Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Henrique de Moraes Holschuh]

On Sun, 20 Apr 2003, Nikolai Prokoschenko wrote:
> The point is actually that deb??an (and others) doesn't care much about
> internationalization, no matter what they say. I'm just trying to be

Go away.  

I hate trolls that make little of the work of others...

If you think something is actively being i18n/l10n unfriendly, file a bug
against that.  The correct severity is either grave (if it is a required
dependency of anything that is i18n/l10n-friendly, and thus it is breaking
that thing's l10n/i18n support), or normal otherwise.  

And the fix for that bug might not be what you expect, AND still be a proper
fix.

-- 
  "One disk to rule them all, One disk to find them. One disk to bring
  them all and in the darkness grind them. In the Land of Redmond
  where the shadows lie." -- The Silicon Valley Tarot
  Henrique Holschuh

Re: Bug#189347: stop the "manage with debconf" madness

[Daniel Martin]

Emile van Bergen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> In most cases, the only feature that's used (and needed) of XML that it
> stores a tree of attribute/value pairs.
> 
> Given limited effort, I am absolutely convinced that it should be
> possible to come up with a more robust, well defined, simple(!), user
> and implementor-friendly(!), do-one-thing-and-do-it-well way of doing
> that.
> 
> Not by starting from "we've got HTML which is being (ab)used for ad-hoc
> RPC purposes, let's make a more general SGML application to do that"
> which became XML, but starting from the simple requirement stated above:
> storing and transmitting nested trees of attribute/value pairs with a
> *limited* number of possible data types. 

I personally must say that I find the format of apt.conf satisfies
this goal admirably.  It also easily allows one to easily override
some specific settings while leaving the rest in place.

For example, here's an apt.conf that I used when I was preparing an
upgrade CD for a machine that sat in a benighted place without network
access:

  Dir "/"
  {
// Location of the state dir
State "var/lib/apt/" 
{
   status "/home/martind/lazarus/status";
};

Cache "/home/martind/lazarus/aptchive";
  };

  Debug::NoLocking "true";

Perhaps it has a few too many quoted strings, semicolons, and braces
for some people's taste, but it has the very distinct advantage that
it's already implemented in a program that's already on every Debian
machine.

Then there's always the format Sun came up with for java's .properties
files, which definitely wins the simplicity award, evne if trailing
spaces can sometimes bite the unwary.

Re: libc6 (security) update does not restart system-services?

[Markus Amersdorfer]

On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 00:05:49 +0900
GOTO Masanori <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> > > > Woody comes with libc6 2.2.5-11.5, so the section about
> > > > restarting services is never reached.
> > > > 
> > > > This leaves the machine vulnerable as all services use the old
> > > > library until restarted.
> > > >
> > > > Shouldn't the services be restarted when installing a new
> > > > libc-version? What reasons would there be not to restart
> > > > services?
> > 
> > But my concern is that running programs such as system services use
> > the old libraries instead of the new one as long as they continue
> > running, don't they? If they do the security bug is still
> > exploitable though the new libraries are already installed on the
> > system.
> 
> Yes, right, good point.  This is not only glibc issue; this problem
> affects all library packages.

Yupp...

> I have to warn all users who believe that we needs only "apt-get
> upgrade, yeah, that's all folks!" concept.  It's not true for this
> library upgrade issue.
> 
> From our glibc upgrade experience, it's difficult to restart packages
> which have specific problem automatically...  The simple method to
> detect old libraries are to use lsof, so debian package system can
> warn for users "there are old libraries which has security problem, so
> you should restart these binaries".  I don't know there is good way to
> fix this problem.

As Bob pointed out in his message, searching for running
programs using the old libraries using lsof and restarting the
corresponding services _automatically_ is currently hardly possible.

IMHO the best practice would be to check if a any version of glibc (or
more generally the library-package just being installed) is installed
already and is to be replaced by the new one. If any running programs
are found, prompt the user an info-message to "make sure to restart
programs/services in order to benefit from the changes".

This would actually only be necessary with either a security update or
with major version changes (such as libc 2.1 -> 2.2).
While the latter is already dealt with by the postinst script, it would
be necessary to know if the update is a simple "new version's
here"-update or if it's a security-related one... That's probabely hard
to decide for Testing and Unstable, I assume, but it is not for the
Stable-tree where generally no updated versions (other than
security-related) are to be installed. So at least for Woody, the
warning message would be appropriate, I think.

> > > > If everything _is_ designed not to restart the services, I
> > > > suppose telling the users to take care of that theirselves would
> > > > be a good idea for example using a simple "echo" in the
> > > > post-install script(or similar).
> > > 
> > > The restarting message is not sufficient for you?
> > 
> > Of course, but the message is only shown if the services _are_ to be
> > restarted (which is only when doing a major version update). 
> > Services are not restarted by the security update though I think
> > they should be (as stated above).
> 
> I think you confuse two issue.  One is generic problem as I write
> above (memory resident libraries issue).  Another is glibc NSS start
> problem as I write below.
> 
> Or did you point the messages which are not appeared in
> libc6.postinst when you upgraded from 2.2 to 2.3 ?

I was writing 'bout the echo-messages in Woody's glibc-version which
inform the user about restarting services in case of upgrading from 2.1
to 2.2, so I suppose this is a similar case as 2.2 -> 2.3.
Anyway, I did not think of "glibc NSS start problems" ... As I've
already mentioned, I actually don't know enough about the
inside-workings of glibc and the corresponding techniques.
I actually just thought about the memory resident libraries issue, yes.

> OK, now start to say about "glibc NSS start problem".  The reason why
> glibc needs to restart all NSS authentication services was written in
> my (a bit long) mail:
> 
> 
> http://lists.debian.org/debian-glibc/2003/debian-glibc-200303/msg00276.html
> 
> The problem is "dlopen()".

Thanks for your explanation and the link. I'll check it out as soon as
some spare time drops by... but this might take a while. :)

Thanks too for clearing things up for me (still) definitely being more
of a user than a developer.

Cheers,
Max

-- 
The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged.
   

http://homex.subnet.at/~max/

Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Marc Haber]

On Sat, 19 Apr 2003 16:47:26 -0500, Steve Langasek
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>Um, no.  *Policy* says that it may not be used as a registry.

This has always prompted me to ask myself _why_ debconf entries are
persistent then. If I _really_ have to parse config files in my config
script to properly seed debconf to ask the right questions, then why
does debconf have a database in the first place?

Greetings
Marc

-- 
-- !! No courtesy copies, please !! -
Marc Haber  |   " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header
Karlsruhe, Germany  | Beginning of Wisdom " | Fon: *49 721 966 32 15
Nordisch by Nature  | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fax: *49 721 966 31 29

Re: libc6 (security) update does not restart system-services?

[Markus Amersdorfer]

On Sat, 19 Apr 2003 18:04:01 +0200
Bernd Eckenfels <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 12:05:49AM +0900, GOTO Masanori wrote:
> > So everytime we have to restart all binaries which use a library
> > involving security-problem.  In additionm this problem affects not
> > only debian packages, but user-built binaries.
> 
> Well, this is why it is most often described in the security advisory.
> 
> To be shure one can eighter use "init 1" and get back to multi user
> mode, or use tools like "lsof" or my package of "memstat" to find
> loaded and deleeted libraries.

I couldn't find any information about restarting programs and services
(no matter what way) in DSA-282 (the corresponding DSA for the
libc-update). Though I think it's a good idea to place such information
in the DSA, I'd suppose an small "notice this" message in the postinst
script (as described in my other mail) would be good as this information
will reach those not reading the DSAs too.

Cheers
Max

-- 
The first time any man's freedom is trodden on, we're all damaged.
   

http://homex.subnet.at/~max/

Re: Bug#189566: amavisd-new: bad interaction with package amavis-ng

[Marc Haber]

On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 01:13:50 -0300, Henrique de Moraes Holschuh
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>It is also a damn hole in Debian policy.  That one I will propose a fix
>to:  scripts that are conffiles MUST test if the package is in the installed
>state, and that test MUST either be done by checking for the presence of a
>*file* (and no other filesystem object!) that is specific for that package
>only in the entire distribution, or by querying the packaging system.

In the last case, there should be a way to do this _easily_. Currently
the only way to do this is parsing dpkg --list output, which is mucho
ugly.

To address the original problem: I think that amavis-ng needs to have
its amavisd renamed, and I am working with the amavis-ng maintainer to
do this.

Greetings
Marc

-- 
-- !! No courtesy copies, please !! -
Marc Haber  |   " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header
Karlsruhe, Germany  | Beginning of Wisdom " | Fon: *49 721 966 32 15
Nordisch by Nature  | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fax: *49 721 966 31 29

Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files

[Marc Haber]

On Sat, 19 Apr 2003 15:14:34 -0400, Matt Zimmerman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
>- Notice that a non-conffile, autogenerated configuration file has been
>  modified by the user, and don't lose their changes
>
>- Use debconf for prompting

That combination prompts a question: Why does dpkg not use debconf for
the "the conffile foo has changed locally, install package
maintainer's version?" script, and why are these questions not asked
on pre-configuration time?

Greetings
Marc

-- 
-- !! No courtesy copies, please !! -
Marc Haber  |   " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header
Karlsruhe, Germany  | Beginning of Wisdom " | Fon: *49 721 966 32 15
Nordisch by Nature  | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fax: *49 721 966 31 29

Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Manoj Srivastava]

>> On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 08:58:14 +0200,
>> Marc Haber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

 > On Sat, 19 Apr 2003 16:47:26 -0500, Steve Langasek
 >> [EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
 >> Um, no.  *Policy* says that it may not be used as a registry.

 > This has always prompted me to ask myself _why_ debconf entries are
 > persistent then.

So one does not have to answer the same question over and over
 on each install.

 > If I _really_ have to parse config files in my config script to
 > properly seed debconf to ask the right questions, then why does
 > debconf have a database in the first place?

Because not all debconf responses are stored in configuration
 files? Some debconf answers influence installation scripts behaviour,
 and never impact the installed program behaviour.

manoj

-- 
No problem is so formidable that you can't just walk away from
it. Schulz
Manoj Srivastava   <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
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Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files (Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness)

[Manoj Srivastava]

>> On Sat, 19 Apr 2003 19:33:21 -0400,
>> Matt Zimmerman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

 > As was explained in detail, in order to do anything useful with
 > that information, it is necessary to be able to show the user the
 > proposed changes to the configuration file.  It is completely
 > unhelpful to say:

 > "You have modified this configuration file, and it has also been
 > updated by the package maintainer.  Do you want to replace it with
 > the version provided by the package maintainer?"

 > Without showing the user the new version.

Hmm. ucf does show the user the changes, and even offers to
 merge maintainer changes into the current configuration file.

What functionality do you think ucf is missing?

manoj
-- 
quit When the quit statement is read, the bc processor is terminated,
regardless of where the quit state- ment is found.  For example, "if
(0 == 1) quit" will cause bc to terminate. (Seen in the manpage for
"bc". Note the "if" statement's logic)
Manoj Srivastava   <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
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Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Cameron Patrick]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 08:58:14AM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
| 
| This has always prompted me to ask myself _why_ debconf entries are
| persistent then. If I _really_ have to parse config files in my config
| script to properly seed debconf to ask the right questions, then why
| does debconf have a database in the first place?
| 

So that most of the time, you don't have to hit enter mindlessly to
confirm the answers to questions that you've already answered when
upgrading?

Cameron.

Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Manoj Srivastava]

>> On Sat, 19 Apr 2003 20:17:16 +0100,
>> Matt Ryan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

 > Policy is what matters not the opinion of some jumped up
 > developers!

Conside rthis: when considering input from a ``jumped up
 developer'' who has demonstrated competence and has put in the effort
 like Joey Hess, and has intituted a couple of major changes in how
 Debian works, and an unknown twit, guess who am I going to listen to?

manoj

-- 
My dear People. My dear Bagginses and Boffins, and my dear Tooks and
Brandybucks, and Grubbs, and Chubbs, and Burrowses, and Hornblowers,
and Bolgers, Bracegirdles, Goodbodies, Brockhouses and Proudfoots.
Also my good Sackville Bagginses that I welcome back at last to Bag
End.  Today is my one hundred and eleventh birthday: I am eleventy-one
today!" Tolkien
Manoj Srivastava   <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
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Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness

[Manoj Srivastava]

>> On Sat, 19 Apr 2003 20:21:14 +0100,
>> Matt Ryan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

 >> Secondly, this isnot a witch hunt. What is being done is that a
 >> policy violation in older practice is being pointed
 >> out. Alternatives are being discussed; a witch hunt would have
 >> involved mass RC bug filings.

