Bug#474947: the state of Bug#474947
>From: A Mennucc <mennucc1@debian.org>
> In this same bug there were reported two different issues, a "Dynamic
> MMap error" and a segmentation fault; moreover some people were using
> APT in Etch, and some other in Lenny.
I believe this is a good estimation of how it breaks down.
> The only way to trigger a segmentation fault was instead to set
> Cache-Limit to a ridiculously low value.
Perhaps I was lucky. It is difficult to probe deeper with the first bug
complicating #474947.
Bugs #409336 and #443564 may be similar, or perhaps the exact same issue.
> So my conclusion is that the forthcoming release notes do address the
> problem some people may encounter in upgrading from Etch to Lenny.
>
> I propose the attached patch, though, since it is funny to suggest a
> value of 12500000 (bytes) when the internal value in Lenny is 20MB.
> I hope someone in the d-relase team can apply it.
One thing comes to mind here, is this an amount of space reserved or an
amount allocated? If the latter, then smaller (embedded) systems will
have problems.
> Some months go by; in Sept. JackYF offers to help fixing the problem by
> changing the code.
> (Unfortunately we are already in deep freeze, and I am afraid deep
> changes to APT would not be accepted by the release team.)
I must suggest that the release team think very carefully about this.
The earliest manifestation of the former (MMap problem without the core
dump) is bug #178623. For the past 5 years, every release has had this
bug multiple times as an important issue and had to have it documented in
release notes. I'm estimating 25-50 reports, plus a large number of
people who found the workaround via Google or simply looking at the
reports and decided that since it was reported and a workaround was
known, a fix must be under way.
This effects a rather large number of people.
Given past history, no matter how high the limit (workaround) is set now,
a significant number of people will encounter it within the lifespan of
Lenny. Worse, when the next version beyond Lenny is produced, upgrades
will very likely trigger this bug yet again and a horde of people will
encounter it.
I must therefore suggest that at the very least, the first part of this
bug is too severe to allow to continue on to yet another release. Despite
the pain now, that it is better to solve this issue and avoid yet more
pain down the road.
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