Bug#398924: Conflict between Gnome, udev, hotplug and linux-2.4

[Robert Millan]

On Thu, Nov 16, 2006 at 05:44:02PM -0800, Steve Langasek wrote:
> On Thu, Nov 16, 2006 at 05:27:22PM +0100, Robert Millan wrote:
> > No, but I think there will be a relevant number of users transitioning through
> > this state (IIRC release notes recommend to upgrade userland first, then
> > kernel).  For some, their network will stop working and they'll have to figure
> > out how to bring it up.
> 
> Why is the network going to stop working?  Removing the hotplug package
> unloads the modules for some reason?

Not unless you reboot the system, which I thought was a good thing to do (to
ensure my runtime was completely up-to-date).  If rebooting at that point is a
source of trouble, I think we could document this in release notes.

But then again, it makes no sense to postpone kernel upgrade after userland if
we can't reboot anyway.  Maybe this means we have to change order ?

> How likely is it that the converse would happen, that the etch kernel
> package would be installed but udev is not, resulting in breakage on reboot
> because hotplug is incompatible?  If anything, this case seems more likely
> if the dependencies of gnome are changed.

But the etch linux-image-* package directly depends on udev, so that's not
possible.

> > This could be done in many ways:
> 
> >   - In any part of the dependency chain between gnome-desktop-environment and
> >     udev.
> >   - Loosening as lowering to Recommends, or as adding hotplug as an alternative.
> 
> I'm pretty sure that the latter would not give the desired results.  What in
> hotplug is going to provide matching functionality for what g-d-e is looking
> for?

Nothing, it is more like: if hotplug is NOT installed, then we definitely want
g-v-m functionality.  Otherwise we don't want it because it'd be at the cost of
losing hotplug.

> > Perhaps a good choice would be to get gnome-desktop-environment to depend on:
> 
> >   "gnome-volume-manager | hotplug"
> 
> That means significant functionality of the GNOME desktop would be
> completely ignored by apt just because hotplug is installed.  Not a good
> option, AFAICS.

Not necessarily.  Later in the install process, when we install etch linux-image
which drags in udev, removal of hotplug will be forced.  Then the dependency on
"gnome-volume-manager | hotplug" is no longer satisfied, and apt has to figure
out that installing gnome-volume-manager does the trick (I'm not sure if it is
able to figure that out, though).

-- 
Robert Millan

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