Please don't ship empty directories in the source package

[Balint Reczey]

[Impact]

Empty directories can't be stored in Git, which is a very popular version control system for maintaining source packages.

Keeping the empty directory in the source package prevents others from easily contributing to the package by importing it in full to a local repository, making changes, then generating an updated source package with tools like git-buildpackage. In that workflow the empty directory would be lost potentially causing errors if the installed binary package relied on it or causing autopkgtest failures if tests used it.

The backport to a stable release helps further maintenance of the package in git-based workflows and avoids accidentally breaking autopkgtests when the existence of the empty dirs matter.

The upload may drop the empty dirs or place placeholder (e.g.: */.keep) files in the source package.

[Test Case]

Extract the source package, then run the following command int the extracted source directory:

 find . -depth -type d -empty

[Regression Potential]

The removed directories or the added placeholders may cause run-time issues or cause autopkgtest failures. To prevent those please check that the placeholder files are not shipped in the binary packages and also run autokgtests.

[Balint Reczey (rbalint)]

This is fixed in update-manager 1:18.04.4.

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

Hello Balint, or anyone else affected,

Accepted update-manager into artful-proposed. The package will build now and be available at https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/update-manager/1:17.10.14 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 on 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-artful to verification-done-artful. If it does not fix the bug for you, please add a comment stating that, and change the tag to verification-failed-artful. In either case, without details of your testing we will not be able to proceed.

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

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

Hello Balint, or anyone else affected,

Accepted update-manager into xenial-proposed. The package will build now and be available at https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/update-manager/1:16.04.13 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 on 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-xenial to verification-done-xenial. If it does not fix the bug for you, please add a comment stating that, and change the tag to verification-failed-xenial. In either case, without details of your testing we will not be able to proceed.

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

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package update-manager - 1:16.04.13

---------------
update-manager (1:16.04.13) xenial; urgency=medium

  * Offer removal of unused autoremovable kernel packages
    (LP: #1624644, #1675079)
  * Support package removals in install backends and really remove packages
    (LP: #1624644, #1675079)
  * Keep PEP 8 checks happy
  * Place .keep files in empty directories to keep them when converting the
    repo to git (LP: #1758963)

 -- Balint Reczey <email address hidden> Sun, 25 Mar 2018 20:10:49 +0100

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

The verification of the Stable Release Update for update-manager 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.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package update-manager - 1:17.10.14

---------------
update-manager (1:17.10.14) artful; urgency=medium

  * Offer removal of unused autoremovable kernel packages
    (LP: #1624644, #1675079)
  * Support package removals in install backends and really remove packages
    (LP: #1624644, #1675079)
  * Keep PEP 8 checks happy
  * Place .keep files in empty directories to keep them when converting the
    repo to git (LP: #1758963)

 -- Balint Reczey <email address hidden> Sun, 25 Mar 2018 19:57:57 +0100