Re: Handling s390 libc ABI change in Debian

2014-07-14 Thread Paul Wise
On Tue, Jul 15, 2014 at 1:18 PM, Aurelien Jarno wrote:

> It's a huge work for Debian, maybe not for other distribution, as it
> basically means we have to rebootstrap everything. This includes manual
> bootstrapping of self-dependent languages (haskell, gnat, ...) and
> manual handling of some dependencies loop. In addition it's something
> which hasn't been done since the libc5 transition, so we might discover
> some unexpected issues.

Helmut Grohne and others have been working on automated rebootstrap of
the Debian archive. The rebootstrap_s390x_gcc49_nobiarch jenkins job
seems to be in good shape currently. That is by no means a full
archive bootstrap, which requires more things.

https://wiki.debian.org/HelmutGrohne/rebootstrap
https://jenkins.debian.net/view/rebootstrap/
https://wiki.debian.org/DebianBootstrap
https://wiki.debian.org/Sprints/2014/BootstrapSprint

-- 
bye,
pabs

https://wiki.debian.org/PaulWise


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Re: Handling s390 libc ABI change in Debian

2014-07-14 Thread Aurelien Jarno
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 11:14:42PM -0400, Carlos O'Donell wrote:
> On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 4:36 PM, Aurelien Jarno  wrote:
> > glibc 2.19 has changed the libc ABI on s390, more specifically the
> > setjmp/longjmp functions [1] [2]. Symbol versioning is used to handle
> > some cases, but it doesn't work when a jmp_buf variable is embedded
> > into a structure, as it changes the size of the structure. The result
> > is that mixing programs or libraries built with 2.18 with ones built
> > with 2.19 do not work anymore, usually they end up with a segmentation
> > fault. Some persons from this list have experienced that with perl.
> 
> That is not true. This is an over generalization of the problem. You
> can use libraries built with 2.18 and 2.19 and they work just fine.

I agree I probably a bit over exaggerated here, but the problem is real,
breakages do happen, and some persons on this mailing list have already
experienced them.

> The extent of the problem in correct language is listed here:
> https://sourceware.org/glibc/wiki/Release/2.19#Packaging_Changes

This seems to minimize the problem, listing only perl. In practice we
have seen much more breakages, part of them being due to the change of
the __pthread_unwind_buf_t struct.

> > We first thought it was limited to a few packages (even if all perl is
> > already more than that), but as time goes more and more issues are
> > found. libpng and gauche are also affected, the issue with mono is
> > also likely due to this ABI change.
> 
> That is new information, and it is important for distributions to
> relay this information back upstream where the decision for a SO bump
> can be made.

I can follow up with a list affected packages, but we are slowly
discovering them one by one, so it might takes time. So far we have:

* Mixing modules/libraries built with pre-2.19 and 2.19 libc
- perl
- libpng 

* Using libc 2.19 without rebuilding anything:
- gauche
- mono

> > According to upstream [3], the problem is that Debian doesn't do a mass
> > rebuild, which is the strategy chosen by Red Hat to handle^Wworkaround
> > this issue. This means some programs might segfault during the upgrade,
> > or on partially upgraded systems.
> 
> I apologize if you took what I wrote to mean that. I did not mean it
> was Debian's problem, but rather that Debian suffered the most because
> they don't do rebuilds. The two are orthogonal. You face a situation
> that is unique to the framework used to build the distribution.
> 
> Please engage upstream to champion a SO name bump for libc for

I think that would be the correct solution. That said as it is not
something trivial and thus not done often, it's an opportunity to push
for more ABI changes if some others are envisaged in the future.

