Bug#111914: apt: Apparently harmless apt.conf causes http method to break.

[Daniel Burrows <dburrows@debian.org>]

Package: apt
Version: 0.5.4
Severity: normal

  After spending hours trying to debug aptitude, I have concluded that my
woes stem from a problem with apt itself.

  The situation is this: the current aptitude revision includes support
for "themes" (don't laugh!)  These are essentially UI settings in a
special configuration tree which "shadow" the default settings if the user
has not overridden them in a configuration file.

  In order to make use of this feature, the user must obviously have some
themes defined in his/her configuration file.  The attached apt.conf includes
some sample theme definitions; in fact, the same theme definitions which
shipped with aptitude 0.2.6.

  These definitions are all within the configuration group "Aptitude::Themes",
which seems to me like a safe section of the apt namespace (I can't imagine
why any other program in the apt suite would want to use it)  However, when
this configuration group is defined, the http method dies silently; the only
indication that something is wrong is the following messages:

E: Method http has died unexpectedly!
 (repeated 3 times -- once for each server, I think)
E: Tried to dequeue a fetching object
 (repeated many times -- I think maybe once for each source)

  To reproduce this, run "apt-get update" with the attached apt.conf.

  Daniel

-- System Information
Debian Release: testing/unstable
Architecture: i386
Kernel: Linux torrent 2.4.9 #6 Thu Aug 30 13:35:51 EDT 2001 i686
Locale: LANG=en_US, LC_CTYPE=en_US

Versions of packages apt depends on:
ii  libc6                  2.2.4-1           GNU C Library: Shared libraries an
ii  libstdc++2.10-glibc2.2 1:2.95.4-0.010902 The GNU stdc++ library

-- 
/-------------------- Daniel Burrows <dburrows@debian.org> -------------------\
|          You are in a maze of twisty little signatures, all alike.          |
\-------- Classes are first-class objects. -- http://www.python.org ----------/

Apt::Acquire::Queue-Mode "host";

Apt::Get::Show-Upgraded "true";

Apt::DSelect::clean "always";

Dpkg::Build-Options "-b -uc -rfakeroot";

//Aptitude::UI::Default-Grouping "";
//Aptitude::UI::Default-Preview-Grouping "action";

//Aptitude::Log "|mail -s 'aptitude install log' daniel";
Aptitude::Log "/var/log/aptitude";

//Aptitude::Auto-Install "true";
//Aptitude::Display-Planned-Action "false";

//Aptitude::Minibuf-Download-Widget "true";

//Aptitude::UI::Minibuf-Prompts "true";


Aptitude::Pkg-Display-Limit "!~snon-free";

// From ~/.aptitude/config:

Aptitude "";
Aptitude::Log "/var/log/aptitude";
Aptitude::Pkg-Display-Limit "!~snon-free";
Aptitude::UI "";
Aptitude::UI::Package-Header-Format "%N %n #%B %u %o";
Aptitude::UI::Package-Status-Format "%d";
Aptitude::UI::Package-Display-Format "%c%a %p #%v%V";
Aptitude::UI::Advance-On-Action "false";
Aptitude::UI::Description-Visible-By-Default "true";
Aptitude::UI::Minibuf-Download-Bar "false";
Aptitude::UI::Prompt-On-Exit "true";
Aptitude::UI::Exit-On-Last-Close "true";
Aptitude::UI::Minibuf-Prompts "false";
Aptitude::UI::Menubar-Autohide "false";
Aptitude::UI::HelpBar "true";
// This file defines some default values for aptitude, including themes.
//
// It is sourced before /etc/apt/apt.conf and ~/.aptitude/config.  This is
// not meant to be a user configuration file; instead, it is an internal
// data file.  (which is why it is not stored in /etc)  To override settings
// in this file, use /etc/apt/apt.conf.

Aptitude::Themes
{
  Vertical-Split {
    Aptitude::UI::Default-Package-View {

      Header Static {
        Row 0;
        Column 0;
        Width 3;
        Height 1;

        ColExpand yes;
        ColAlign Center;

        RowAlign Center;

        Color ScreenHeaderColor;

        ColumnsCfg HEADER;
      };

      Center MainWidget {
        Row 1;
        Column 0;
        Width 1;
        Height 1;

        RowExpand yes;
        RowShrink yes;

        ColExpand yes;
        ColShrink yes;
      };

      Bottom Static {
        Row 2;
        Column 0;
        Width 3;
        Height 1;

        ColExpand yes;
        ColAlign center;

        RowAlign center;

        Color ScreenStatusColor;

        ColumnsCfg STATUS;
      };

      sep Static {
        Row 1;
        Column 1;
        Width 1;
        Height 1;

        ColExpand no;

        RowExpand yes;
        RowShrink yes;

        PopupdownLinked desc;

        Columns "";
        Color ScreenStatusColor;
      };

      desc Description {
        Row 1;
        Column 2;
        Width 1;
        Height 1;

        ColExpand yes;

        RowShrink yes;
        RowExpand yes;

        Popupdownkey ShowHideDescription;
      };
    };
  };
};