Bug#405694: inet6 option in /etc/resolv.conf causes problems for a lot of programs
Package: libc6
Version: 2.3.6.ds1-9
Severity: important
Adding 'options inet6' in /etc/resolv.conf will cause many programs to
crash or misbehave. The documentation currently contains (reformated):
inet6 sets RES_USE_INET6 in _res.options. This has the effect
of trying a AAAA query before an A query inside the
gethostbyname() function, and of mapping IPv4 responses
in IPv6 ``tunnelled form'' if no AAAA records are found
but an A record set exists.
A *big* warning should be given that setting this flag will cause
programs to behave strangely, as they will get back an AAAA record
and not the expected A record
Additionally one could consider to remove this feature as 'tunneled
forms', with which most likely ::a.b.c.d or ::ffff:a.b.c.d are meant
are deprecated by the IETF as they only cause issues, for instance
like these.
For instance a 2.6.x kernel will report the following when
doing a IPv4 traceroute (pkg: traceroute-nanog 6.3.10-2):
"traceroute forgot to set AF_INET in raw sendmsg. Fix it!"
Also SpamAssassin (3.1.7-1) will segfault when this option is used.
Separate bugs will be failed against these packages, referencing
this bug.
Greets,
Jeroen
-- System Information:
Debian Release: 4.0
APT prefers unstable
APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (500, 'testing')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Locale: LANG=C, LC_CTYPE=C (charmap=ANSI_X3.4-1968)
Versions of packages libc6 depends on:
ii tzdata 2006p-1 Time Zone and Daylight Saving Time
libc6 recommends no packages.
-- no debconf information
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