[SRU] sdformat on Trusty crash due to a bug in debian patch

[Jose Luis Rivero]

Using the version of sdformat library from Trusty (1.4.11-1) will make the applications using it to abort (core dumped) under certain circumstances in the input file. The problem is in the patch applied in Debian.

Upstream bug:
https://bitbucket.org/osrf/sdformat/issue/63/gzsdf-segfaults-in-trusty

[Impact]
 * Unfortunately, it is affecting what is probably the most extensive open source robotics framework (ROS - Robot operative system) community and a show stopper for their LTS next release. The bug is marked as critical. https://github.com/ros/rosdistro/issues/4933.

[Development version]
The problem does not affect to the version in Utopic since the current patch works fine with the liburdfdom version in Utopic.

[Test Case]
 * apt-get install libsdformat-dev
 * Attached to this bug will be an .urdf file, download it using wget.
 * Attached to this bug will be a test.cc file. Download it in the same directory than urdf
 * g++ -I/usr/include/sdformat-1.4 test.cc -lsdformat -o test
 * ./test < ... invalid pointer ... >

[Regression Potential]
 * The proposed solution is removing part of the patch introduced in debian which is only triggered under certain circunstances. These circunstances now lead to a segfault, so situation can not virtually go worse. This patch (and a testing package) has been released, tested and is now in use by the ROS framework users, which should lead us to minimize regressions.

[Other Info]
 * None

[Jose Luis Rivero (j-rivero)]

Attached is the debdiff needed to solve the problem described in the bug.

[Ubuntu Foundations Team Bug Bot (crichton)]

The attachment "debdiff to patch current sdformat-1.4.11-1" seems to be a debdiff. The ubuntu-sponsors team has been subscribed to the bug report so that they can review and hopefully sponsor the debdiff. If the attachment isn't a patch, please remove the "patch" flag from the attachment, remove the "patch" tag, and if you are member of the ~ubuntu-sponsors, unsubscribe the team.

[This is an automated message performed by a Launchpad user owned by ~brian-murray, for any issue please contact him.]

[Alberto Salvia Novella (es20490446e)]

It renders essential functionality of the package (or a dependent one) broken.

[Alberto Salvia Novella (es20490446e)]

The package doesn't exist in the official Ubuntu repositories, so we are unable to fix this bug.

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

@Alberto - this package most certainly does exist in the official Ubuntu repositories. Here is the output of rmadison.

 $ rmadison sdformat
 sdformat | 1.4.11-1 | trusty/universe | source
 sdformat | 2.0.0-4 | utopic/universe | source
 sdformat | 2.0.0-5 | utopic-proposed/universe | source

Also see the following page about the package: https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/sdformat.

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

It looks like this was fixed in this release of sdformat which is available in Utopic.

sdformat (2.0.0-1) unstable; urgency=medium

  * Fix compilation against urdfdom-0.3.0 (Closes: #74381)
  * Fix watch file to check for several digits versions
  * Upstream fixed the problems for running tests
  * Imported Upstream version 2.0.0
  * New ABI sdformat1 -> sdformat2
  * Remove patches, all changes were merged upstream

[Jose Luis Rivero (j-rivero)]

Thanks Alberto, Brian. Indeed, Utopic is not really affected (the patch was removed) since Utopic is using urdfdom-0.3.0 and this bug is only triggered by urdfdom-0.2.0, Utopic should be safe.

[Michael Vogt (mvo)]

I uplaoded the fix to trusty-proposed now.

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

Hello Jose, or anyone else affected,

Accepted sdformat into trusty-proposed. The package will build now and be available at http://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/sdformat/1.4.11-1ubuntu0.1 in a few hours, and then in the -proposed repository.

Please help us by testing this new package. See https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/EnableProposed for documentation how to enable and use -proposed. Your feedback will aid us getting this update out to other Ubuntu users.

If this package fixes the bug for you, please add a comment to this bug, mentioning the version of the package you tested, and change the tag from verification-needed to verification-done. If it does not fix the bug for you, please add a comment stating that, and change the tag to verification-failed. In either case, details of your testing will help us make a better decision.

Further information regarding the verification process can be found at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/QATeam/PerformingSRUVerification . Thank you in advance!

[Jose Luis Rivero (j-rivero)]

I have installed the new packages on my Trusty system, and the bug is not present any more.
It would be nice if a different person also give it a try. Thanks.

[Steven Peters (scpeters)]

I ran the example program with libsdformat1_1.4.11-1ubuntu0.1_amd64.deb and libsdformat-dev_1.4.11-1ubuntu0.1_amd64.deb, and it has fixed the problem.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package sdformat - 1.4.11-1ubuntu0.1

---------------
sdformat (1.4.11-1ubuntu0.1) trusty-proposed; urgency=high

  * Fix crash due to part of the patch applied in debian which only will work
    with urdfdom 0.3.0 while urdfdom in trusty is 0.2.0. (LP: #1338845)
 -- Jose Luis Rivero <email address hidden> Wed, 2 Jul 2014 02:46:00 +0200

[Colin Watson (cjwatson)]

The verification of the Stable Release Update for sdformat has completed successfully and the package has now been released to -updates. Subsequently, the Ubuntu Stable Release Updates Team is being unsubscribed and will not receive messages about this bug report. In the event that you encounter a regression using the package from -updates please report a new bug using ubuntu-bug and tag the bug report regression-update so we can easily find any regressions.