Reportbug's behaviour now that bts=ubuntu is dropped

Wed Jan 7 23:33:38 UTC 2009

On Wed, 7 Jan 2009 14:21:20 -0500
Scott Kitterman <ubuntu at kitterman.com> wrote:

> On Wednesday 07 January 2009 12:30, Iain Lane wrote:
> > Hi all,
> >
> > Just a quick mail to solicit some kind of general consensus on this
> > issue, which came up when I merged reportbug 3.48 from Debian[0].
> >
> > Previous versions of reportbug in Ubuntu were configured to mail bug
> > reports to the ubuntu-users mailing list (AFAIK, I've never been
> > subscribed to this). This was obviously unsustainable, and
> > rightfully it has been removed as of version 3.47ubuntu1. What I'd
> > like to discuss now is what reportbug should do by default.
> > Currently (3.47ubuntu1), it displays this message when either the
> > default BTS is set to Ubuntu or the user hasn't configured any
> > default yet:
> >
> > `*** ERROR: "Ubuntu" BTS is currently unsupported. Please use
> > "ubuntu-bug" (from the apport package) for
> > reporting bugs in Ubuntu. You can report bugs to Debian by using
> > bts=debian (see reportbug(1)).'
> >
> > The program then exits.
> >
> > I mentioned in the bug that I think it would be nice if the user has
> > never configured reportbug before (no ~/.reportbugrc) then it'd be
> > nice to proceed to the normal configuration process after
> > displaying the warning and requiring some appropriate
> > confirmation.Something like:
> >
> > `WARNING: Ubuntu has stopped using reportbug for reporting bugs.
> > reportbug is a tool for Ubuntu developers to report bugs in Debian.
> >
> > Do you wish to continue to report a bug to Debian [yN]?'
> >
> > And then we write bts=debian to the user's reportbugrc file, as
> > this is not currently done, meaning the warning is repeatedly
> > displayed even after a successful configuration and bug filing. If
> > bts=ubuntu then I agree that bailing out is appropriate.
> >
> > What do people think is a good way to proceed on this? Will
> > mis-filings to Debian be too high if we remove the explicit
> > configuration requirement? Any other approaches?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Iain
> >
> > [0] https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/reportbug/+bug/314556
> 
> A couple of comments ....
> 
> Ubuntu never used reportbug for reporting bugs, so it can't have
> stopped.
> 
> As we discussed on IRC, since reportbug knows the packagename, it
> seems to me it would be more friendly to fire up ubuntu-bug and pass
> it the package name.
> 
> I do not think sending bugs to Debian should be one question away for
> the casual user.  Upstreaming bugs to Debian requires knowning
> something about the package and if the bug is related to Ubuntu,
> Debian, or upstream. Virtually no end users have the knowledge to
> deal with that.
> 
> Scott K
> 

If it has never been used, could someone tell the users using it that?
Here is one of the recent reports:

From: Brad Sims <bmsims1 at comcast.net>
To: Ubuntu Bug Tracking System <ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com>
Subject: usbview: Can not open /proc/bus/usb/devices
Date: Sat, 03 Jan 2009 00:52:56 -0600
Reply-To: "Ubuntu user technical support,
 not for general discussions" <ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com>
X-Mailer: reportbug 3.41ubuntu2

Package: usbview
Version: 1.0-11
Severity: grave
Justification: renders package unusable

I am using the ubuntu kernel for Intrepid and it doesn't work... there
is no /proc/bus/usb/devices file, and from reading previous bugs against
this package there is no one who cares that this package doesn't
actually work.

I'd like to see it either fixed, or removed from the archives.

If nothing else whoever reads this: tag it won't/can't fix.

-- System Information:
Debian Release: lenny/sid
  APT prefers intrepid-updates
  APT policy: (500, 'intrepid-updates'), (500, 'intrepid-security'),
(500, 'intrepid-proposed'), (500, 'intrepid-backports'), (500,
'intrepid') Architecture: i386 (i686)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.27-11-generic (SMP w/1 CPU core)
Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash

Versions of packages usbview depends on:
ii  libatk1.0-0        1.24.0-0ubuntu1       The ATK accessibility
toolkit ii  libc6              2.8~20080505-0ubuntu7 GNU C Library:
Shared libraries ii  libcairo2          1.8.0-0ubuntu1.1      The Cairo
2D vector graphics libra ii  libfontconfig1     2.6.0-1ubuntu4
generic font configuration library ii  libglib2.0-0
2.18.2-0ubuntu2       The GLib library of C routines ii
libgtk2.0-0        2.14.4-0ubuntu1       The GTK+ graphical user
interface ii  libpango1.0-0      1.22.2-0ubuntu1       Layout and
rendering of internatio ii  libx11-6           2:1.1.5-2ubuntu1.1
X11 client-side library ii  libxcomposite1     1:0.4.0-3
X11 Composite extension library ii  libxcursor1
1:1.1.9-1             X cursor management library ii
libxdamage1        1:1.1.1-4             X11 damaged region extension
libra ii  libxext6           2:1.0.4-1             X11 miscellaneous
extension librar ii  libxfixes3         1:4.0.3-2             X11
miscellaneous 'fixes' extensio ii  libxi6
2:1.1.3-2build1       X11 Input extension library ii
libxinerama1       2:1.0.3-2             X11 Xinerama extension library
ii  libxrandr2         2:1.2.3-1             X11 RandR extension
library ii  libxrender1        1:0.9.4-2             X Rendering
Extension client libra

usbview recommends no packages.

-- no debconf information

-- 
ubuntu-users mailing list
ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
Modify settings or unsubscribe at:
https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-users

-- 
Charlie Kravetz 
Linux Registered User Number 425914          [http://counter.li.org/]
Never let anyone steal your DREAM.           [http://keepingdreams.com]