 > The TEX discussion is definitely in witchunt territory. Maintainers

Really? We are discussion a policy violation that causes loss
 of user changes, and you think this is a witch hunt? And You happen
 to be a developer. Seems like a flaw in the NM process

 > (on the whole) try to make the best job they can of the packaging
 > of their programs.

Anyone can make mistakes.

 > What is not helpful is when a developer gets a bad case of NOMUS
 > (Not On My UNIX System) and goes off on one about how perfectly the
 > world would be if everyone agreed with their narrow definition of
 > the 'correct' way to do things. The recent /run debate was another
 > example of this virulent disease taking hold amongst the vocal
 > developer cabal.

Really a flaw in the NM process. Don't we require peopel to
acknowledge the importance of policy nowadays? 

 > Diversity is what keeps the human race going...

Right. The hell with policy, since following policy is mind
 less conformance.

Jesus.

manoj
-- 
There appears to be irrefutable evidence that the mere fact of
overcrowding induces violence. Harvey Wheeler
Manoj Srivastava   <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
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Re: New project proposal: debian-lex

[Sami Haahtinen]

On Sat, Apr 19, 2003 at 09:33:05PM +0200, Ralf Hildebrandt wrote:
> * Sami Haahtinen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> > > "lex" is the better word, as it is not only known in English, but also
> > > in most other (roman) Languages for law.
> > 
> > Oh right, in finland there is a site finlex.fi, which is ofcouse
> > obviously a site that contains the finnish law. This is the first time
> > i've even heard the definition for 'lex', i support naming it
> > debian-law, so that it's clear for the non-lawyers too.
> 
> You forget that "lex, legis (f.)" is well known with lawyers. They'll
> immedialtely recognize it, since so many laws are of roman origin and
> many latin terms occur.

Are you trying to tell me, that if the list is named debian-lex, more
people will know what it means, than by naming it debian-law?

I think i can claim that pretty much all the lawyers that attend the
list, know english. Atleast enough to know what 'law' means.

Regards, Sami

-- 
  -< Sami Haahtinen >-
  -[ Notify immediately if you do not receive this message ]-
-< 2209 3C53 D0FB 041C F7B1  F908 A9B6 F730 B83D 761C >-

Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Manoj Srivastava]

>> On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 00:26:04 +0200,
>> Nikolai Prokoschenko <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

 > What I think about is some regulated way to care about the needs of
 > international debian users. Let's take an example: some
 > programmîplays badly along with UTF-8 and therefore can't be
 > properly used by me, as I need e.g. both German and Russian. I can
 > as well file a bug against it, but it wouldn't matter much, as the
 > maintainer would just say 'it's not supported upstream' and nothing
 > would happen. 

And what exactly have *YOU* done about it, apart from whinging?

manoj
-- 
"Your mother was a hamster, and your father smelt of elderberrys!"
Monty Python and the Holy Grail
Manoj Srivastava   <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
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Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Manoj Srivastava]

>> On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 02:05:33 +0200,
>> Eduard Bloch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

 >> A point. What *is* yours?

 > Read. Just read and try with imagination.  => Better, flexible and
 > _smooth_ i18n in debian-desktop. Something userfriendly but not
 > easy to achieve without conditional dependencies, debconf config
 > with controllable queue order and some other things I have already
 > told about in the past :(

Apart from telling various and sundry people about it, have
 you done anything? This is free software. If it scratches youtr itch,
 fix it. And send patches.


manoj
-- 
Windows NT Beer: Comes in 32-oz. cans, but you can only buy it by the
truckload. This causes most people to have to go out and buy bigger
refrigerators. The can looks just like Windows 3.1 Beer's, but the
company promises to change the can to look just like Windows 95 Beer's
-- after Windows 95 beer starts shipping. Touted as an "industrial
strength" beer, and suggested only for use in bars.
Manoj Srivastava   <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
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Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Manoj Srivastava]

>> On Sat, 19 Apr 2003 20:24:21 +0100,
>> Matt Ryan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 


 > You really need to calm down. Twice now recently you have
 > opened your
 > mouth and stuck your foot in when there really wasn't any need
 > to. Take a Valium and do something less stressful.


Heh. First you bad mouth Joey Hess. And now you go up against
 Ben Collins. And both times you take what I consider impolitic
 stances  that show poor judgment (even ignoring the fact that you
 are, with nothing whatsoever to back it up) some of the most
 respected developers in Debian.

I applaud this masterly demonstration of a nadir of cluelessness.

I suppose this is accomplishment of a sort.

manoj
-- 
This fortune would be seven words long if it were six words shorter.
Manoj Srivastava   <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
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Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Eduard Bloch]

Moin Henrique!
Henrique de Moraes Holschuh schrieb am Sunday, den 20. April 2003:

> On Sun, 20 Apr 2003, Nikolai Prokoschenko wrote:
> > The point is actually that deb??an (and others) doesn't care much about
> > internationalization, no matter what they say. I'm just trying to be
> 
> Go away.  

Come on, is fscking wish reports a good way to communicate with users?

> If you think something is actively being i18n/l10n unfriendly, file a bug
> against that.  The correct severity is either grave (if it is a required

Against what? Who is to blame? Who cares? For example, as user, I would like
mlterm to work with UTF8 out of the box when I install (bogus)
utf8-environment package plus language-ru? See #186983 and tell us how
you, as maintainer, could _ensure_ that the damn thing works (with the
best font for this charset environment) _and_ works like the user expects it.

Yes, you may say that this is something debian-desktop should work with,
but a) who is debian-desktop and b) how should debian-desktop (whoever
it is, most likely the each maintianer) deal with it without having a
sane structure to make things flexible?

And before you do not have the answer or if you did never work in a
complelete UTF-8 environment at all (or permanently charset-switching
environment), please think twice befre you raise your voice.

> dependency of anything that is i18n/l10n-friendly, and thus it is breaking
> that thing's l10n/i18n support), or normal otherwise.  
> 
> And the fix for that bug might not be what you expect, AND still be a proper
> fix.

Oh please, he is a pure USER. It is nasty to deal with charset switching
in every program, you have to find out how to do it, you have to find
out what maintainers forgot, you have to do some research with apt-cache
to locate and replace some packages with the UTF-8 versions. I do not
say that UTF-8 support on Debian is generaly bad (or worse than with
other distributions), but the last (user-relevant) step of the setup is
not user-friendly at all.

MfG,
Eduard.
-- 
Wir wissen nicht was wir tun, das aber mit System!

Re: New project proposal: debian-lex

[Michael Tindal]

On Sat, 2003-04-19 at 15:33, Ralf Hildebrandt wrote:
> * Sami Haahtinen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> 
> > > "lex" is the better word, as it is not only known in English, but also
> > > in most other (roman) Languages for law.
> > 
> > Oh right, in finland there is a site finlex.fi, which is ofcouse
> > obviously a site that contains the finnish law. This is the first time
> > i've even heard the definition for 'lex', i support naming it
> > debian-law, so that it's clear for the non-lawyers too.
> 
> You forget that "lex, legis (f.)" is well known with lawyers. They'll
> immedialtely recognize it, since so many laws are of roman origin and
> many latin terms occur.

I would have to vote for debian-law, because while lex might be
recognizable by lawyers, everyone who sees it is not going to be a
lawyer.  A good sized portion of them, in fact, will be software
developers.  The first impression such a person would encounter would be
to associate it with something like flex, as mentioned before.  I think
debian-law would create a lot less confusion than debian-lex, but IANADD
so just my two cents.

Mike

Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Peter Makholm]

Nikolai Prokoschenko <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> My problem was: everybody was acting like mad, screaming "at last,
> some good fonts for linux!", whereas, as far as I remember, these
> fonts lacks many many scripts, starting with the simpliest ones like
> Cyrillic. I don't even want to mention double-width characters. The

What do you suggest?

Shouldn't we package these fonts before they are of use to everybody?

> used by me, as I need e.g. both German and Russian. I can as well file
> a bug against it, but it wouldn't matter much, as the maintainer would
> just say 'it's not supported upstream' and nothing would happen. Other

What do you suggest?

Well at least the maintainer should probally forward the bug
upstream and mark it forwarded. Not that this alone would help very
much.

The only way to really improve the general situation is if someone who
cares does the work. For exampel the IPv6-developers has done a lot of
work this way. Finding packages with disabled IPv6-support finding
patches and pushing them upward a that kind of stuff. You as
utf8-interrested have to do the same to improve the situation.

> language environments had been (I'm just speculating) a part of Debian
> Policy. In that case, package at least could have been marked as
> 'non-functioning under non-latin circumstances' and this could

We have the BTS for this kind of information. 

And why should we pull packages that works 95% of the time? That would
be damaging. Please find some way to improve the situation without
doing great harm to those statisfied with status quo.

If you force people to put a lot of work in something they don't want
they are going to be even more resisting changes. 


> Thank you for your time, and you want to tell me I'm paranoid, don't
> bother, it is not worth your time :) Better tell me what I might have
> missed in the observing the subject.

I doesn't think any of the above counts as paranoia which obvious
doesn't mean that you aren't paranoid. What you have missed? Probally
some basic facts of how stuff is done with the least damage.

-- 
 Peter Makholm |  I have no caps-lock but I must scream...
 [EMAIL PROTECTED] |   -- Greg
 http://hacking.dk |  

Re: foo has reached testing, removing versioned build-depends?

[Bill Allombert]

On Sat, Apr 19, 2003 at 03:50:23PM +0100, Colin Watson wrote:
> I've read the changelog and the bug report closed by that earlier
> change, and removing the version still makes no sense. If earlier
> versions of debiandoc-sgml produce incorrect output, as reported, then
> the versioned build-dep should be left there, as it will help people
> trying to build with older versions to know what the problem is.

There is no problem with older versions, only with buggy versions.
Some debiandoc-sgml version (not the one in woody e.g) produced
incorrect output with a lot of package, not just menu, but fortunately
this caused only a minor problem. I do not know the exact versions where
this problem occured, and probably some others versions had worse
problems as well.

I was nder the impression that builddeps were not to be used to avoid
using buggy packages.  Sometime packages with bugs are uploaded,
eventually fixed packages are uploaded, but the detail about that belong
to the package changelog, not to other packages control files.

The only reason I have used versionned builddeps in the first place was
to ensure the buildd pick up a fixed version, now the risk is gone, so I
have removed it.

In the same vein, should I write the complete list of g++ version that
are known to misbuild menu on at least one arch ?

Cheers,
-- 
Bill. <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

Re: Accepted openldap2 2.1.17-1 (i386 source)

[Turbo Fredriksson]

Quoting Torsten Landschoff <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

> Source: openldap2
> Binary: slapd libldap2 ldap-utils libldap2-dev
> Version: 2.1.17-1
> Changes: 
>  openldap2 (2.1.17-1) unstable; urgency=low
> [...]
>  openldap2.1 (2.1.16-1) unstable; urgency=low

Was this such a clever idea? Shouldn't the new upload
ALSO be named 'openldap2.1'?
-- 
Ft. Meade smuggle kibo BATF assassination explosion Honduras pits
president tritium PLO colonel FSF Marxist $400 million in gold bullion
[See http://www.aclu.org/echelonwatch/index.html for more about this]

Re: debconf review of cvsd (was Re: stop abusing debconf already)

[Arthur de Jong]

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1


> Arthur de Jong wrote:
> > Ok, could you review my cvsd package for me for correct debconf usage
> > and tell me what you do and don't like?
>
> Thanks for taking advantage of that offer. (So far you're the only one.)
> I am ccing this to -devel just because.
>
> All of the debconf questions are pretty well worded and clear, but
> there's always room for improvement:

Thanks for the review. I've changed most of the wording according to your
suggestions (English isn't my native language).

>s/zero (0)/0/  # Apparently writing it out has the possibility to make
>   # someone enter the number the wrong way so why not just
>   # not write it out?

I spelled out zero because some (most) fonts don't represent 0 differently
from O. Same goes for 1 and l.

