[Debian GNUstep maintainers] Bug#583804: Bug in gnustep-base1.19.3 (source): whitespace erroneously stripped from XML property lists

[Michael Werle]

Package:	libgnustep-base1.19
Version:	> 1.19.1


When loading an XML Property List (plist) which contains leading or
trailing whitespace in a string property, or whitespace surrounding an
XML entity, this whitespace is incorrectly stripped.

eg. <string> A &amp; B </string>
-> "A&B"

This bug specifically affects the game Oolite on systems with these
faulty versions of libgnustep-base.  Oolite is packaged and shipped with
Debian.

This bug has been fixed by GNUstep in their trunk revision #30454 and
they will backport the fix to the 1.20 version of gnustep-base.  They
have indicated they will not backport the fix to 1.19.x
See: https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/index.php?29955

The bug has also been raised for Ubuntu:
See: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gnustep-base/+bug/585179

Please find attached a backported patch for gnustep-base-1.19.3.  This
patch has been used to build PPA versions of libgnustep-base1.19 for
Ubuntu Lucid and Ubuntu Maverick.
See:
https://launchpad.net/~3-launchpad-micha-michaelwerle-com/+archive/ppa

Please also find attached a test program (supplied by Jens Ayton) which
illustrates this issue.  Specifically, Tests #1, #2, and #6 are
affected.

Many thanks,
 - Micha.