Bug#931052: release-notes text proposal for bug 931052: webkit2gtk not supported on non-sse2 i386 hardware
Alberto Garcia wrote:
> Justin B Rye wrote:
>> The trouble with talking about WebKitGTK is that besides
>> libwebkit2gtk-* there are also a couple of packages like
>> libwebkitgtk3.0-cil that look as if they'd be relevant to this but
>> aren't.
>
> Packages named *webkitgtk* (without the '2') refer to the previous API
> of WebKitGTK. That's no longer supported and it is not available in
> buster, all packages depending on the old webkitgtk have either been
> removed or they switched to webkit2gtk.
Don't forget, the people who need to be able to guess how all this
fits together are the ones still running stretch.
>> Maybe we should only mention "webkit2gtk", which turns out after all
>> to be fairly transparently connected to the name of the main library
>> packages it builds (even if the -gtk2 suffix on one of them is a bit
>> mystifying).
>
> I think so, plus if you a package named *webkit2gtk* then you
> directly or indirectly depend on libwebkit2gtk-4.0-37 and
> libjavascriptcoregtk-4.0-18, so you are affected.
Missing verb. "Have installed"?
>>>> Users of a modern desktop environment with older (roughly,
>>>> pre-Pentium IV) CPUs may wish to delay upgrading until then.
>>>
>>> Reading again bug 930935 it seems that there are still devices in
>>> production, so age isn't a good qualifier. I put it in because it
>>> seems I don't have much inspiration for this at this moment.
>
> Maybe you can mention "embedded CPUs", which seem to be the other type
> of CPUs without SSE2 (e.g. AMD Geode).
Maybe "older or embedded CPUS such as Pentium III or Geode". Also
perhaps I should move this line earlier.
>>> Close. https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/webkit2gtk shows that there
>>> is also javascriptcoregtk to grep.
>>
>> It looks like the only way I'd have that is if I had manually
>> installed it to support some sort of local JavaScript GUI, and I'm
>> hoping I would remember writing one of those.
>
> There's also a command-line javascript interpreter (installed in the
> -bin) package.
>
>>> + <section id="webkit2gtk-on-non-sse2" arch="i386">
>>> + <title>WebKitGTK (initially) requires SSE2 support</title>
>>
>> Maybe "Webkit2gtk", or then again maybe just "WebKit".
>
> I wouldn't say just "WebKit", there are other WebKit ports (in
> particular the Qt one is in stretch and buster).
>
> Berto
Here's another try.
--
JBR with qualifications in linguistics, experience as a Debian
sysadmin, and probably no clue about this particular package
diff --git a/en/issues.dbk b/en/issues.dbk
index cdf71c12..8a11c374 100644
--- a/en/issues.dbk
+++ b/en/issues.dbk
@@ -288,6 +288,32 @@ $ sudo update-initramfs -u
</para>
</section>
+ <section id="webkit2gtk-on-non-sse2" arch="i386">
+ <title>WebKit2GTK (initially) requires SSE2 support</title>
+ <para>
+ Due to changes in the upstream code, <systemitem
+ role="package">webkit2gtk</systemitem> has been built requiring SSE2
+ support. Fixes for this in the Debian code came too late to be
+ incorporated in the initial buster release. This means that systems
+ without SSE2 support built into their CPU (older or embedded processors
+ such as Pentium III or Geode) can't run applications which use
+ <systemitem role="package">libwebkit2gtk-*</systemitem> (e.g. <systemitem
+ role="package">liferea</systemitem> or <systemitem role="package">zenity</systemitem>).
+ These applications will crash, most likely with an <literal>Illegal
+ instruction</literal> error message.
+ </para>
+ <para>
+ The first update of <systemitem role="package">webkit2gtk</systemitem>
+ in buster is expected to restore support for these systems, in either a
+ point release or security update. Users of a modern desktop environment
+ on an affected CPU may wish to delay upgrading until then.
+ It is also intended that the buster-backports archive will receive an
+ updated package once that archive opens up for uploads, so an alternative
+ could be to install <systemitem role="package">webkit2gtk</systemitem>
+ from there once it's available.
+ </para>
+ </section>
+
<section id="noteworthy-obsolete-packages" condition="fixme">
<title>Noteworthy obsolete packages</title>
<para>
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