>   - It's sort of odd that you use spaces to separate multiple items in one
> question, and then colons to separate them in the next.

It would be nice if debconf would have some unified way of entering lists.
I'm also not very happy with the way it is currently done, but I've
modeled it after the cvs questions and a colon is the "standard" seporator
for directories, while using : in addresses may provide problems with IPv6
addresses (improving this is on my TODO list).

>   - I was fairly confused by cvsd/limit_memorylocked, because I thought
> that only programs run as root could lock memory, and why would cvs
> want to? Was this just added for (over)completeness?

Probably. I provided questions for all the limits I could find. The code
also covers limits for things that are not settable on linux (there is
even a debconf question about it that is never asked).

>   - You have no translations for the debconf templates in the package. The
> DDTP project has a complete German translation at
> http://ddtp.debian.org/debconf/source/cvsd. Of course you may want to
> make the above changes first, and wait for an updated translation..

I have received a Brazillian translation of the debconf questions that I'm
merging into cvsd (bug #187795). I saw the German translation at
  http://ddtp.debian.org/cgi-bin/ddtp.cgi?part=debconf&package=cvsd
before but I never saw the page you linked (very useful page but I can't
find it linked from the site). And since the site says "(Now) we don't
need any action from the debian package maintainer." I didn't take any
action regarding the translation.

> If I reconfigure cvsd, pick all the limits, and take the default value
> for everything else, it exits with code 20:
>
> debconf (developer): <-- GET cvsd/limits
> debconf (developer): --> 0 coredumpsize, cputime, datasize, filesize,
> memorylocked, openfiles, maxproc, memoryuse, stacksize, virtmem
> debconf (developer): <-- GET cvsd/limit_coredumpsize cputime datasize 
> filesize memorylocked openfiles maxproc memoryuse stacksize virtmem
> debconf (developer): --> 20 Incorrect number of arguments
> zsh: exit 20DEBCONF_DEBUG=. dpkg-reconfigure cvsd
>
> Looks like a bug.. After doing this I also did not see all the limits
> stuff in cvsd.conf, it had only these config items:
>
> Uid cvsd
> Gid cvsd
> PidFile /var/run/cvsd.pid
> RootJail /var/lib/cvsd
> MaxConnections 10
> Nice 1
> Listen * 2401

This looks like it may be due to a bug (or incompatibility) in zsh. Do you
have /bin/sh set to zsh? I have some strange results if I use zsh to
process the postinst. I'll do some more testing. Somehow the result of the
'GET cvsd/limits' is passed to the next command.

> Looking at your priorities, I'm not sure why the maximum connection
> limit is at priority medium.

I already changed it to low for the next release (couldn't remember
either why it was set to medium).

> > I've set it up to ask first whether to use debconf to manage
> > configuration of /etc/cvsd/cvsd.conf (not a conffile). If the user
> > chooses to not use debconf, he's on his own (an example cvsd.conf is
> > provided).
>
> Of course this is where in my opinion you lose. First of all, as Colin
> pointed out recently, any question that asks "use debconf" and defaults
> to true results in the package violating debian policy on any system
> where the debconf priority is higher than the question, or
> noninteractive mode is used. If the question is not shown to the user at
> all, and a default config is put into place, and the user edits that
> config and loses changes on upgrade, then you've violated policy.
>
> Secondly of course, I hate all "use debconf" questions. It's the wrong
> way to use debconf; you should be intelligently parsing answers out of
> the file on reconfigure and upgrade, and intelligently editing them back
> into the file, so you do not lose an admin's modifications or comments.
> No config file in debian should have warnings at the top about not
> editing it. I wince every time I see another "do not edit this file"; I
> consider every one at least one user lost to gentoo or some other
> distribut

Re: New project proposal: debian-lex

[Jeremy Malcolm]

On Sat, 2003-04-19 at 23:57, Andreas Tille wrote:
> On 19 Apr 2003, Jeremy Malcolm wrote:
> 
> > I am interested in coordinating a new sub-project called Debian-Lex,
> Could you please explain the naming "lex" for non English speakers?
> 
> In general I really like your idea because I think those internal
> projects are an important way to fit the needs of our users.  I
> would recommend to read the slides of my talk about internal projects
> and also follow rhe link to the Subproject HOWTO.

OK, thanks.  Here (http://people.debian.org/~terminus/debian-lex/) is a
rough Web page which I have shamelessly plagiarised from your Debian-Med
project.  I will contact the appropriate people in the mailing list and
Web page groups to see if we can get this formalised.  I have a
preliminary list of packages (or proposed packages) that I would want to
see as part of Debian-Lex, and I will contact those developers also.

-- 
JEREMY MALCOLM <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Personal: http://www.malcolm.id.au
Providing online networks of Australian lawyers (http://www.ilaw.com.au)
and Linux experts (http://www.linuxconsultants.com.au) for instant help!
Disclaimer: http://www.terminus.net.au/disclaimer.html. GPG key: finger.




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Description: This is a digitally signed message part

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Bruce Stephens]

Andreas Dilger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

[...]

> I'm sure all the FSF/Debian folks would be thrilled if someone
> changed the code in [x]emacs to not output anything about the GPL at
> startup, or if vim didn't include any info about helping Ugandan
> orphans.

XEmacs and Emacs follow sensible guidelines: if you start them without
any arguments, then they display useful information, including
information about the GNU GPL.  If you start them such that they can
usefully display something else (like a filename that you want to
edit), then they don't display the other information, and you don't
get reminded about the GNU GPL.

So the information isn't thrust in anybody's face: if you don't give
it any arguments, Emacs doesn't have anything else it might display,
so it may as well display information about itself (how to get help,
conditions of copying, etc.).

To remove this code would be a bad technical decision---there's no
reason to.  I presume (if any code has been changed) that some of the
reiserfs code is doing something that's less technically justifiable.

(I don't know about vim.)

[...]

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Marcelo E. Magallon]

[ I wrote this yesterday when I first saw Hans' message on -devel, but
  postponed it to let the people who have actually had something to do
  with this to speak up.  But it seems that I was right when I assumed
  people wouldn't really know what this is about.  So, stamp a big FYI
  on this post.  Don't Cc me, I'll follow the discussion on -devel.
  Thanks. ]

On Sat, Apr 19, 2003 at 08:07:03PM +0400, Hans Reiser wrote:

 > Please explain your reasons for removing the credits and attributions
 > from the reiserfs utilities in violation of our copyright.

 Just for the benefit of people who don't have any idea what Hans is
 talking about, the following text is printed by (upstream's but not
 Debian's) mkreiserfs before exiting:

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is the
primary sponsor of Reiser4. DARPA does not endorse this project;
it merely sponsors it.

Continuing core development of version 3 is mostly paid for by
Hans Reiser from money made selling licenses in addition to the
GPL to companies who don't want it known that they use ReiserFS
as a foundation for their proprietary product.  And my lawyer
asked 'People pay you money for this?'.  Yup.  Hee Hee.  Life is
good.  If you buy ReiserFS, you can focus on your value add
rather than reinventing an entire FS.  You should buy some free
software too

SuSE pays for continuing work on journaling for version 3, and
paid for much of the previous version 3 work.  Reiserfs
integration in their distro is consistently solid.

MP3.com paid for initial journaling development.

Bigstorage.com contributes to our general fund every month, and
has done so for quite a long time.

Thanks to all of those sponsors, including the secret ones.
Without you, Hans would still have that day job, and the merry
band of hackers would be missing quite a few

Have fun.

 > In the academic world, this is called plagiarism.  In the academic
 > world, knowledge is shared but fairly credited.  The GPL is born of
 > the academic tradition.

 JFTR:

  plagiarism
   n 1: a piece of writing that has been copied from someone else
and is presented as being your own work
   2: the act of plagiarizing; taking someone's words or ideas as
  if they were your own [syn: {plagiarization}, {plagiarisation},
   {piracy}]

 Marcelo

Re: ITO: searching new maintainer for gworkspace package

[Martin Michlmayr]

* Paul Seelig <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2003-04-10 15:28]:
> here's your Debian package maintainer (still) for the gworkspace package
> writing. I want to get rid of the gworkspace package and wanted to first
> ask here before i move on to simply orphan the package via bug report.

Has anyone volunteered?  If not, I think it's time to file a WNPP bug.

-- 
Martin Michlmayr
[EMAIL PROTECTED]

Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Henrique de Moraes Holschuh]

On Sun, 20 Apr 2003, Eduard Bloch wrote:
> > On Sun, 20 Apr 2003, Nikolai Prokoschenko wrote:
> > > The point is actually that deb??an (and others) doesn't care much about
> > > internationalization, no matter what they say. I'm just trying to be
> > 
> > Go away.  
> 
> Come on, is fscking wish reports a good way to communicate with users?

Of course it is not.  But you get the treatment you ask for... and being
insulting IS asking to be ignored or insulted back.  Since it is an user
report, I was quite civilized...

> > If you think something is actively being i18n/l10n unfriendly, file a bug
> > against that.  The correct severity is either grave (if it is a required
> 
> Against what? Who is to blame? Who cares? For example, as user, I would like

Well, you don't have to care much about it. Any Debian maintainer worth the
name knows how to reassign bug reports.

> mlterm to work with UTF8 out of the box when I install (bogus)
> utf8-environment package plus language-ru? See #186983 and tell us how
> you, as maintainer, could _ensure_ that the damn thing works (with the
> best font for this charset environment) _and_ works like the user expects it.

"Ensure"?  I would create a sub-project "Debian-desktop-RU" that had all
defaults tweaked so that it would work.  I don't think there is anything
else you can do that will *ensure* it will always be at best .ru condition.

There is also the often-forgotten X resources.  Configure everything
correctly through it...  It is not impossible to get all packages to
cooperate enough that you can do so.  And a X term that can't handle
resources is so broken, it deserves a grave bug to keep it out of Debin
stable until it learns to do so [I am speaking this with my Debian QA hat
on].

Then package the resources and call it debian-desktop-ru or something.

> but a) who is debian-desktop and b) how should debian-desktop (whoever
> it is, most likely the each maintianer) deal with it without having a
> sane structure to make things flexible?

Well, what is missing to have this "sane structure"?  Propose it well
enough, and if someone that can implement it starts, it will be done.

THAT IS HOW DEBIAN WORKS.

> > And the fix for that bug might not be what you expect, AND still be a proper
> > fix.
> 
> Oh please, he is a pure USER. It is nasty to deal with charset switching

I don't know if you noticed yet, but being a pure user in Debian does not
mean we will assume you are a braindead moron that cannot think or learn for
yourself.  That is exactly what set us appart from other distros.  And yes,
this DOES have its drawbacks sometimes.

> other distributions), but the last (user-relevant) step of the setup is
> not user-friendly at all.

Then work at improving it.  UTF8 in Debian is _very_ imature still, and even
a "how to make your package UTF-8 friendly" document that you could write (and
posted to d-devel and d-desktop if you don't know better places to put it
in, since someone will read it and update the other stuff with it if it is
good enough) would help things immensely.

But don't be insulting at the people who DO spend a lot of effort with l18n
while you're at it.

-- 
  "One disk to rule them all, One disk to find them. One disk to bring
  them all and in the darkness grind them. In the Land of Redmond
  where the shadows lie." -- The Silicon Valley Tarot
  Henrique Holschuh

Re: Bug#189566: amavisd-new: bad interaction with package amavis-ng

[Richard Braakman]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 09:00:51AM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
> In the last case, there should be a way to do this _easily_. Currently
> the only way to do this is parsing dpkg --list output, which is mucho
> ugly.

I'd actually prefer the file check, and not involve the packaging system
in the day-to-day running of the system.

(Example: if I'm installing and configuring a firewall, I'd like to be
able to delete the dpkg files from the final image before flashing it.)

Richard Braakman

Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Richard Braakman]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 10:34:10AM +0200, Eduard Bloch wrote:
> Henrique de Moraes Holschuh schrieb am Sunday, den 20. April 2003:
> > Go away.  
> 
> Come on, is fscking wish reports a good way to communicate with users?

Yes.  If they say things like "deb??an (and others) doesn't care much about
internationalization, no matter what they say", then they should be told
to go away.  That kind of shit just demoralizes the people who are doing
the work.

