Bug#1026256: backuppc: BackupPC destroys its configuration when you "Save" in the admin web console

[Axel Beckert]

Control: clone -1 -2
Control: severity -1 grave
Control: severity -2 wishlist
Control: reassign -2 perl
Control: retitle -2 perl: Please add a versioned Conflicts with backuppc

Hi Andreas,

Andreas Feldner wrote:
> after a recent update (probably to a Perl library),
> a bug in BackupPC leads to it destroying its configuration files
> when saved from the BackupPC admin console.

Urgs. That's data loss and hence validates an release-critical
severity. Hence bumping the severity to "grave".

Thanks for the heads up! (I never use the possibility to edit the
configuration via the web interface, so I probably wouldn't have
noticed myself.)

> This bug is reported upstream:
> https://github.com/backuppc/backuppc/issues/466

The upstream report mentions Data::Dumper, which is indeed a Perl
library and part of the perl Perl core, i.e. part of the libperl5.36
Debian package.

Since Data::Dumper hasn't been mentioned in
/usr/share/doc/doc/perl/changelog.Debian.gz (recently), this must have
crept in with the bump to the 5.36 upstream release in June.

The upstream bug report mentions Data::Dumper version 2.182 and
according to

  corelist -a Data::Dumper | egrep '2\.18[123]|v5\.3[456]\.'

there was indeed a version bump between Perl 5.34 (Data::Dumper 2.179)
and 5.36 (Data::Dumper 2.184) which included 2.182. So this confirms
that the Perl upstream bump in June is the cause for this issue.

> A fix seems to be available and extremely easy to apply (not
> verified myself), but is not yet part of an upstream release.

It indeed looks easy to apply. Will provide a backuppc package update
soon after this bugreport.

Niko and Dominic: Can you update the perl package similar to what you
did for "duck" recently? Maybe best only after I updated the backuppc
package. (I've cloned this bug report accordingly for that purpose.)

I suggest either a Conflicts with "backuppc (<= 4.4.0-6+b1)" or with
"backuppc (<< 4.4.0-7~)", whatever deems you more fitting.

		Regards, Axel
-- 
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