Fusionforge fails-to-install cleanup

[Thorsten Glaser]

Dear Ubuntu release managers,

please remove all versions of the source packages gforge and fusionforge 5.x (older than 5.1), i.e. these:

maverick 5.0.1+svn10088-1 (ridden by LP: #663933)
natty 5.0.2-5 (since FF <5.1 fails on systems with Multiarch libc, LP: #811804)

The version in oneiric 5.1-5 should be fine, and the version in lucid and older should be fine as long as they are not kept (or upgraded to 5.1 immediately) on a system with multiarch libc or a Python version that Breaks: gforge-web-apache2 (< 5.0.1+svn10155)

Once you have removed these versions from the affected releases, you _can_, if it is desired, add backports of the 5.1 version to them. Otherwise, point users to https://fusionforge.org/plugins/mediawiki/wiki/fusionforge/index.php/Installing which is where upstream puts up snapshot packages (like a PPA); unfortunately, the links contained on the subpages are currently 404 so upstream will have to fix the Wiki pages (just reported this).

The Fusionforge for Debian packaging team has decided we cannot invest the time and effort to provide packages for inclusion into Ubuntu, sorry. It was felt that the packages uploaded to Debian proper are “good enough” and official, and Ubuntu should be able to take them and “backport” to their releases when there are Ubuntu-specific problems (such as switching to multiarch MUCH earlier than Debian).

But please, do remove the 5.0* versions from the releases. They are broken and will not be fixed. (I have no idea how the Launchpad version of an RM (RoM) in Debian works, but guess subscribing ubuntu-release would be my best bet.) They currently produce a lot of “duplicate bug spam”.

I am one of the Fusionforge contributors, although not currently listed in the Uploaders field; the others are even less willing to deal with Ubuntu issues, so I decided to at least look at the problems.

[Thorsten Glaser (mirabilos)]

Given the sheer number of bugs reported as duplicates of LP: #154199 it might make sense to remove the old packages there, too.

Maverick additionally suffers from the change of /etc/init.d/postgresql-8.3 to /etc/init.d/postgresql which is also fixed in 5.1 versions.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Thorsten Glaser (mirabilos)]

Mark all bugs that can be fixed with this removal as duplicates of this bug.
Set status to New so that the Ubuntu release team knows to act.

[Scott Kitterman (kitterman)]

Ubuntu doesn't do post-release removal except in extremely rare circumstances. "Package is buggy" is not enough.

[Thorsten Glaser (mirabilos)]

Scott, this is not "Package is buggy" but "Package cannot be fully installed, nor uninstalled once it’s in a certain state", for some of the bugreports. Please consider.

[Thorsten Glaser (mirabilos)]

(It might help to provide 5.1 in maverick-backports and natty-backports, but that won’t reach all users, so the removal would still be helpful.)

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Thorsten Glaser (mirabilos)]

Dear Ubuntu release managers,

this keeps popping up again and again, and your actions and inactions harm the good name of the FusionForge project. Please remove the broken versions from the old releases, or at least backport the version currently in wheezy.

[Stefano Rivera (stefanor)]

Thorsten:
Yeah, this seems pretty broken.

The correct answer here is probably to backport the 5.1 packages into -updates (an SRU: Stable release update).
Ubuntu backports isn't for fixing bugs.

The SRU policy calls for minimal patches, but if you don't think that's possible, then I guess we don't have much choice here. These packages seem broken enough that there couldn't be any negative consequence to doing this, right? It seems like the least bad (and only) option.

Are you still happy with fusionforge going into newer Ubuntu releases?

For future reference: The release team takes care of the current devel release, not previous ones, but the SRU team and backporters are well represented within the release team, so your message is getting through. Also, the SRU team (like the Debian release team) reviews and approves uploads rather than preparing them themselves.

[Thorsten Glaser (mirabilos)]

> These packages seem broken enough that there couldn't be any negative
> consequence to doing this, right? It seems like the least bad (and only) option.

Right. They are uninstallable for several reasons (one of them being that Ubuntu
switched to multiarch libraries much earlier).

> Are you still happy with fusionforge going into newer Ubuntu releases?

The FF team is split on that, but the general consensus seems to be to tell people
to “just use the Debian packages” (from unstable). I think most of the current
breakage in those older versions could have avoided by using piuparts before
the release, though.

I can’t really say. The FF developers don’t have any resources (and most don’t
want to, either) to keep ensuring FF works on Ubuntu, so that would have to be
done by people working on Ubuntu instead. I don’t think Canonical wants to do
that, so unless there are volunteers, we all might be better off by not releasing
FF in Ubuntu any more. (There are always Debian packages, the FF Jenkins auto-
built snapshot packages, and PPAs.) Emphasis on the “might”, as I am unsure.

In FF, “if Ubuntu wants to release them, they need to maintain them; they can
take everything from Debian and our SVN but need to work on it themselves”
was also heard.
 So, technically, no reason against, but would only work if you
found a volunteer.

> For future reference: The release team[…]

Ah, okay. Noted, thanks.

[Stefano Rivera (stefanor)]

Obviously, the vast majority of universe goes largely unmaintained in Ubuntu, and that's generally not a problem. MOTU isn't a huge team, universe is enormous, and most packages work unmodified.

We appreciate it when the Debian package maintainers keep an eye on their packages in Ubuntu, but don't require support from them. So unless you are strongly against having fusionforge in Ubuntu, it might as well stay where it is.

We're at feautre freeze now, so if the packages look ok, there's every reason to beleive they'll stay that way for the release.

[Scott Kitterman (kitterman)]

Maverick has gone out of support and Natty does in a few weeks, so this is very unlikely to ever be addressed.