> > Now we have to chose a strategy for Debian. I see multiple options:
> >
> > 1) Ignore the issue and just rebuild (binNMU) the packages that seems
> > affected when we discover them. This means partial upgrades will likely
> > be broken, and that we might discover some broken packages only after
> > the jessie release.
> >
> > 2) Rebuild (binNMU) all packages. This means partial upgrades will
> > likely be broken.
> >
> > 3) Bump the soname of affected packages and rebuild their reverse
> > dependencies. It is the solution that is currently being implemented for
> > perl. It clearly won't scale if more broken packages (and even for
> > libpng) are discovered as it requires a source upload and a transition
> > handled by the release team. It also means breaking the ABI compatibility
> > with other distributions.
> >
> > 4) Bump the libc soname to libc.so.6.1 and do a libc transition. This is
> > probably what upstream should have done instead of breaking the ABI.
> > This is a huge work though, and this also means breaking the ABI
> > compatibility with other distributions.
> >
> > 5) Revert the ABI change. This is likely just postponing the problem as
> > the change is required to support future hardware. This also means
> > breaking the ABI compatibility with other distributions.
> >
> > 6) simply drop the s390x port and tell users to either use an other
> > distribution or use Debian on other hardware.
> >
> > Any opinion? Any other ideas how to handle that?
> 
> Option (6) is the nuclear option, and clearly a little excessive given
> the situation. If user's install from an installer they get a
> perfectly working system. Punishing those users because partial
> upgrades don't work seems excessive.

If we are not able to solve this problem by ensuring all the packages
in the next release are using a consistent ABI, I think it is an option
to consider. It's probably better being honest with the users telling
them "we fail" than shipping a half broken release. Consider that we
have limited human resources to maintain this port.

> Option (5) postpones the problem until newer s390 hardware arrives.
> 
> Option (4) is likely what upstream should have done. Why do you think
> it's a huge amou

Re: Handling s390 libc ABI change in Debian

2014-07-14 Thread Carlos O'Donell
On Mon, Jul 14, 2014 at 4:36 PM, Aurelien Jarno  wrote:
> glibc 2.19 has changed the libc ABI on s390, more specifically the
> setjmp/longjmp functions [1] [2]. Symbol versioning is used to handle
> some cases, but it doesn't work when a jmp_buf variable is embedded
> into a structure, as it changes the size of the structure. The result
> is that mixing programs or libraries built with 2.18 with ones built
> with 2.19 do not work anymore, usually they end up with a segmentation
> fault. Some persons from this list have experienced that with perl.

That is not true. This is an over generalization of the problem. You
can use libraries built with 2.18 and 2.19 and they work just fine.

The extent of the problem in correct language is listed here:
https://sourceware.org/glibc/wiki/Release/2.19#Packaging_Changes

> We first thought it was limited to a few packages (even if all perl is
> already more than that), but as time goes more and more issues are
> found. libpng and gauche are also affected, the issue with mono is
> also likely due to this ABI change.

That is new information, and it is important for distributions to
relay this information back upstream where the decision for a SO bump
can be made.

> According to upstream [3], the problem is that Debian doesn't do a mass
> rebuild, which is the strategy chosen by Red Hat to handle^Wworkaround
> this issue. This means some programs might segfault during the upgrade,
> or on partially upgraded systems.

I apologize if you took what I wrote to mean that. I did not mean it
was Debian's problem, but rather that Debian suffered the most because
they don't do rebuilds. The two are orthogonal. You face a situation
that is unique to the framework used to build the distribution.

