kpackagekit hangs indefinitely when apt-listchanges is supposed to display any changes

[Thilo-Alexander Ginkel]

Since upgrading to Natty, kpackagekit hangs indefinitely from time to time when installing updates. A quick check revealed that it is waiting for a pager process running in the background, which has been triggered by apt-listchanges:

root 11376 0.2 0.6 227140 56128 ? Sl 11:14 0:01 /usr/lib/packagekit/packagekitd
root 11463 0.0 0.1 227140 12472 pts/3 Ss+ 11:16 0:00 /usr/lib/packagekit/packagekitd
root 11464 0.0 0.0 4220 588 pts/3 S+ 11:16 0:00 /bin/sh -c /usr/bin/apt-listchanges --apt || test $? -ne 10
root 11465 0.0 0.3 80708 27056 pts/3 S+ 11:16 0:00 /usr/bin/python /usr/bin/apt-listchanges --apt
root 11616 0.0 0.0 4220 584 pts/3 S+ 11:16 0:00 sh -c sensible-pager /tmp/tmp2g9Idx
root 11617 0.0 0.0 4220 584 pts/3 S+ 11:16 0:00 /bin/sh /usr/bin/sensible-pager /tmp/tmp2g9Idx
root 11618 0.0 0.0 8648 684 pts/3 S+ 11:16 0:00 pager /tmp/tmp2g9Idx

As it is impossible to interact with that process due to the lack of an associated console, kpackagekit will just sit arond and wait forever.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.04
Package: kpackagekit 0.6.3.3-0ubuntu2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.38-10.44-generic 2.6.38.7
Uname: Linux 2.6.38-10-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
Architecture: amd64
Date: Wed Jun 29 11:36:22 2011
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_US:en
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: kpackagekit
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to natty on 2011-06-13 (15 days ago)

[Daniel Nicoletti (dantti)]

If apt-listchanges work like apt-listbugs then it should also conflict with PackageKit.
To fix the issue both apt-listchanges and apt-listbugs must support debconf protocol which imHo should be a must for this kind of application.