apt-xapian-index's postinst runs a background process which causes automation problems

[Clint Byrum]

The postinst starts the index update in the background using the '&' shell operator. This seems sloppy to me, and it leaves things running after apt-get has exitted which causes problems for automated systems. Specifically this broke diskimage-builder (https://git.openstack.org/cgit/diskimage-builder) in really awful ways when apt-xapian-index was updated.

This is a violation of policy IMO, as the script should run invoke-rc.d. The use of policy-rc.d directly seems improper.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 13.04
Package: apt-xapian-index 0.45ubuntu2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.8.0-30.44-generic 3.8.13.6
Uname: Linux 3.8.0-30-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.9.2-0ubuntu8.3
Architecture: amd64
Date: Wed Sep 18 17:02:22 2013
InstallationDate: Installed on 2013-01-14 (247 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 12.10 "Quantal Quetzal" - Release amd64+mac (20121017.3)
MarkForUpload: True
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 TERM=xterm
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=<set>
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: apt-xapian-index
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to raring on 2013-04-30 (141 days ago)

[Clint Byrum (clint-fewbar)]

Subscribing ubuntu-security.

Just wanted to note that the recent security update caused us some grief due to this bug.

[OpenStack Infra (hudson-openstack)]

Reviewed: https://review.openstack.org/47293
Committed: http://github.com/openstack/diskimage-builder/commit/2d70812e81a6e807dcf4c2336f93f65f5e5ecf36
Submitter: Jenkins
Branch: master

commit 2d70812e81a6e807dcf4c2336f93f65f5e5ecf36
Author: Clint Byrum <email address hidden>
Date: Wed Sep 18 17:22:59 2013 -0700

    Remove apt-xapian-index from ubuntu cloud images

    This package recently caused us some very large headaches when it
    was updated for a security issue. It is completely unnecessary and
    should be removed.

    Note that we have recommended that it be removed from the cloud images
    in launchpad bug #1227425.

    fixes bug #1227420

    Change-Id: Ic0d4efa7b44c46271d19576f5191c9421d07c015