====

  Id  Name                    Payload                            Payload opts
  --  ----                    -------                            ------------
  0   Exploit: multi/handler  linux/x64/meterpreter/reverse_tcp  tcp://192.168.112.1:4444

msf6 auxiliary(scanner/smb/smb_lookupsid) > jobs -v

Jobs
====

  Id  Name                    Payload                            Payload opts              URIPATH  Start Time                 Handler opts  Persist
  --  ----                    -------                            ------------              -------  ----------                 ------------  -------
  0   Exploit: multi/handler  linux/x64/meterpreter/reverse_tcp  tcp://192.168.112.1:4444           2024-05-17 14:02:58 +0100                true

[sjanusz-r7]

Release Notes

Fixed persistent jobs not working when rebooting MSF console.