Richard Braakman

dpkg conffiles merging - request for status summary

[Jarno Elonen]

Just to bring the uninitiated like me up to date about ways to upgrade changed 
dpkg conffiles, I would greatly appreciate if someone with insight could 
summarize the current status:

 + How emotional has the discussion on this topic been in the past?
   Scale: 0 (mostly technical) ... 5 (flamewars) ... 9 (new religion)

 + Are there some specific reasons why dpkg doesn't offer
   "merge interactively" in addition to "keep old", "install new",
   "show diff" and "shell" when  upgrading a package with changed conffiles
   or is it just a feature that nobody has tried to implement yet?

 + Does dpkg currently save the original conffiles somewhere to make 3-way
   merging possible?

 + If I understand correctly, "ucf" has some merging features. Can it be
   used as an alternative for dpkg's conffile upgrade interface or is it
   meant solely for postinst scripts?

 + I recently proposed using generic configuration file parser program(s)
   for editing and upgrading simple config files directly without saving
   the same options in many places at the same time. Have such tools been
   discussed and/or tried before in the Debian project?

 + I can program and find this problem interesting. Would some of you
   authors/maintainers of related tools appreciate help in developing
   configuration management features?

- Jarno

Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Andrew Suffield]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 02:28:13AM +0200, Nikolai Prokoschenko wrote:
> Andrew Suffield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >> Thank you for your time, and you want to tell me I'm paranoid, don't
> >> bother, it is not worth your time :) Better tell me what I might have
> >> missed in the observing the subject.
> AS> A point. What *is* yours?
> 
> The point is actually that deb??an (and others) doesn't care much about
> internationalization, no matter what they say. I'm just trying to be
> diplomatic,???not to risk a 'Do It Yourself' Answer. I'd like to have
> solutions.

There's no magic wand for i18n/l10n. Every application has to be
handled individually, and every language needs some global tuning
before stuff will work right.

We can't do anything about "general" stuff like this, because it's
open-ended. Pick specific stuff that you care about and see what can
be done with it.

-- 
  .''`.  ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield
 : :' :  http://www.debian.org/ | Dept. of Computing,
 `. `'  | Imperial College,
   `- -><-  | London, UK


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Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Andrew Suffield]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 02:05:33AM +0200, Eduard Bloch wrote:
> #include 
> * Andrew Suffield [Sun, Apr 20 2003, 12:29:49AM]:
> > On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 12:26:04AM +0200, Nikolai Prokoschenko wrote:
> > > Thank you for your time, and you want to tell me I'm paranoid, don't
> > > bother, it is not worth your time :) Better tell me what I might have
> > > missed in the observing the subject.
> > 
> > A point. What *is* yours?
> 
> Read. Just read and try with imagination. 

Lengthly and vague and it's easier for me to ask him to get to the
point than to read through it all.

-- 
  .''`.  ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield
 : :' :  http://www.debian.org/ | Dept. of Computing,
 `. `'  | Imperial College,
   `- -><-  | London, UK


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Re: Do we need policy changes?

[David Starner]

> And why should we pull packages that works 95% of the time?

One of the release goals for Woody (I believe) was that everything is
8-bit clean. The same could have been said for that; why should we pull
packages that work 95% of the time? (And if 8-bit cleanness is not 95%
of the time, then neither is not handling UTF-8, considering that's
requirement for India, home of over a sixth of the world's population.)

-- 
David Starner - [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Ic sæt me on anum leahtrice, ða com heo and bát me!

Re: debconf review of cvsd (was Re: stop abusing debconf already)

[Joey Hess]

Arthur de Jong wrote:
> I have received a Brazillian translation of the debconf questions that I'm
> merging into cvsd (bug #187795). I saw the German translation at
>   http://ddtp.debian.org/cgi-bin/ddtp.cgi?part=debconf&package=cvsd
> before but I never saw the page you linked (very useful page but I can't
> find it linked from the site). And since the site says "(Now) we don't
> need any action from the debian package maintainer." I didn't take any
> action regarding the translation.

I think they want thier translations to be used, but I don't really
know. Don't expect the DDTP to make things very useful or organized
though. :-/ I have a script that can automatically download translations
from the DDTP, it's only a prototype however.

> > If I reconfigure cvsd, pick all the limits, and take the default value
> > for everything else, it exits with code 20:
> >
> > debconf (developer): <-- GET cvsd/limits
> > debconf (developer): --> 0 coredumpsize, cputime, datasize, filesize,
> > memorylocked, openfiles, maxproc, memoryuse, stacksize, virtmem
> > debconf (developer): <-- GET cvsd/limit_coredumpsize cputime datasize 
> > filesize memorylocked openfiles maxproc memoryuse stacksize virtmem
> > debconf (developer): --> 20 Incorrect number of arguments
> > zsh: exit 20DEBCONF_DEBUG=. dpkg-reconfigure cvsd
> >
> > Looks like a bug.. After doing this I also did not see all the limits
> > stuff in cvsd.conf, it had only these config items:
> >
> > Uid cvsd
> > Gid cvsd
> > PidFile /var/run/cvsd.pid
> > RootJail /var/lib/cvsd
> > MaxConnections 10
> > Nice 1
> > Listen * 2401
> 
> This looks like it may be due to a bug (or incompatibility) in zsh. Do you
> have /bin/sh set to zsh? I have some strange results if I use zsh to
> process the postinst. I'll do some more testing. Somehow the result of the
> 'GET cvsd/limits' is passed to the next command.

My /bin/sh is dash. Looks like there must be some problem in the for
loop that is not splitting the RET on words.

> Reading the current configuration is almost finished and will go into the
> next release.

> I'll look into editing the existing configuration file rather than
> overwriting it. I ran into some problems earlier though (especially things
> like where do you put new configuration options that were not there
> before). Also Limit, Repos and Listen may be specified multiple times so
> that may be tricky.

Remember you can use perl for either the config or the postinst script.
Might make the more complicated stuff more maneagable. I'm glad you're
making progress on this.

-- 
see shy jo


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Re: Bug#189566: amavisd-new: bad interaction with package amavis-ng

[Marc Haber]

On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 15:54:23 +0300, Richard Braakman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:
>On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 09:00:51AM +0200, Marc Haber wrote:
>> In the last case, there should be a way to do this _easily_. Currently
>> the only way to do this is parsing dpkg --list output, which is mucho
>> ugly.
>
>I'd actually prefer the file check, and not involve the packaging system
>in the day-to-day running of the system.

That way, one would need to have a special "tag file" in the package,
since every file in real use of the package can potentially be present
in a conflicting package as well.

Maybe the init scripts should check an md5sum of the file they intend
to invoke before doing so? But that wouldn't solve the problem for
inetd configuration left around for example.

Greetings
Marc

-- 
-- !! No courtesy copies, please !! -
Marc Haber  |   " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header
Karlsruhe, Germany  | Beginning of Wisdom " | Fon: *49 721 966 32 15
Nordisch by Nature  | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fax: *49 721 966 31 29

Common Policy Proposal

[Wafula Okumu]

Dear Debian and Chad:

Is it possible for you to assist me by sharing with me a framework for a common 
defence and security policy proposal.

I would be most grateful if you can share with me this information at your 
earliest possible convenience.

Happy Easter,

Wafula

-- 
__
Sign-up for your own FREE Personalized E-mail at Mail.com
http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup

Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Josef Spillner]

On Sunday 20 April 2003 10:09, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
>   Apart from telling various and sundry people about it, have
>  you done anything? This is free software. If it scratches youtr itch,
>  fix it. And send patches.

The original author stated that it occurs that upstream rejects UTF-8 fixes 
and the like.
So, here's my proposal, Nikolai:
Make a public webpage with a list of all projects which reject such fixes, 
and/or maintainers who claim that their upstream rejects such fixes.
Add a column to this list with applications and libraries which lack proper 
support, so people can see where it's worth working on improvements and where 
it's worth checking out alternative projects if nothing happens after some 
time.

Further improvements can be accellerated by adding support on development 
tools (for instance automake still cannot handle i18n'd manpages), even 
though this is not always easy to do.

Another example: The German translation of passwd(1) is from 1993, and is 
plain wrong.
The way to handle such issues is not to complain, but to run:
apt-cache show `dpkg -S /usr/share/man/de/man1/passwd.1.gz | cut -d ":" -f 1` 
| grep Maintainer
...and to send the guy in question a mail with an updated manpage (or use the 
BTS in more complicated cases, or send it to upstream directly where it makes 
sense).

Sarge will have an updated version, because I cared about it :)

Josef

-- 
Play for fun, win for freedom.

Re: New project proposal: debian-lex

[Enrico Zini]

On Sat, Apr 19, 2003 at 01:41:51PM -0400, Daniel Burrows wrote:

> > > > I am interested in coordinating a new sub-project called Debian-Lex,
> > > Could you please explain the naming "lex" for non English speakers?
> > It's latin, not english. :-) It means "law".
>   I strongly urge you to change it to something like "Debian-Law", or
> everyone will think you're creating a subproject for regexp-based
> tokenizers :-)  (or maybe libraries, which was my second guess from your
> subject line)

I should point out that there are probably more lawyers than software
developers in the world, so your point can be reversed.


If english people don't even know what "lex" means, they should make a
damn effort and and learn it, or at least try to see if they can.

The rest of people on Earth using computers have been having headaches
learning stupid english slang words like widgets, gadgets or applets for
years: show at least some respect, damnit.



With love,

Enrico

--
GPG key: 1024D/797EBFAB 2000-12-05 Enrico Zini <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>


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ITA: mpich: Parallel computing system

[Adam C Powell IV]

Package: wnpp
Severity: wishlist
Greetings,
I'm in the process of adopting mpich from Junichi Uekawa.  This is at 
Junichi's request, as described on the debian-beowulf list a few days ago.

Zeen,
--
-Adam P.
GPG fingerprint: D54D 1AEE B11C CE9B A02B  C5DD 526F 01E8 564E E4B6
Welcome to the best software in the world today cafe! 

Re: why do we care about configuration files?

[Darren Salt]

I demand that Anthony DeRobertis may or may not have written...

> Is it just me, or would this fix the problem simply:

>1) If a postinst generates a configuration file with debconf, it must
>   place the md5sum of the generated configuration file in /var

>2) A package should try and parse the current configuration file back
>   into debconf before prompting.

>3) After prompting, the package must confirm that the current md5sum
>   matches the one stored in /var. If it does and the package succeeded
>   at (2) it may replace the configuration file. Otherwise, use ucf.

4) The user edits the configuration file ("I'd changed that to do "),
then notices that his extra configuration text has gone missing, along with
his comments as to why the change was made. And it's all been restored to the
original layout, and he finds it harder to follow when it's formatted like
that...

5) Said user happens finds your message and some followups, and agrees that
you were probably too tired to think straight... ;-)

-- 
| Darren Salt   | nr. Ashington, | linux (or ds) at
| woody, sarge, | Northumberland | youmustbejoking
| RISC OS   | Toon Army  | demon co uk
|   Oh, sarge too...

Avoid run-on sentences they are hard to read.

Re: New project proposal: debian-lex

[Jarno Elonen]

> 
> If english people don't even know what "lex" means, they should make a
> damn effort and and learn it, or at least try to see if they can.
>
> The rest of people on Earth using computers have been having headaches
> learning stupid english slang words like widgets, gadgets or applets for
> years: show at least some respect, damnit.
> 

Ouch, punch taken.. There's a difference here, however. 'Lex' is an academin 
slang word for which a common language alternative exists, 'law', while 
'widget' is the only name for the thing it represents. Debian-law is not an 
optimal name either, though. It feels like the package contains The Debian 
Law that every user must follow. (And makes Debian-policy sound like it's a 
project for making Debian suitable for the police.. :])

Don't mind us detailists, the project is an ambitious and admirable one. You 
have the right to name it however you like - and if it sounds good to a 
member of its intended audience, it's probably good. =)

- Jarno

Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files (Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness)

[Matt Zimmerman]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 02:45:32AM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote:

>   Hmm. ucf does show the user the changes, and even offers to
>  merge maintainer changes into the current configuration file.
> 
>   What functionality do you think ucf is missing?

