Bug#292401: kdm_config override /etc/kde3/kdm/kdmrc which is a conffile
severity 292401 important
stop
On January 26, 2005 17:56, Bill Allombert wrote:
> Package: kdm
> Version: 4:3.3.1-4
> Severity: serious
> Justification: Policy 10.7.3
...which states:
Configuration file handling must conform to the following behavior:
* local changes must be preserved during a package upgrade, and
* configuration files must be preserved when the package is removed,
and only deleted when the package is purged.
Nothing kcontrol does violates policy 10.7.3, which describes package
upgrades and removals. It does not forbid some GUI tool from completely
re-writing the file, since running that tool is up to the user and has
nothing to do with packaging policy.
That kcontrol does what it does is very annoying and a very nasty
shortcoming, but not a policy violation.
> kcontrol overwrite the conffile /etc/kde3/kdm/kdmrc without
> respecting comment and formating. For example if you start with the
> file provided in the current kdm package, launch kcontrol,
> choose Login manager->Administrator Mode,make a change, cancel it
> and it apply, you get a complelty different file /etc/kde3/kdm/kdmrc,
> see patch below.
>
> This means dpkg conffiles handling is useless here since you cannot
> merge the changes.
To fix this, we'd need either to ship a kdmrc that conforms to the
kcontrol configurator's basic pattern, and so wouldn't be modified by
kcontrol more than is really necessary (could we make it keep the
comments, at least?), or else re-write the kdm module of kcontrol to
behave less stupidly, which would be quite an undertaking.
Comments?
Cheers,
Christopher Martin
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