On Wed, Dec 06, 2017 at 06:39:36PM +0100, Guillem Jover wrote: > Hi! > > On Tue, 2017-12-05 at 08:03:28 -0800, Brian Murray wrote: > > In Ubuntu we have recently had reports[1] where users were unable to upgrade > > python packages because they had installed a version of python in > > /usr/local/bin which did not provide the expected functions. While we worked > > around this by using the complete path to python in its postinst scripts > > this > > is not an ideal solution because this issue certainly does not just affect > > python. Additionally, the python maintainer in Ubuntu is concerned that this > > workaround is a violation of the Debian Policy[2] regarding maintainer > > scripts > > - "Programs called from maintainer scripts should not normally have a path > > prepended to them". > > Yes, I'd consider this a violation. I've to agree with Ian, that the > correct course of action here is to close such bug reports. This is > entirely a self-inflicted problem. > > > This issue of having a clean environment for maintainer scripts was > > previously > > raised[3] in 2002 and on debian-devel mailing list[4], > > Perhaps more relevant is #631081. A recentish new instance of this > discussion happened around > <https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2017/10/msg00130.html>. > > > at that time there was > > an argument that "the system adminstrator may prefer using a 3rd party > > version > > of adduser". While that is true I think the technical savvy of users of dpkg > > has changed since then and peferring a 3rd party version of a utility is now > > the less likely case. Subsequently, we could prevent users a lot of pain by > > providing a clean environment for maintainer scripts. > > IMO that kind of misses the point. We have defined such policy (no > absolute paths) so that users can override system programs. If a user > has done so, and then we ignore those paths only in maintainer > scripts, this does not avoid breakage from any package contents at > run-time, due to mismatches between the declared versions from > dependencies and the used versions, because in fact the user has > globally overriden the dependency system. > > If things break, honestly, the user gets to keep the pieces together, > > > Would it be possible to remove /usr/local/bin from $PATH when package > > operations are being performed by dpkg? > > I think this would be a bad idea. I'm fine though with something like > adding mechanisms to cleanse or pre-define the environment from within > dpkg, but that should IMO be inert by default.
I believe having those mechanisms would accomplish what we are looking for in Ubuntu. How could these be added to dpkg? -- Brian Murray
