Drop 20_add_alt_screen_toggle_ui.patch - it does nothing with vte3 >= 0.34.9

[Vlad Orlov]

On 2013-09-30, the alternate scroll mode has been implemented in vte3 upstream [1]. In the same commit, vte_terminal_set_alternate_screen_scroll function has been added which does nothing and is there only for the compatibility with the previously patched Ubuntu's vte3 (the patch has been dropped in vte3 0.34.9-1ubuntu1).

Since this function now does nothing, Ubuntu's 20_add_alt_screen_toggle_ui.patch for gnome-terminal does nothing too. It doesn't matter whether you turn the alt.scroll on or off in gnome-terminal's preferences window - the mouse scroll in console apps like man is ALWAYS turned on. Seems like it's always turned on in vte3 >= 0.34.9 (again, see [1] for more info).

So I propose to drop this 20_add_alt_screen_toggle_ui.patch since it's useless now.

[1] https://git.gnome.org/browse/vte/commit/?id=9f8c1b88dcd880c2d9e78c93521ee755560a9275

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Egmont Koblinger (egmont-gmail)]

Indeed, this patch should be dropped.

[Vlad Orlov (monsta)]

I see this is fixed in Vivid, thanks. Needs to be fixed for Trusty and Utopic.

[Vlad Orlov (monsta)]

Attached a simple debdiff which removes the obsolete patch.

[Ubuntu Foundations Team Bug Bot (crichton)]

The attachment "This debdiff removes the useless patch." 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.

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[Dmitry Shachnev (mitya57)]

That patch being useless is not a justification to do a stable release update — it should fix an important bug.

And that patch no longer exists in the current development release (vivid), so nothing is needed to do there.

[Vlad Orlov (monsta)]

Dmitry, it's not just useless, it also adds a confusing checkbox to the preferences dialog (confusing for users).

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

Could you provide some evidence indicating that the checkbox is confusing? We have plenty of SRUs that get uploaded and then never verified so I'm like confirmation that this fixes a real problem.

[Egmont Koblinger (egmont-gmail)]

I'm not against fixing it at all, but ... if you take a look around either here among launchpad bugs (both gnome-terminal and vte/vte3) or mainstream bugzilla and git, you'll find quite a few way more important issues, including crash scenarios with known fixes - yet there's no activity and willingness from anyone backporting them to Trusty or Utopic. It's really strange to see discussing the possibility of releasing a fix for one of the least important bugs while ignoring the others. I mean, there's a checkbox that doesn't do anything, and you're worried about this but not the segfaults? C'mon... As long as there are unfixed crashes, putting any amount of work in backporting the removal of a nonfunctional checkbox is IMO precious engineering time not well spent, and yet another update is probably more annoying to the users than useful.

[Vlad Orlov (monsta)]

Brian, the checkbox is confusing because it does nothing. Users will expect it to change some parameter, but the alternate scroll is always turned on and won't be affected by that checkbox.

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

I understand the principle of the confusion, but I'd like to see some evidence of people really being confused by it.

[Vlad Orlov (monsta)]

Somebody please mark it as wontfix for Trusty if it's not going to be patched there. I'm fine with it, I just don't have the rights to mark it so.