Bug#863118: devscripts needs proper configuration file parsing

[Adrian Bunk]

Package: devscripts
Version: 2.17.5
Severity: normal

devscripts.conf(5) says:

  The two configuration files are /etc/devscripts.conf for system-wide
  defaults and ~/.devscripts for per-user settings. They are written
  with bash(1) syntax, but should only have comments and simple variable
  assignments in them; they are both sourced (if present) by many of the
  devscripts scripts.


This is a hack, not a proper handling of the configuration.

As seen in #863101, "they are both sourced" implies that one
whitespace too many can have unexpected consequences.

The "but should only have" statement implies that users cannot
rely on being able todo anything other than variable assignment
in them.

It would be much more robust against user typos if the configuration
files would be properly parsed instead of blindly executed.