In my first message, I listed bullet points for goals, most of which ucf
meets, and then outlined the problems with this model, and linked to
previous threads discussing them in detail.

http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2003/debian-devel-200304/msg01320.html

-- 
 - mdz

Re: debconf review of cvsd (was Re: stop abusing debconf already)

[Steve Langasek]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 12:03:40PM +0200, Arthur de Jong wrote:

> >s/zero (0)/0/  # Apparently writing it out has the possibility to make
> >   # someone enter the number the wrong way so why not just
> >   # not write it out?

> I spelled out zero because some (most) fonts don't represent 0 differently
> from O. Same goes for 1 and l.

In this case, I would suggest putting the word, not the number, in
parentheses:  0 (zero).

Regards,
-- 
Steve Langasek
postmodern programmer


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Re: md5 checksums

[Javier Fernández-Sanguino Peña]

On Thu, Apr 17, 2003 at 02:11:49PM +0200, Josip Rodin wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 17, 2003 at 01:14:04PM +0200, Stephane Jourdois wrote:
> > I just noticed that not all packages in sid do provide md5 checksums
> > for the files they contains.
> > 
> > What should be done against this ? Shall we file bugreports against
> > all packages that we can found, or perhaps lintian should check this ?
> 
> No. md5sums control file is an optional feature.

Which, IMHO should be required by now. IMHO it's bad enough that dpkg does 
not handle this itself (#155799 and, better, #187019).

Regards

Javi


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Re: New project proposal: debian-lex

[Steve Langasek]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 06:56:14PM +0300, Jarno Elonen wrote:
> > 
> > If english people don't even know what "lex" means, they should make a
> > damn effort and and learn it, or at least try to see if they can.
> >
> > The rest of people on Earth using computers have been having headaches
> > learning stupid english slang words like widgets, gadgets or applets for
> > years: show at least some respect, damnit.
> > 

> Ouch, punch taken.. There's a difference here, however. 'Lex' is an academin 
> slang word for which a common language alternative exists, 'law',

English is not the common language for lawyers.  Nor is "lex" a slang
word.

-- 
Steve Langasek
postmodern programmer


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anti-spam trick for debian ml (was Re: News about the Package Tracking System)

[Domenico Andreoli]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 02:49:26PM +0200, Raphael Hertzog wrote:
> Hi folks,
> 
hi Raphael,

> I just made an important change to PTS. Since the PTS email adresses
> have been available on the web, they start collecting a significant
> quantity of spam. As a first measure to avoid them I decided that any
> email sent directly to the PTS should be auto-approved. Auto-approval is
> easy, you just have to add an "X-PTS-Approved" header with a non-empty
> value. If you don't do that, you get a bounce (and the bounce explains
> you how to auto-approve your message).
>
why not use this trick also for posts to debian mailing lists?


-[ Domenico Andreoli, aka cavok
 --[ http://filibusta.crema.unimi.it/~cavok/gpgkey.asc
   ---[ 3A0F 2F80 F79C 678A 8936  4FEE 0677 9033 A20E BC50

Re: New project proposal: debian-lex

[Andreas Barth]

* Jarno Elonen ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) [030420 18:20]:
> Ouch, punch taken.. There's a difference here, however. 'Lex' is an academin 
> slang word for which a common language alternative exists, 'law', while 

But: lex is also used in many different languages than English. I
don't see the strong need for an english word when there is a much
better international alternative that is understand by jurisprudent
people all over the world - the potential users.



Andi
-- 
   http://home.arcor.de/andreas-barth/
   PGP 1024/89FB5CE5  DC F1 85 6D A6 45 9C 0F  3B BE F1 D0 C5 D1 D9 0C
   Fachbegriffe des Schienenverkehrs #1 von Marc Haber in dasr
   Alles wird billiger: 50 % Preiserhöhung für Stammkunden.

Re: New project proposal: debian-lex

[Christian Surchi]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 06:56:14PM +0300, Jarno Elonen wrote:
> Ouch, punch taken.. There's a difference here, however. 'Lex' is an academin 
> slang word for which a common language alternative exists, 'law', while 
> 'widget' is the only name for the thing it represents. Debian-law is not an 
> optimal name either, though. It feels like the package contains The Debian 
> Law that every user must follow. (And makes Debian-policy sound like it's a 
> project for making Debian suitable for the police.. :])

And after that we should create Debian-dogma! 

-- 
Christian Surchi, [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] |   ICQ 
www.debian.org - www.softwarelibero.it - www.firenze.linux.it| 38374818
He who laughs has not yet heard the bad news. -- Bertolt Brecht

Re: anti-spam trick for debian ml (was Re: News about the Package Tracking System)

[Jack Moffitt]

> > I just made an important change to PTS. Since the PTS email adresses
> > have been available on the web, they start collecting a significant
> > quantity of spam. As a first measure to avoid them I decided that any
> > email sent directly to the PTS should be auto-approved. Auto-approval is
> > easy, you just have to add an "X-PTS-Approved" header with a non-empty
> > value. If you don't do that, you get a bounce (and the bounce explains
> > you how to auto-approve your message).
> >
> why not use this trick also for posts to debian mailing lists?

Is there some reason why TMDA isn't being used?  We've used this at
Xiph.org for the mailing lists for quite some time now, and I don't
think a single spam has gotten through yet.  

It's somewhat similar what what you discuss above, but a lot more user
friendly.

jack.

Re: New project proposal: debian-lex

[Christian Surchi]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 11:19:23AM -0500, Steve Langasek wrote:
> > Ouch, punch taken.. There's a difference here, however. 'Lex' is an 
> > academin 
> > slang word for which a common language alternative exists, 'law',
> 
> English is not the common language for lawyers.  Nor is "lex" a slang
> word.

Probably they missed lessons about ancient Rome... :)

-- 
Christian Surchi, [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED] |   ICQ 
www.debian.org - www.softwarelibero.it - www.firenze.linux.it| 38374818
Grazie dei fiori, anch'io ti farò un mazzo così. -- Freak Antoni

Re: Do we need policy changes?

[Morgon Kanter]

> > other distributions), but the last (user-relevant) step of the setup is
> > not user-friendly at all.
> 
> Then work at improving it.  UTF8 in Debian is _very_ imature still, and even
> a "how to make your package UTF-8 friendly" document that you could write (and
> posted to d-devel and d-desktop if you don't know better places to put it
> in, since someone will read it and update the other stuff with it if it is
> good enough) would help things immensely.

That document would certainly be a good idea, and I would take it to 
heart. I would certainly love to make my prospective packages as UTF-8 
(and i18n in gerenal) friendly as possible.

-- 
Morgon Kanter   GPG key ID: 297CEA5B
If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, there'd be 
peace. -- John Lennon

Re: md5 checksums

[Colin Walters]

On Sun, 2003-04-20 at 12:16, Javier FernÃndez-Sanguino PeÃa wrote:

> Which, IMHO should be required by now. IMHO it's bad enough that dpkg does 
> not handle this itself (#155799 and, better, #187019).

And even better than both of those, #155676.

Re: foo has reached testing, removing versioned build-depends?

[Colin Watson]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 11:20:54AM +0200, Bill Allombert wrote:
> On Sat, Apr 19, 2003 at 03:50:23PM +0100, Colin Watson wrote:
> > I've read the changelog and the bug report closed by that earlier
> > change, and removing the version still makes no sense. If earlier
> > versions of debiandoc-sgml produce incorrect output, as reported, then
> > the versioned build-dep should be left there, as it will help people
> > trying to build with older versions to know what the problem is.
> 
> There is no problem with older versions, only with buggy versions.
> Some debiandoc-sgml version (not the one in woody e.g)

Aha, I see. Thanks.

> I was nder the impression that builddeps were not to be used to avoid
> using buggy packages.

I tend to agree.

-- 
Colin Watson  [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Chris Cheney]

Of course as you already know emacs includes so many thing unrelated to
editing that anyone using it has already decided they don't mind the
bloat.  *OT* Really is there any argument that a psychoanalysis program
in an editor is not bloat? By the way emacs21 takes 50MB to install (vim
takes 15MB), and yes a full KDE install takes more at around 254MB to
install but it could be argued it provides more functionality. ;)  Of
course KDE can also be seen as bloat to people enjoying using command
line tools or flipping the switches on their altair. ;) *OT*  The point
I was trying to make was that adding bloat for no good reason at all,
in this case over a screenfull of advertising to a console util harms
its usability.

Chris

Re: New project proposal: debian-lex

[Ralf Hildebrandt]

* Sami Haahtinen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

> > You forget that "lex, legis (f.)" is well known with lawyers. They'll
> > immedialtely recognize it, since so many laws are of roman origin and
> > many latin terms occur.
> 
> Are you trying to tell me, that if the list is named debian-lex, more
> people will know what it means, than by naming it debian-law?
> 
> I think i can claim that pretty much all the lawyers that attend the
> list, know english. Atleast enough to know what 'law' means.

Well, "med" isn't a word at all. At least lex is a word.

-- 
Ralf Hildebrandt (Im Auftrag des Referat V a)   [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Charite Campus MitteTel.  +49 (0)30-450 570-155
Referat V a - Kommunikationsnetze - Fax.  +49 (0)30-450 570-916
AIM: ralfpostfix

Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files (Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness)

[Manoj Srivastava]

> On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 12:22:31 -0400,
> Matt Zimmerman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

 > On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 02:45:32AM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
 >> Hmm. ucf does show the user the changes, and even offers to merge
 >> maintainer changes into the current configuration file.
 >>
 >> What functionality do you think ucf is missing?

 > In my first message, I listed bullet points for goals, most of
 > which ucf meets, and then outlined the problems with this model,
 > and linked to previous threads discussing them in detail.

 > http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2003/debian-devel-200304/msg01320.html

From my reading of that message, about the only thing that is
 missing is using debconf to ask the questions. Have I missed
 anything? (I must confess I only skimmed the first few layers of the
 message tree you pointed to as references; from my memory of those
 discussions, there was little new, and the consensus seemed to have
 been reached for post-inst prompting).

Using debconf is on the TODO list for ucf, and perhaps a
 rewrite of the current prototype in C for speed later down the line.

manoj
-- 
Smear the road with a runner!!
Manoj Srivastava   <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
1024R/C7261095 print CB D9 F4 12 68 07 E4 05  CC 2D 27 12 1D F5 E8 6E
1024D/BF24424C print 4966 F272 D093 B493 410B  924B 21BA DABB BF24 424C

Re: anti-spam trick for debian ml (was Re: News about the Package Tracking System)

[Raphael Hertzog]

Le Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 06:19:07PM +0200, Domenico Andreoli écrivait:
> > quantity of spam. As a first measure to avoid them I decided that any
> > email sent directly to the PTS should be auto-approved. Auto-approval is
> > easy, you just have to add an "X-PTS-Approved" header with a non-empty
> > value. If you don't do that, you get a bounce (and the bounce explains
> > you how to auto-approve your message).
>
> why not use this trick also for posts to debian mailing lists?

For the PTS it's ok as it's not something used regularly to send mails.

But for mailing lists it would be annoying to have to add an
extra-header each time you want to write to the list. And there are
people who don't use mutt or gnus and can't easily add arbitrary
headers. I really think that this auto-approval thingie is just a
temporary measure until we do something better.

Cheers,
-- 
Raphaël Hertzog -+- http://www.ouaza.com
Formation Linux et logiciel libre : http://www.logidee.com

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Frank Gevaerts]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 01:02:15PM -0500, Chris Cheney wrote:
> in an editor is not bloat? By the way emacs21 takes 50MB to install (vim
> takes 15MB), and yes a full KDE install takes more at around 254MB to
> install but it could be argued it provides more functionality. ;) 

Are you sure ? Emacs provides a _lot_ of functionality ;)

Frank

> Chris
> 
> 
> -- 
> To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Re: imlib-linked-with-libpng3

[Steve M. Robbins]

On Fri, Apr 18, 2003 at 07:53:50PM -0500, Steve Langasek wrote:
> On Fri, Apr 18, 2003 at 08:43:45PM -0400, Steve M. Robbins wrote:

> > What would be the best way to accomodate such a request?  I can
> > imagine introducing a new package of imlib linked with libpng3.  But
> > since it has to use the same SOVERSION as the current imlib1, it would
> > have to conflict with imlib1.  Each individual admin could then choose
> > to use imlib+png2 or to use imlib+png3.  However, each choice would
> > have its own set of incompatible programs so this option doesn't
> > appeal to me.
> 
> If upstream is dormant (and I know that's an understatement), you could
> also try to coordinate with other vendors who might still ship imlib and
> agree to pick a new soname anyway.  That seems a better choice than
> creating a new package that conflicts with imlib1, IMHO.

