What is with the kernel maintainer? (How not to close Bug#147077)
reopen 147077
thanks
On May 15, when submitting Bug#147077 against kernel-source-2.4.18, I
(Brian Mays) wrote:
> > Please remove the following lines (numbered here for convenience)
> > from the Makefile:
> >
> > 392 # Backwards compatibilty symlinks for people still using old versions
> > 393 # of pcmcia-cs with hard coded pathnames on insmod. Remove
> > 394 # _modinst_post_pcmcia for kernel 2.4.1.
> > 395 .PHONY: _modinst_post_pcmcia
> > 396 _modinst_post_pcmcia:
> > 397 cd $(MODLIB); \
> > 398 mkdir -p pcmcia; \
> > 399 find kernel -path '*/pcmcia/*' -name '*.o' | xargs -i -r ln -sf ../{} pcmcia
> >
> > As the comments clearly indicate, these lines should have been
> > removed upstream long ago. Their presence causes the following
> > serious problem.
> >
> > I built a custom kernel using "make-kpkg". I also built a
> > pcmcia-modules package to accompany this kernel. When I try
> > to install this package, the following errors result from file
> > conflicts: ...
[example omitted]
Herbert Xu <herbert@gondor.apana.org.au> closed the report with:
> You shouldn't include PCMCIA modules in your kernel-image if you
> intend to install it with pcmcia-modules. -
Not good enough! Please explain WHY these symlinks should not be
removed and WHAT purpose they serve. If you can give me ONE valid
reason for their existence, then I'll withdraw my request. As it is,
they are simply a pain in the ass.
Why the hell does getting you to do anything have to be like pulling
teeth?! You completely failed to address any of my other comments. For
example, your assertion above strongly implies that the kernel-image
package in question should conflict with the pcmcia-modules package, and
indeed, this is what I suggested in my bug report:
> > Thus, for the kernel packages to comply with policy they must either
> > (1) remove the "compatibility symlinks," or (2) the resulting
> > kernel-image package must conflict with the pcmcia-modules package
> > if it contains these symlinks. ...
Your reply, however, fails to mention my suggestion at all and, in all
of my experience with Debian, is the sorriest excuse for a response to a
bug report (especially when closing the report) that I have ever seen.
This report is the second time that I have explained to you the problems
that these symlinks cause. You might disagree with my complaint, but
you should at least try to elucidate your side of the issue. Then,
we can have a reasonable debate on the technical points. Dismissing
my arguments outright with two lines of explanation that do not even
address my request is not acceptable.
I'm tired of dealing with this type of lackadaisical effort on your
part. Thus, I am sending a copy of this response to debian-devel to
demonstrate the terrible job you are doing as maintainer of these
packages and to provide an example to Debian developers everywhere of
how NOT to close a bug report.
- Brian
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