the image for the autopkg tests has a big python3 stack installed

[Matthias Klose]

the image for the autopkg tests has a big python3 stack installed, that leads to test errors different to Debian, and is different across architectures (armhf != !armhf). These packages should be removed for autopkg testing.

Seen with python-jsonschema failing it's autopkg tests:

http://autopkgtest.ubuntu.com/packages/p/python-jsonschema/focal/amd64
http://autopkgtest.ubuntu.com/packages/p/python-jsonschema/focal/armhf

amd64: 2020-01-23 20:45:55 UTC
armhf: 2020-01-23 20:09:14 UTC

The jsonschema/jsonpointer issue is described in
https://bugs.debian.org/949723.

On non armhf archs, the python3-json-pointer package stays installed and triggers some additional tests, while on armhf it is not installed and the tests pass.

This makes it very hard to debug the tests, when you have undocumented packages installed, which are also different across architectures.

As a first step, please list the installed packages in the autopkg tests.

Second, please remove the dependencies installed by cloud-init before running the tests. having a big python3 stack installed by default doesn't help.

[Iain Lane (laney)]

> As a first step, please list the installed packages in the autopkg tests.

In the artifacts, there is a file which lists the packages in the testbed (before your test ran). In the test log itself, you can see which packages the test caused to be installed. So I believe this point is already solved?

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

It is a reasonable improvement to try to minimize the contents of the testbed image, if for no other reason than it speeds up upgrades. However, package tests shouldn't misbehave in the presence of extra packages and if they do that's a bug.