I was in fact having email discussions with both upstream and with
a Red Hat maintainer last August & September.  We had mutually 
agreed to pick a new soname.  As Chris pointed out, Red Hat has
gone ahead and released imlib1 with the new soname.  

I was waiting for the new upstream release for fear of violating a
rule about changing the soname from upstream.  You're suggesting we
just go ahead.  I'm fine with that.  I expect that any new upstream
release would have to take into account the soname of the
currently-shipping Red Hat package anyway.

If changing the soname for imlib1 bothers anyone, do let me know now.
I want to emphasize that this is only for imlib1: I have no plan to
change anything with gdk-imlib.

Thanks,
-Steve

Re: anti-spam trick for debian ml (was Re: News about the Package Tracking System)

[Raphael Hertzog]

Le Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 10:47:55AM -0600, Jack Moffitt écrivait:
> Is there some reason why TMDA isn't being used?  We've used this at
> Xiph.org for the mailing lists for quite some time now, and I don't
> think a single spam has gotten through yet.  

I don't know exactly.

It's because most of the Debian lists have always been 100% open... and
requiring a confirmation would close the list for complete newbies who
can't understand the principle.

I for one would be ok to test TMDA at the PTS level if someone shows me
how to integrate it nicely in the current setup. But you know
master.debian.org is running potato and I don't know if the TMDA in
potato is well suited ... 

Cheers,
-- 
Raphaël Hertzog -+- http://www.ouaza.com
Formation Linux et logiciel libre : http://www.logidee.com

Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files (Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness)

[Matt Zimmerman]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 12:59:27PM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote:

> > On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 12:22:31 -0400,
> > Matt Zimmerman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 
>  > In my first message, I listed bullet points for goals, most of
>  > which ucf meets, and then outlined the problems with this model,
>  > and linked to previous threads discussing them in detail.
> 
>  > http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2003/debian-devel-200304/msg01320.html
> 
>   From my reading of that message, about the only thing that is
>  missing is using debconf to ask the questions. Have I missed
>  anything? (I must confess I only skimmed the first few layers of the
>  message tree you pointed to as references; from my memory of those
>  discussions, there was little new, and the consensus seemed to have
>  been reached for post-inst prompting).

Yes, debconf would seem to be the only item in that list that ucf does not
implement, now that the three-way option is documented in 0.12 (18 Apr).

>   Using debconf is on the TODO list for ucf, and perhaps a
>  rewrite of the current prototype in C for speed later down the line.

ucf still has the same fundamental problem with regard to preconfiguration,
which was the primary issue that I raised in my original message.  The
consensus, as I recall, was that preconfiguration is important, and that
prompting in postinst should be minimized.  If such a system is to be used
for a large number of packaging, this would mean moving a large number of
prompts into postinst, which I think is undesirable.

-- 
 - mdz

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Andrew Suffield]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 01:02:15PM -0500, Chris Cheney wrote:
> Of course as you already know emacs includes so many thing unrelated to
> editing that anyone using it has already decided they don't mind the
> bloat.  *OT* Really is there any argument that a psychoanalysis program
> in an editor is not bloat?

Yes. It's the same as the argument that "a psychoanalysis program in
an editor" is not a gerbil, nameably that there's no apparent
connection.

From The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (09 FEB 02) [foldoc]:

  software bloat
  
  The result of adding new features to a program
 or system to the point where the benefit of the new features
 is outweighed by the extra resources consumed ({RAM}, disk
 space or performance) and complexity of use.  Software bloat
 is an instance of Parkinson's Law: resource requirements
 expand to consume the resources available.  Causes of software
 bloat include {second-system effect} and {creeping
 featuritis}.  Commonly cited examples include Unix's "{ls}(1)"
 command, the {X Window System}, {BSD}, {Missed'em-five},
 {OS/2} and any {Microsoft} product.
  
 [{Jargon File}]
  
 (1995-10-16)

In order to demonstrate that something is "bloat", you have to
demonstrate that including it causes a problem which outweighs the
advantage.

Note that you have to do this in an environment where .5Gb of memory,
120Gb hard drives, and 1GHz processors are relatively common, and so
losing a few hundred kb of storage is not likely to bother you
much. Certainly doesn't bother me.

[As a side note, this implies that "bloat" is a context-sensitive
term, and not an absolute - much like "fast".]

-- 
  .''`.  ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield
 : :' :  http://www.debian.org/ | Dept. of Computing,
 `. `'  | Imperial College,
   `- -><-  | London, UK


pgpybwy176XTC.pgp
Description: PGP signature

Re: anti-spam trick for debian ml (was Re: News about the Package Tracking System)

[Jarno Elonen]

> But for mailing lists it would be annoying to have to add an
> extra-header each time you want to write to the list. And there are
> people who don't use mutt or gnus and can't easily add arbitrary
> headers. I really think that this auto-approval thingie is just a
> temporary measure until we do something better.

How about keeping a whitelist database in which the users can add themselves 
by sending a mail in certain format to something like 
"[EMAIL PROTECTED]"? Only after that would mail from that address be 
accepted without bouncing. That should filter out most of the spam.

- Jarno

Re: anti-spam trick for debian ml (was Re: News about the Package Tracking System)

[Jack Moffitt]

> > Is there some reason why TMDA isn't being used?  We've used this at
> > Xiph.org for the mailing lists for quite some time now, and I don't
> > think a single spam has gotten through yet.  
> 
> I don't know exactly.
> 
> It's because most of the Debian lists have always been 100% open... and
> requiring a confirmation would close the list for complete newbies who
> can't understand the principle.

We haven't seen this problem on the vorbis lists.  We do occasionally
get people who quote the entire reply from TMDA when authorizing
themselves, but even so, it's better than a lot of spam and certainly
better than closing the lists.

jack.

Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files (Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness)

[Jarno Elonen]

> ucf still has the same fundamental problem with regard to preconfiguration,
> which was the primary issue that I raised in my original message.  The
> consensus, as I recall, was that preconfiguration is important, and that
> prompting in postinst should be minimized.

I may have missed something but why can't the changed/merged configuration 
files be saved somewhere in preinstall phase and the current "live" configs 
be overwritten only in the postinstall phase by dpkg or postinst scripts if 
the rest of the installation went well?

- Jarno

Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files (Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness)

[Matt Zimmerman]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 09:48:48PM +0300, Jarno Elonen wrote:

> > ucf still has the same fundamental problem with regard to
> > preconfiguration, which was the primary issue that I raised in my
> > original message.  The consensus, as I recall, was that preconfiguration
> > is important, and that prompting in postinst should be minimized.
> 
> I may have missed something but why can't the changed/merged configuration
> files be saved somewhere in preinstall phase and the current "live"
> configs be overwritten only in the postinstall phase by dpkg or postinst
> scripts if the rest of the installation went well?

Again: see my first message and followups for a specific, concrete example
of why this won't work.

-- 
 - mdz

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Matt Ryan]

> > Dude,
> >
> > You really need to calm down. Twice now recently you have opened
your
> > mouth and stuck your foot in when there really wasn't any need to. Take
a
> > Valium and do something less stressful.
>
> Are you talking to me?

You are the one with the foot hanging out of your mouth so by a process of
elimination it has to be you. Really we don't need to alienate upstream
software authors with flame responses. Point out that he can file a bug and
leave it at that.


Matt.

Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Matt Ryan]

> Conside rthis: when considering input from a ``jumped up
>  developer'' who has demonstrated competence and has put in the effort
>  like Joey Hess, and has intituted a couple of major changes in how
>  Debian works, and an unknown twit, guess who am I going to listen to?

Yawn. I don't know and I doubt you would listen if I did. It doesn't really
matter. Everyone has an opinion and I have voiced mine. Perhaps I should be
censored to avoid my rambling encroaching into your computer?

Just because they have put some effort into the project does *not* make them
infallible - all it makes them is a good coder, nothing more. Emboldening
them with further super-powers is ridiculous.


Matt.

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Matt Ryan]

> Heh. First you bad mouth Joey Hess. And now you go up against
>  Ben Collins. And both times you take what I consider impolitic
>  stances  that show poor judgment (even ignoring the fact that you
>  are, with nothing whatsoever to back it up) some of the most
>  respected developers in Debian.
>
> I applaud this masterly demonstration of a nadir of cluelessness.
>
> I suppose this is accomplishment of a sort.

Ignore me then if I don't rate in your view. On the other hand you could try
to educate me, but I guess I'm too dumb for that. Perhaps if you removed the
Debian prune from your ass I may take some notice. A Linux distribution is
not worth getting so excited over in the grand scheme of things!


Matt.

Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Matt Ryan]

> No offense, but I think you joined the wrong project, then.

No offence taken. I joined when Debian wasn't run by anal retentives. Sure
there was the whole free software part - but not the SS Nazi version of free
software that is being prompted recently. I have to say that I'm beginning
to think that your assessment is right and I should find a more liberal
bunch of Linux fanatics to join with.


Matt.

BTW: Remember at the end of the day it is only a Linux distribution, nothing
more, nothing less.

Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Matt Ryan]

>Um, no.  *Policy* says that it may not be used as a registry.

[SNIPPED LONG DIATRIBE THAT DOES NOT PROVE THE ABOVE STATEMENT]

Sure, you delete the registry things should still work. Did I say anything
different? You are making a long tenuous link to prove your point which I
don't subscribe to. Unless we have a formal definition of 'registry' in
policy as well we can argue this forever as to what is the right way to view
it. Perhaps not taking a Windows centric view would help?

>I'm not sure why you think Joey's expertise doesn't qualify him to make
>pronouncements about the use of debconf.  Unlike you, he at least gets
>the answer right.

Well I don't agree on the right answer bit and I never said he wasn't right
(in some people views). All I said was he answer was not the gospel on this
issue.


Matt.

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Brian Nelson]

Chris Cheney <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> Of course as you already know emacs includes so many thing unrelated to
> editing that anyone using it has already decided they don't mind the
> bloat.  *OT* Really is there any argument that a psychoanalysis program
> in an editor is not bloat? By the way emacs21 takes 50MB to install (vim
> takes 15MB), and yes a full KDE install takes more at around 254MB to
> install but it could be argued it provides more functionality. ;)  Of
> course KDE can also be seen as bloat to people enjoying using command
> line tools or flipping the switches on their altair. ;) *OT*  The point
> I was trying to make was that adding bloat for no good reason at all,
> in this case over a screenfull of advertising to a console util harms
> its usability.

Yeah, yeah, we've heard it all before.  Why don't you take it to
slashdot instead.  Don't you have anything better to do than to make
these pointless, off-topic rants?  You haven't fucked up libvorbis in a
couple weeks.  Why don't you go randomly break that again instead?

-- 
I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less
than half of you half as well as you deserve.


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Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Matt Ryan]

> BTW the opinion of this jumped-up developer is "please don't send me
> private copies of posts to mailing lists". Thanks.

Apologies, 'reply-all' is not clever enough in Outlook Express to evaluate
the sender preference on being copied on list emails. Any suggestions for a
MUA that can perform this feat are appreciated. Altering top posts based on
preference would be an advantage as well.


Matt.

Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness

[Matt Ryan]

>  > What is not helpful is when a developer gets a bad case of NOMUS
>  > (Not On My UNIX System) and goes off on one about how perfectly the
>  > world would be if everyone agreed with their narrow definition of
>  > the 'correct' way to do things. The recent /run debate was another
>  > example of this virulent disease taking hold amongst the vocal
>  > developer cabal.
>
> Really a flaw in the NM process. Don't we require peopel to
> acknowledge the importance of policy nowadays?

Please. I assume we are both adults (I am at least). Therefore we should be
able to have a sensible debate without getting too heated about it.

> Right. The hell with policy, since following policy is mind
>  less conformance.

I never suggested to throw out policy (perhaps you should revisit my email).
All I said was that this was prior best practice and now we might make a
change. Do not burn everyone for trying their best to make things easy for
users just because someone has a bee in their bonnet over this issue.
Eventually someone (MDZ seems to be starting this again) will come up with a
sensible solution (that doesn't predepend on some configuration program
bloat) that will deal with this. Then we can all move over to using that and
everyone will the happy again.


