Problems mixing debconf and ucf in a perl script

[Brian Nelson <pyro@debian.org>]

I'm trying to implement ucf in a perl postinst script, but I'm running
into problems due to debconf's fuckage with the file descriptors, I
think.

I call stop() as soon as I'm done interfacing with debconf, but that
doesn't seem to be good enough when I get to ucf.  First, I tried

  system("/usr/bin/ucf $tmpfile $realfile");

but that hung due to ucf listening on but not receiving anything from fd
0.  So, as I hack I tried:

  system("/usr/bin/ucf $tmpfile $realfile < /dev/tty");

and that made it possible for ucf to receive stuff on fd 0, but only the

    Y or I  : install the package maintainer's version
    N or O  : keep your currently-installed version

options are usable.  The others fail to work and simply return to the
ucf prompt.  Any ideas how to work around this?  Being unable to mix
debconf and ucf really makes ucf a lot less appealing.

-- 
I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less
than half of you half as well as you deserve.

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