Bug#714634: [lsb-discuss] Clarification of general LSB requirements

On Wed, Jul 10, 2013 at 02:10:22AM -0700, Russ Allbery wrote:
> But, in the example that you raise, this is an optional configuration.
> Indeed, at least at present and in all previous releases of Debian, one
> has to go out of one's way to get the lsb-invalid-mta package installed,
> since a fully functional mail transport agent providing the sendmail
> command is part of a standard Debian installation.  You have to go out of
> your way to remove it.  So the scenario I describe above doesn't really
> apply, and the problem reduces to whether the installation of the Debian
> lsb-core package should guarantee that a fully functional sendmail program
> is present on the system (but possibly not configured), as opposed to
> delivering one by default but allowing the local systems administrator to
> choose to replace it with a error-producing stub without removing the
> lsb-core package.

I don't think there's any problem here wrt the LSB standard, but I'm not
thrilled about the package-wise implementation of lsb-invalid-mta,
particularly from the perspective of a Debian derivative which does not ship
an MTA by default.

 - user installs a stock system with no MTA.
 - user installs lsb-core so they can install an LSB package
 - user installs a package that Depends: mail-transport-agent
 - user gets a system without a usable MTA, only because they installed
   lsb-core first

I would argue that lsb-invalid-mta is a perfectly valid solution for
lsb-core, but that it should not Provide: mail-transport-agent - so that any
packages that actually say "yes, I require an MTA" get the default MTA and
not the lsb-invalid-mta bodge.  It's not reasonable for an LSB package which
is at arm's length from the system to require a working and configured MTA,
but for native packages I think this is legitimate - and installing the MTA
by default does require the user to configure it for use.

> (It's probably also worth noting that Debian does not claim LSB compliance
> and the description of that Debian package states, rather prominently:
> "The intent of this package is to provide a best current practice way of
> installing and running LSB packages on Debian GNU/Linux.  Its presence
> does not imply that Debian fully complies with the Linux Standard Base,
> and should not be construed as a statement that Debian is LSB-compliant."
> So, really, it's kind of hard to see what's notably egregious about this.)

Well, I think that package description is silly in its lawyeresque
weaselness.  The raison d'être of the package is to provide an LSB-compliant
layer, which is what it means to support installing and running LSB
packages.  I don't see any reason the package description should have this
long disclaimer about the possibility of bugs in the implementation.

-- 
Steve Langasek                   Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
Debian Developer                   to set it on, and I can move the world.
Ubuntu Developer                                    http://www.debian.org/
[email protected]                                     [email protected]

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