Matt.

Note: That's happy until the next time someone gets all fussed up over the
wrong location for a configuration file.

Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files (Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness)

[Manoj Srivastava]

On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 21:48:48 +0300, Jarno Elonen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

>> ucf still has the same fundamental problem with regard to
>> preconfiguration, which was the primary issue that I raised in my
>> original message.  The consensus, as I recall, was that
>> preconfiguration is important, and that prompting in postinst
>> should be minimized.

> I may have missed something but why can't the changed/merged
> configuration files be saved somewhere in preinstall phase and the
> current "live" configs be overwritten only in the postinstall phase
> by dpkg or postinst scripts if the rest of the installation went
> well?

Well, for configuration files that require the unpacked
 package to generate, you can't ask during preconfiguration. For files
 created using non essential packages, you need to wait until
 postinst, or else those utilities may not be available. 

Thus, in a number of cases, the ``new'' configuration file is
 not determinable in the preinst phase.

Even for files in the package there is no way for ucf to get
 at them -- especially given that the files handled by ucf are not
 conffiles, and thus mingled in the package data.

manoj
-- 
Virtue is a relative term. Spock, "Friday's Child", stardate 3499.1
Manoj Srivastava   <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
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RE: NOTICE: libcupsys2 splitting

[Donald Spoon]

 Jeff Licquia wrote:
> -SNIP- <
If, however, your package deals with the CUPS raster image format
somehow, your package will fail to work with 1.1.18-3 or later until it
is rebuilt with the new libs.  I have identified three packages as
possibly meeting that test: gs-esp, cupsys-driver-gimpprint, and
foomatic-bin.  I maintain gs-esp, and will be dealing with that package
shortly.  The other two maintainers are CCed on this message.
FYI:
I can confirm that it does break cupsys-driver-gimpprint and 
foomatic-bin because I missed this message, and my CUPS printing system 
quit working on about 16 Apr.  These remain broken as of 20 Apr 2003.

I have managed to get printing working under CUPS with a combination of 
your new gs-esp package from "unstable" + hpijs + a printer specific PPD 
generated from linuxprinting.org for my HP 960C printer.  This offers a 
temporary "fix" for owners of HP inkjet printers until 
cupsys-driver-gimpprint and foomatic-bin are re-built.

Cheers,
-Don Spoon-

Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness

[Matt Zimmerman]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 09:06:38PM +0100, Matt Ryan wrote:

> Eventually someone (MDZ seems to be starting this again) will come up with

Please avoid using my name in support of your arguments.  I rather not be
associated with your recent publicity.

-- 
 - mdz

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Manoj Srivastava]

On Sat, 19 Apr 2003 19:46:41 -0700, Craig Dickson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

> Chris Cheney <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> First of all emacs is pure bloat so who cares what it does...

Ah, a troll.

> Don't be an ass. There are a lot of people who would say the same of
> KDE, so it's silly for one of the main Debian KDE maintainers to be
> saying such a thing.

Please don't feed the troll. We already have a problem with
 the miasma of the bones beneath the bridge.

manoj
-- 
If God had not given us sticky tape, it would have been necessary to
invent it.
Manoj Srivastava   <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  
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Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Andrew Suffield]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 08:57:38PM +0100, Matt Ryan wrote:
> > No offense, but I think you joined the wrong project, then.
> 
> No offence taken. I joined when Debian wasn't run by anal retentives. Sure
> there was the whole free software part - but not the SS Nazi version of free
> software that is being prompted recently. I have to say that I'm beginning
> to think that your assessment is right and I should find a more liberal
> bunch of Linux fanatics to join with.

Please do.

> BTW: Remember at the end of the day it is only a Linux distribution, nothing
> more, nothing less.

Bullshit.

-- 
  .''`.  ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield
 : :' :  http://www.debian.org/ | Dept. of Computing,
 `. `'  | Imperial College,
   `- -><-  | London, UK


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Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Manoj Srivastava]

On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 20:39:09 +0100, Matt Ryan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

> You are the one with the foot hanging out of your mouth so by a
> process of elimination it has to be you. Really we don't need to
> alienate upstream software authors with flame responses. Point out
> that he can file a bug and leave it at that.

If the upstream author is rude to me, he does not deserve any
 consideration from myself.  If he chooses to alienate his clientele,
 he should expect to reap what he sowed. 

manoj
-- 
In order to live free and happily, you must sacrifice boredom. It is
not always an easy sacrifice.
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Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Manoj Srivastava]

On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 20:53:11 +0100, Matt Ryan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

> A Linux distribution is not worth getting so excited over in
> the grand scheme of things!

Then you are in the wrong project. If you do not think Debian
 is important in the grand scheme of things, and if you think fawning
 obsequiousness is an appropriate stance for Debian developers to
 take, you really need to think about your commitment to this project.

manoj

-- 
On the subject of C program indentation: "In My Egotistical Opinion,
most people's C programs should be indented six feet downward and
covered with dirt." Blair P. Houghton
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Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Andrew Suffield]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 08:39:09PM +0100, Matt Ryan wrote:
> > > Dude,
> > >
> > > You really need to calm down. Twice now recently you have opened
> your
> > > mouth and stuck your foot in when there really wasn't any need to. Take
> a
> > > Valium and do something less stressful.
> >
> > Are you talking to me?
> 
> You are the one with the foot hanging out of your mouth so by a process of
> elimination it has to be you. Really we don't need to alienate upstream
> software authors with flame responses. Point out that he can file a bug and
> leave it at that.

I'm with Ben. Hans was trolling and you're being a dick.

-- 
  .''`.  ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield
 : :' :  http://www.debian.org/ | Dept. of Computing,
 `. `'  | Imperial College,
   `- -><-  | London, UK


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Re: Common Policy Proposal

[Chad Walstrom]

"Wafula Okumu" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>  wrote:
> Dear Debian and Chad:
> 
> Is it possible for you to assist me by sharing with me a framework for
> a comm on defence and security policy proposal.

HUH?  OK.  Let's give this a try.  I'm thinking that a couple Patriot
Missle batteries would be essential in any common defense and security
policy proposal.  I mean, if you're really going to deter your foes, why
not do it the right way.  They're a rightous weapon, and they attract
the babes like a basket full of Cadbury Chocolate Easter Eggs.

Now, you're going to have to hire at least enough mercenaries for a 5:1
ratio of your upper division staff, the people you most want to protect.
You could drop down to 1:20 for the rest of your company staff, maybe
even 1:50.  If you're trying to protect a country, well, I can't give
you exact numbers, but you're going to want tens of thousands of troops.
That might be a bit expensive to pay mercenaries, so try instilling a
draft.  In any case, make sure you keep them busy on the off time by
helping hide those Easter Eggs in the mine-field.  It's a diversion
tactic.  Your foes won't be able to resist the temptation of a good
egg hunt.

Before you ask, chemical weapons are right out.  It's just too messy and
way to problematic.  You'll likely kill half of your own troops trying
to pull off any sort of attack.  Train them in how to defend against
such warfare, but don't give them the means to participate in any other
way.  You do want some sort of credibility, don't you?  If you really
must, send your foes truckloads of "Peeps", you know, the marshmello
sugar bombs.  If that doesn't devestate your foe completely, they'll at
least be busy shoveling out the latrine for weeks.

Weapons of mass distruction?  Again out.  Don't even bother.  Just be
smart on how you deploy your forces and you'll do fine.  If you can,
however, try to get your hands on a "Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch".
They're quite effective, especially against vorpal bunnies, but rare
indeed.  I suggest that you train your special forces in using this
awesome weapon by screening Monty Python's, "The Search for the Holy
Grail."  It is the defacto standard training material for Holy weaponry.
Remember, you must pull the pin and toss the Grenade on "three".

> I would be most grateful if you can share with me this information at
> your ea rliest possible convenience.

My pleasure.  I hope my information has helped you out...  OK, not
really.

-- 
Chad Walstrom <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>   http://www.wookimus.net/
   assert(expired(knowledge)); /* core dump */

Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files (Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness)

[Jarno Elonen]

> > I may have missed something but why can't the changed/merged
> > configuration files be saved somewhere in preinstall phase
> > [...]
>
> Again: see my first message and followups for a specific, concrete example
> of why this won't work.

Thanks, I read the thread. So the reason was that configuration file 
generation is mostly done in postinst scripts? I didn't quite get why it 
couldn't in practically all cases be done in preinst (or even a completely 
new installation if required), though. Could you provide some 
counter-example(s)?

I doubt the (pre-)dependencies on tools used for generation would really be a 
problem - the generation scripts are usually quite simple and can usually use 
pretty standard tools that don't change much.


- Jarno

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Jarno Elonen]

>   If the upstream author is rude to me, he does not deserve any
>  consideration from myself.  If he chooses to alienate his clientele,
>  he should expect to reap what he sowed.

The difficulty of their character unfortunately often seems to correlate with 
the important of their software. ;) So even if the upstreams sometimes heats 
up easily, please spend extra patience on them for the sake of the users. 
Pretty please.. I'd really hate to lose something like Reiserfs from Debian 
just because of a few unpolite mails back and forth.

- Jarno

Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Colin Walters]

On Sun, 2003-04-20 at 15:57, Matt Ryan wrote:
> > No offense, but I think you joined the wrong project, then.
> 
> No offence taken. I joined when Debian wasn't run by anal retentives. Sure
> there was the whole free software part - but not the SS Nazi [...]

Congratulations, you just proved (yet again) Godwin's Law.

Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness

[Manoj Srivastava]

On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 21:06:38 +0100, Matt Ryan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

> I never suggested to throw out policy (perhaps you should revisit my
> email).  All I said was that this was prior best practice and now we
> might make a change.

Any prior practice that promotes not preserving user changes
 ad comments (despite all that policy says on that subject) can't
 possibly be deemed "best".

> Do not burn everyone for trying their best to make things easy for
> users just because someone has a bee in their bonnet over this
> issue.

Throwing away user changes is doing ones best for them? Since
 when? And when is doing something suboptimally been excusable by
 whining "but I was doing my best"? Making mistakes is not an
 issue. Everyone makes them.


Mindlessly defending practices that go against what we promise
 our users, despite being told by several other developers, is a level
 of intransigence that is unacceptable.

> Eventually someone (MDZ seems to be starting this again)

MDZ seems to be (sinsibly) distancing himself from your stance.

> will come up with a sensible solution (that doesn't predepend on
> some configuration program bloat) that will deal with this. Then we
> can all move over to using that and everyone will the happy again.

Heh. The solution, when presented to you that does keep the
 admin in the loop whenever their changes would be blown away, while
 allowing generation of new configuration files via debconf or other
 programmatic means, it is "bloat", even when under 20KB of code. 

So, while you are wringing your hands over the hurt
 sensibilities of practitioners of a practice that discards user
 changes, do _you_ have any constructive suggestions that can be
 rapidly prototyped, and put into use soon, and are not, in your
 considered opinion, bloat?

manoj
-- 
You!  What PLANET is this! McCoy, "The City on the Edge of Forever",
stardate 3134.0
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Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files (Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness)

[Jarno Elonen]

> > I may have missed something but why can't the changed/merged
> > configuration files be saved somewhere in preinstall phase and the
> > [...]
>
>   Well, for configuration files that require the unpacked
>  package to generate, you can't ask during preconfiguration. For files
>  created using non essential packages, you need to wait until
>  postinst, or else those utilities may not be available.

I have a feeling that these cases are actually quite rare. At least with a 
little help, the developers currently facing those few cases would most 
likely be able to split their packages so that proper pre-depends could be 
applied. Or am I provably being too optimistic?

- Jarno

Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Michael Banck]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 08:57:38PM +0100, Matt Ryan wrote:
> > No offense, but I think you joined the wrong project, then.
 
> No offence taken. I joined when Debian wasn't run by anal retentives. Sure
> there was the whole free software part - but not the SS Nazi version of free
> software that is being prompted recently. 

A great, so we can end this thread now.

> BTW: Remember at the end of the day it is only a Linux distribution, nothing
> more, nothing less.