Please engage upstream to champion a SO name bump for libc for

> Now we have to chose a strategy for Debian. I see multiple options:
>
> 1) Ignore the issue and just rebuild (binNMU) the packages that seems
> affected when we discover them. This means partial upgrades will likely
> be broken, and that we might discover some broken packages only after
> the jessie release.
>
> 2) Rebuild (binNMU) all packages. This means partial upgrades will
> likely be broken.
>
> 3) Bump the soname of affected packages and rebuild their reverse
> dependencies. It is the solution that is currently being implemented for
> perl. It clearly won't scale if more broken packages (and even for
> libpng) are discovered as it requires a source upload and a transition
> handled by the release team. It also means breaking the ABI compatibility
> with other distributions.
>
> 4) Bump the libc soname to libc.so.6.1 and do a libc transition. This is
> probably what upstream should have done instead of breaking the ABI.
> This is a huge work though, and this also means breaking the ABI
> compatibility with other distributions.
>
> 5) Revert the ABI change. This is likely just postponing the problem as
> the change is required to support future hardware. This also means
> breaking the ABI compatibility with other distributions.
>
> 6) simply drop the s390x port and tell users to either use an other
> distribution or use Debian on other hardware.
>
> Any opinion? Any other ideas how to handle that?

Option (6) is the nuclear option, and clearly a little excessive given
the situation. If user's install from an installer they get a
perfectly working system. Punishing those users because partial
upgrades don't work seems excessive.

Option (5) postpones the problem until newer s390 hardware arrives.

Option (4) is likely what upstream should have done. Why do you think
it's a huge amount of work? If all s390-supporting distributions agree
then we just change the SO name?

Option (3), (2) or (1) all look like reasonable "fire and forget"
options that require users of s390 to simply move forward with their
installs to full new versions of Debian. It's an option for RHEL
because we don't allow partial-upgrades and we are working with users
to notify them of the breakage during a major RHEL upgrade e.g. RHEL7
to RHEL8.

In my opinion it's not too late to do option (4).

Cheers,
Carlos.


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Handling s390 libc ABI change in Debian

2014-07-14 Thread Aurelien Jarno
Hi all,

glibc 2.19 has changed the libc ABI on s390, more specifically the
setjmp/longjmp functions [1] [2]. Symbol versioning is used to handle
some cases, but it doesn't work when a jmp_buf variable is embedded
into a structure, as it changes the size of the structure. The result
is that mixing programs or libraries built with 2.18 with ones built
with 2.19 do not work anymore, usually they end up with a segmentation
fault. Some persons from this list have experienced that with perl.

We first thought it was limited to a few packages (even if all perl is
already more than that), but as time goes more and more issues are
found. libpng and gauche are also affected, the issue with mono is
also likely due to this ABI change.

According to upstream [3], the problem is that Debian doesn't do a mass
rebuild, which is the strategy chosen by Red Hat to handle^Wworkaround
this issue. This means some programs might segfault during the upgrade,
or on partially upgraded systems.

Now we have to chose a strategy for Debian. I see multiple options:

1) Ignore the issue and just rebuild (binNMU) the packages that seems
affected when we discover them. This means partial upgrades will likely
be broken, and that we might discover some broken packages only after
the jessie release.

2) Rebuild (binNMU) all packages. This means partial upgrades will
likely be broken.

3) Bump the soname of affected packages and rebuild their reverse
dependencies. It is the solution that is currently being implemented for
perl. It clearly won't scale if more broken packages (and even for
libpng) are discovered as it requires a source upload and a transition
handled by the release team. It also means breaking the ABI compatibility
with other distributions.

4) Bump the libc soname to libc.so.6.1 and do a libc transition. This is
probably what upstream should have done instead of breaking the ABI.
This is a huge work though, and this also means breaking the ABI
compatibility with other distributions.

5) Revert the ABI change. This is likely just postponing the problem as
the change is required to support future hardware. This also means
breaking the ABI compatibility with other distributions.

6) simply drop the s390x port and tell users to either use an other
distribution or use Debian on other hardware.

Any opinion? Any other ideas how to handle that?

Regards,
Aurelien


[1] 
http://sourceware.org/git/?p=glibc.git;a=commitdiff;h=ee4ec1d7f9bdbdfc87117133478cfb2f6653e65c
[2] https://sourceware.org/glibc/wiki/Release/2.19#Packaging_Changes
[3] https://sourceware.org/ml/libc-alpha/2014-07/msg00316.html

-- 
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aurel...@aurel32.net http://www.aurel32.net


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