Package: console-data Version: 2:1.07-6 Severity: grave Justification: can cause data loss in certain applications
[I am forwarding this report from Ubuntu to you. I have confirmed that the bug also affects my copy of Debian testing. I last dist-upgraded about 2 weeks ago.] ~~~ >From https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/console-data/+bug/279973 : On Ubuntu 8.10, in console mode, the PrintScreen key sends SIGQUIT to the running application. Depending which application you are running, this may cause it to dump core. So this single wrong keystroke can cause data loss. Most text editors are unaffected, but most other apps are. This problem has affected most Linux PCs for almost a decade now, but AFAICT nobody has ever filed a proper bug report about it with the kernel folks or with Ubuntu. People have complained on mailing lists though. == Steps to repro == 1. Press Control+Alt+F1 2. Log in 3. Do one of the following: a) type "sudo aptitude" then spend fifteen minutes looking through the list of packages and picking what you want, OR b) start up the "lynx" browser then spend 15 minutes editing a Wikipedia article 4. In the middle of step 3, accidentally press the Print Screen key on your keyboard. == What happens == * When you press PrtSc, the kernel sends the ^\ (Control-Backslash) key combination to the terminal. This is by design, but it is a bad design. It causes data loss. * ^\ sends a SIGQUIT signal, causing the application to immediately abort and dump core. == What should have happened == * When you press PrtSc, the kernel should not send ^\ -- it should either send a different key combination, or send nothing at all. ~~~ Greg Grossmeier wrote: I can confirm this behavior in 8.10. ~~~ Jason Spiro wrote: Does this affect the package "kbd" also? I thought it did but now I'm not sure. Will Intrepid use keymaps from the package "kbd" anyway? How about later releases of Ubuntu after Intrepid? ~~~ Jason Spiro wrote: Followup to my last comment: No, this does not affect "kbd". The problem is only in console-data. In Debian console-data-1.07/keymaps/i386/include/linux-keys-bare.inc, keycode 99 = Control_backslash. But in Debian kbd-1.14.1/data/keymaps/i386/include/linux-keys-bare.inc, keycode 99 = Compose. And Intrepid too, not just Debian testing, uses kbd-1.14.1. ~~~ Jason Spiro wrote: Marking invalid in package "kbd" as per my last comment. ~~~ Jason Spiro wrote: I recently tested pressing PrintScreen inside several uncommonly-used text editors while running in console mode. The key seems to make a few of them, including NLED by Evan Weaver, become unresponsive forever. Vim and Nano are unaffected though. P.S. I will soon be forwarding this bug upstream to http://bugs.debian.org/console-data -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
