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Re: Line ending issue when "Reading database"



On Tue, Mar 28, 2017 at 03:57:33PM +0100, Ian Jackson wrote:
> Sven Joachim writes ("Re: Line ending issue when "Reading database""):
> > One problem here is that there is currently no option for dpkg to
> > suppress the output entirely, see bug #539617[1].  The other one is that
> > apt always runs dpkg in a tty, unless an undocumented option is used[2].
> 
> I wasn't aware of that latter.  I think that is a bug in abpt.
> 
> Maybe once upon a time this was a reasonable workaround for ancient
> maintainer scripts, and the need to be able to run apt without a tty.
> But those days are long gone.
> 
> Would someone care to file a bug against apt, requesting that the
> default be changed early in the buster cycle ?

That "obviously" breaks all features which need apt to multiplex the
terminal rather than handing it of to dpkg (which hands it to debconf…)
including but not limited to /var/log/apt/term.log, a visual progress
bar, …

You can do without those in cron scripts and co probably as you might
(or might not) have other forms of logging in this area – and given that
there is no user interaction there is less need for logging (or more?).
As a default it is unsuitable through as humans like their shiny
progress bars (and some even logs).


The undocumented option is btw from 2013 introduced to help with testing
the case in which apt can't do the pseudo dance successfully (also,
tests involving dpkg output is harder for preciously the initial
problem).  It isn't really targeted for usage by the general public…
(Althrough we had it thankfully for the public as temporary workaround
at the time pseudo terminal handling ran hovac in the small differences
between linux and kfreebsd last time I pulled my hair out over trying to
work on that code)


Best regards

David Kalnischkies

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