Bug#284469: "cp -a" fails on some filesystems, causing postin st failure

[Frank Küster <frank@debian.org>]

One other point:

I, frank@kuesterei.ch (Frank Küster) wrote:

> Chad Miller <Chad.Miller@veritas.com> wrote:
>
>> Indeed, I am not using a Debian kernel.  I am stuck within a "virtual
>> server" on a huge physical server, over which I've added Debian's userspace.
>> So your position is that having a filesystem in which I can set timestamps
>> should be a prerequisite for installing (not "using", note) tetex?
>
> Honestly, maintainer scripts cannot cater for every thinkable buggy
> filesystem or kernel.

One more point: If this is the same bug in the XFS ACL implementation as
in the previous cases that reported the problem, you have more problems
than just cp -p. It was solved somewhen around 2.4.20 and 2.4.21, while
Kernels up to 2.4.23 have a vulnerability that can be used to get root
access - and _has_ been actually used.

You should really talk to your administrators and ask them to upgrade
the kernel.

Regards, Frank
-- 
Frank Küster
Inst. f. Biochemie der Univ. Zürich
Debian Developer