Steve Langasek wrote: > reassign 308234 debconf > thanks > > Hi guys, > > On Mon, May 09, 2005 at 08:20:23AM +0200, Torsten Landschoff wrote: > > > On Mon, May 09, 2005 at 12:21:32AM +0200, Ferenc Engard wrote: > > > > While I have upgraded my system, slapd upgrade asked some questions, > > > including directory to dump databases. The text said the default is > > > /var/backups/slapd-VERSION. Reading that, I simply pushed enter. After > > > that, the preinst script have failed, rendering slapd unconfigured. > > > Meanwhile, apt has upgraded my libldap2 package. > > > Which debconf frontend to you use? I hit the same problem with the > > readline frontend which does not seem to use the default value if you > > just push enter but instead the empty value. Maybe the configuration > > script should just replace the empty value by the default value again. > > I really think this is a bug that needs to be dealt with from the debconf > side of things. Torsten, if you want to add a workaround to slapd, that > should be ok, but the real bug appears to be that the readline frontend is > somehow defaulting to an empty string for text values (although, not in my > testing here...). It may be that slapd is one of the more severely affected > packages, but I'm sure it's not the only place this causes problems.
The bug is in slapd for including this text in its debconf template:
"The default is /var/backups/slapd-VERSION"
This comes under the heading of not referring to debconf UI in a
template. Just as you don't know how debconf will choose to present a
yes/no question and thus "say yes" constructions should be avoided, you
don't know how or if a given debconf frontend handles default values[1].
Indeed a static template such as this one doesn't even know for sure
what the default value _is_; it could have been overriden.
The technical details of why debconf is not able to present a default
value with the readline frontend, when the recommended
literm-readline-gnu-perl is not installed, or with the teletype
frontend, are already explained in bug #183970. I know of no better
solution than what debconf already does, aside from perhaps refusing to
run the readline frontend without literm-readline-gnu-perl (but this
wouldn't fix the teletype frontend anyway).
I'll reassign this back to slapd if it's agreeable.
--
see shy jo
[1] For example, the white mice debconf frontend[2] cannot offer a default
value to the mice as they decide which tunnel to run down in the
debconf maze. They have to choose right or left, and any debconf
template telling them there is a default is obviously wrong.
[2] Cheezy, I know, but I'm running out of useful hypothetical debconf
frontends. Besides, doom is passe and HHGTTG is back in.
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