Ever had a look at http://www.debian.org/ports/#nonlinux?

cheers,

Michael

Re: Proposed handling of generated configuration files (Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness)

[Manoj Srivastava]

On Sun, 20 Apr 2003 23:49:50 +0300, Jarno Elonen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> said: 

> Thanks, I read the thread. So the reason was that configuration file
> generation is mostly done in postinst scripts? I didn't quite get
> why it couldn't in practically all cases be done in preinst (or even
> a completely new installation if required), though. Could you
> provide some counter-example(s)?


my package contains /usr/bin/floobargle that I use to analize
 the system to create a configuration file.  /usr/bin/floobargle is
 not available until unpacked. 

Or, I have a file I can generate, which is in
 /usr/lib/foo/bar.conf; and this file is large, and changes often, I
 do not want to embed it inline in my packages preinst file.

> I doubt the (pre-)dependencies on tools used for generation would
> really be a problem - the generation scripts are usually quite
> simple and can usually use pretty standard tools that don't change
> much.

It depends on what I use to generate the file. A few xml
 files, a little bit of xsl transofrms, and you have a ton of
 prepends. 

manoj
-- 
"I was recently on a tour of Latin America, and the only regret I have
was that I didn't study Latin harder in school so I could converse
with those people." Danforth Quayle
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Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Shyamal Prasad]

"Jarno" == Jarno Elonen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

Jarno> I'd really hate to lose something like Reiserfs from Debian
Jarno> just because of a few unpolite mails back and forth.

Well, if we do lose something because of a few unpolite emails alone I
don't think it qualifies as being free enough to be in Debian to
start with, right?

Not that I'm suggesting being rude to upstream, but if it was about
opinions there's a few people who'd like to see my "OS masquerading as
an editor" go away too ;-)

Cheers!
Shyamal

Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Manoj Srivastava]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 08:57:38PM +0100, Matt Ryan wrote:
> > No offense, but I think you joined the wrong project, then.
>
> No offence taken. I joined when Debian wasn't run by anal
> retentives. Sure there was the whole free software part - but not
> the SS Nazi version of free software that is being prompted
> recently. I have to say that I'm beginning to think that your
> assessment is right and I should find a more liberal bunch of Linux
> fanatics to join with.

Oooh, is that a promise? Anything we can do to facilitate that?

manoj
-- 
A man who turns green has eschewed protein.
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Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Chris Cheney]

I followed Release Managers request on how to deal with the libvorbis
mess, if you have a problem with how it was dealt with bring it up on
irc. You should know this already but a message was sent out a week in
advance to the libvorbis breakage occuring so that maintainers would
about it.  And no the general consensus is not for a library to conflict
with every package that built against an older version (I don't recall
if you suggested that or if it was someone else).

Thanks,
Chris

Re: stop abusing debconf already

[Colin Watson]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 09:09:41PM +0100, Matt Ryan wrote:
> Colin Watson wrote:
> > BTW the opinion of this jumped-up developer is "please don't send me
> > private copies of posts to mailing lists". Thanks.
> 
> Apologies, 'reply-all' is not clever enough in Outlook Express to
> evaluate the sender preference on being copied on list emails. Any
> suggestions for a MUA that can perform this feat are appreciated.

Any mailer that honours the Mail-Followup-To: header that I set would do
nicely. There are plenty of these in Debian, such as the one I'm using.

Cheers,

-- 
Colin Watson  [EMAIL PROTECTED]

Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian

[Glenn Maynard]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 12:38:31PM +0100, Bruce Stephens wrote:
> So the information isn't thrust in anybody's face: if you don't give
> it any arguments, Emacs doesn't have anything else it might display,
> so it may as well display information about itself (how to get help,
> conditions of copying, etc.).
> 
> To remove this code would be a bad technical decision---there's no
> reason to.  I presume (if any code has been changed) that some of the
> reiserfs code is doing something that's less technically justifiable.

Remember, the issue here isn't whether there's good reason to remove the
Reiser message, but whether we're allowed to (apparently not) and
whether not being allowed to do so is DFSG-free.  Even if we were happy
with simply putting it back in, it still can't go in main if it's not free.

> (I don't know about vim.)

Vim is similar; if you load it without opening a file, it displays a
"transparent" message onscreen that goes away once you do something.

If Emacs's message is about the GPL, then it can't be removed, and
that's accepted as Free by Debian, but that doesn't imply that this
transfers to sponsorship messages.

Vim's message can be removed, since Vim is dual-licensed under the GPL
and the message isn't covered by 2c.  It'd certainly be extremely rude
to remove the message, and I've never heard of anyone doing so, but it's
not against the license.

-- 
Glenn Maynard

Re: bad postinst in kernel-images

[Herbert Xu]

Marcel Kolaja <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> 
> Well, it looks like a dependency problem in Debian. What do you exactly
> mean with "recent binutils"? This problem appears on Woody, that means
> with binutils 2.12.90.0.1-4 and modutils 2.4.15-1.

Then this is not the problem.  Only the binutils from sarge/sid
generates map files that are not understood.  Besides, these errors
are only warnings, the generated modules.dep still works.
-- 
Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 is out! ( http://www.debian.org/ )
Email:  Herbert Xu ~{PmV>HI~} <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Home Page: http://gondor.apana.org.au/~herbert/
PGP Key: http://gondor.apana.org.au/~herbert/pubkey.txt

Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness

[Darren Salt]

I demand that Matt Zimmerman may or may not have written...

> On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 09:06:38PM +0100, Matt Ryan wrote:

>> Eventually someone (MDZ seems to be starting this again) will come up with

Come up with what?

Let's restore some context...

>> a sensible solution (that doesn't predepend on some configuration program
>> bloat) that will deal with this. 

> Please avoid using my name in support of your arguments.  I rather not be
> associated with your recent publicity.

Ahem. From here, given that reference to a sensible solution and your
"proposed handling" posting (which looks like it'll become Something Useful),
that looks like "look, things are heading in the right direction again".

Maybe you were too quick to criticise Matt and to distance yourself?

-- 
| Darren Salt   | nr. Ashington, | linux (or ds) at
| woody, sarge, | Northumberland | youmustbejoking
| RISC OS   | Toon Army  | demon co uk
|   This space reserved for future expansion

Beware of friends who are false and deceitful.

apache php4-imap Segmentation fault (help needed)

[Jørgen Hermanrud Fjeld]

Hi.
On one of my servers, apache segfaults when php4 loads the imap.so module.
I have a few servers with similar versions, and only one of the servers 
experiences the segfault. 

I am unable to discover the cause of the segfault, and would really appreciate 
some advice in how to locate it.

What I have done:

I have set "LogLevel debug" in "/etc/apache/httpd.conf"

When commenting out the line "extension=imap.so" from  
"/etc/php4/apache/php.ini", apache starts and works very well.
# tail -2 /var/log/apache/error.log
[Mon Apr 21 00:31:46 2003] [info] mod_unique_id: using ip addr 127.0.0.1
[Mon Apr 21 00:31:47 2003] [info] created shared memory segment #4194305

When uncommenting the line "extension=imap.so", I use the following to do a 
strace of apache "strace apache -X 2> /tmp/apache.strace"
# tail -1 /var/log/apache/error.log
[Mon Apr 21 00:42:34 2003] [info] mod_unique_id: using ip addr 127.0.0.1
# tail /tmp/apache.strace
open("/etc/protocols", O_RDONLY)= 5
fcntl64(5, F_GETFD) = 0
fcntl64(5, F_SETFD, FD_CLOEXEC) = 0
fstat64(5, {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=1748, ...}) = 0
old_mmap(NULL, 4096, PROT_READ|PROT_WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_ANONYMOUS, -1, 0) = 
0x40233000
read(5, "# /etc/protocols:\n# $Id: protoco"..., 4096) = 1748
close(5)= 0
munmap(0x40233000, 4096)= 0
--- SIGSEGV (Segmentation fault) ---
+++ killed by SIGSEGV +++

On another server, that doesn't experience the segfault, the following is 
straced instead of the segfault:
open("/etc/protocols", O_RDONLY)= 5
fcntl64(5, F_GETFD) = 0
fcntl64(5, F_SETFD, FD_CLOEXEC) = 0
fstat64(5, {st_mode=S_IFREG|0644, st_size=1748, ...}) = 0
old_mmap(NULL, 4096, PROT_READ|PROT_WRITE, MAP_PRIVATE|MAP_ANONYMOUS, -1, 0) = 
0
x40245000
read(5, "# /etc/protocols:\n# $Id: protoco"..., 4096) = 1748
close(5)= 0
munmap(0x40245000, 4096)= 0
brk(0)  = 0x80dd000
brk(0x80de000)  = 0x80de000
brk(0)  = 0x80de000
brk(0x80df000)  = 0x80df000
brk(0)  = 0x80df000
...

The two servers where php4-imap behave differently run mainly stable, but with  
apache and php4 from unstable. Both with 2.4 kernels.
On the machine with the segfault:
# cat /proc/version
Linux version 2.4.18-686-smp ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) (gcc version 2.95.4 20011002 
(Debian prerelease)) #1 SMP Sun Apr 14 12:07:19 EST 2002
# dpkg -l "apache*"  | grep "^ii"
ii  apache 1.3.27-0.1 Versatile, high-performance HTTP server
ii  apache-common  1.3.27-0.1 Support files for all Apache webservers
arjuna:/etc/php4/apache# dpkg -l "php4*"  | grep "^ii"
ii  php4   4.2.3-13   A server-side, HTML-embedded scripting langu
ii  php4-imap  4.2.3-13   IMAP module for php4
ii  php4-pear  4.2.3-13   PEAR - PHP Extension and Application Reposit
ii  php4-pear-log  1.6.0-1Log module for PEAR
ii  php4-pgsql 4.2.3-1PostgreSQL module for php4

On the machine without the segfault:
cat /proc/version
Linux version 2.4.20-586tsc ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) (gcc version 2.95.4 20011002 
(Debian prerelease)) #1 Sat Jan 11 20:01:58 EST 2003
# dpkg -l "apache*"  | grep "^ii"
ii  apache 1.3.27-0.1 Versatile, high-performance HTTP server
ii  apache-common  1.3.27-0.1 Support files for all Apache webservers
ii  apache-doc 1.3.26-0woody3 Apache webserver docs
h2o:/etc/php4/apache# dpkg -l "php4*"  | grep "^ii"
ii  php4   4.2.3-13   A server-side, HTML-embedded scripting langu
ii  php4-apc   1.1.0pl1-9 Caches PHP scripts to get them loaded much f
ii  php4-cgi   4.2.3-13   A server-side, HTML-embedded scripting langu
ii  php4-imap  4.2.3-13   IMAP module for php4
ii  php4-ldap  4.2.3-13   LDAP module for php4
ii  php4-pear  4.2.3-13   PEAR - PHP Extension and Application Reposit
ii  php4-pear-log  1.6.0-1Log module for PEAR
ii  php4-pgsql 4.2.3-1PostgreSQL module for php4

And finally a look at how this imap.so file is linked:
On the machine with the segfault:
# ldd /usr/lib/php4/20020429/imap.so
libcrypto.so.0.9.7 => /usr/lib/i686/cmov/libcrypto.so.0.9.7 
(0x40016000)
libssl.so.0.9.7 => /usr/lib/i686/cmov/libssl.so.0.9.7 (0x40108000)
libc-client.so.2003debian => /usr/lib/libc-client.so.2003debian 
(0x40137000)
libgssapi_krb5.so.2 => /usr/lib/libgssapi_krb5.so.2 (0x401ed000)
libkrb5.so.3 => /usr/lib/libkrb5.so.3 (0x401fe000)
libk5crypto.so.3 => /usr/lib/libk5crypto.so.3 (0x40253000)
libcom_err.so.2 => /lib/libcom_err.so.2 (0x40264000)
libc.so.6 => /lib/libc.so.6 (0x40267000)
libdl.so.2 => /lib/libdl.so.2 (0x40377000)
libpam.so.0 => /lib/libpam.so.0 (0x4037a000)
libresolv.so.2 => /lib/libresolv.so.2 (0x40382000)
/

Re: stop the "manage with debconf" madness

[Matt Zimmerman]

On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 11:22:48PM +0100, Darren Salt wrote:

> Ahem. From here, given that reference to a sensible solution and your
> "proposed handling" posting (which looks like it'll become Something
> Useful), that looks like "look, things are heading in the right direction
> again".

Perhaps it would, if it had not come on the tails of a string of unwarranted
insults against other developers (most of whom seem to agree with my ideas
on the technical subject under discussion).

-- 
 - mdz