[debhelper-devel] [Pkg-zsh-devel] Bug#770226: zsh-common: installation fails with "dpkg-maintscript-helper: error: original symlink target is not an absolute path"

[Axel Beckert]

Control: clone -1 -2
Control: reassign -2 debhelper 9.20141107
Control: severity -2 important
Control: retitle -2 dh_installdeb: Using symlink_to_dir with relative symlinks needs ${misc:Pre-Depends} = dpkg >= 1.17.14
Control: tag -1 + confirmed

Hi,

Axel Beckert wrote:
> I tried to reproduce this issue in a freshly bootstrapped jessie
> chroot, but couldn't (which doesn't surprise me much as piuparts
> couldn't either).
[...]
> One thing which is a good candidate for such a failure is a too old
> dpkg version. Both, zsh and zsh-common have a "Pre-Depends: dpkg (>=
> 1.17.5)" because of this, but maybe that Pre-Depends is not strict
> enough (despite it has been set by debhelper for using
> dpkg-maintscript-helper with symlink_to_dir. But reading dpkg's
> changelog.Debian.gz, I find the following entry for 1.17.14:
> 
>   * Add support for relative symlinks to dpkg-maintscript-helper
>     symlink_to_dir command. [...]
> 
> So I suspect this happened with a dpkg version < 1.17.14 and we likely
> need to bump that Pre-Depends to >= 1.17.14.

I could confirm that by downgrading dpkg from 1.17.21 to 1.17.13 and
then installing zsh:

Preparing to unpack .../zsh-common_5.0.7-4_all.deb ...
dpkg-maintscript-helper: error: original symlink target is not an absolute path
dpkg: error processing archive /var/cache/apt/archives/zsh-common_5.0.7-4_all.deb (--unpack):
 subprocess new pre-installation script returned error exit status 1
dpkg-maintscript-helper: error: original symlink target is not an absolute path

> debhelper maintainers: Shall I clone or reassign this bug report to
> debhelper for bumping ${misc:Pre-Depends} in such cases?

I'm sure this should be fixed in debhelper's ${misc:Pre-Depends}, too,
hence I cloned the bug report.

I'm just not sure if it should be generally bumped to dpkg >= 1.17.14
or only in cases with relative symlinks.

I'm also not sure if this is of RC severity for debhelper. Downgrading
the clone to important for now. Feel free to raise it to RC severity
again.

> Scott, can you tell me the dpkg version which was running at that
> time.

No more needed. I'm sure now.

		Regards, Axel
-- 
 ,''`.  |  Axel Beckert <abe at debian.org>, http://people.debian.org/~abe/
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