Package: debian-cd, module-init-tools Tags: d-i Severity: grave module-init-tools-udeb is listed in the d-i netinst ISO image as Priority: standard, despite being listed in the official Packages file from ftp.debian.org as Priority: extra. This breaks the debian installer, thus the severity of this bug report.
Today I noticed a new behavior in testing the debian installer. DHCP failed to work, pcmcia failed to work, and I got two messages about af_packet and pcmcia_core like this: netcfg[6892]: FATAL: Error inserting af_packet (/lib/modules/2.4.25-1-386/kernel/net/packet/af_packet.o): Unknown symbol in module, or unknown parameter (see dmesg) dmesg had nothing to say. I eventually realized that the d-i system had loaded up the module-init-tools udeb, and had replaced the busybox modprobe/insmod with the ones from that udeb. They seem to work most of the time -- loading these modules at the command line succeeded -- but I guess they have problems with 2.4.25 kernel modules (is this a bug on it's own?). (Kenshi Muto had ran into a similar problem with d-i about a week ago. It would be good to know if he was also using module-init-tools-udeb somehow back then.) I've already put in a quick patch for this problem: The module-init-tool-udeb will not be included on the CD images anymore (there is not reason to include it on them anyway, it belongs in the d-i initrd if anywhere). Part of the right fix for this problem is for Marco d'Itri to change the Priority in the udeb to extra. The other part of the right fix is for debian-cd to be fixed to honor the priority and other overrides from the debian ftp site. It's particularly important that it do so for udebs, but it should also do so for debs, really. I'm suprised that it seems to ignore the priority info in the Packages files, and just uses whatever priority is declared inside the udeb. This is not correct behavior, and is liable to lead to subtle breakage, especially in d-i. If this fix to debian-cd cannot be done immediatly, please tell me. I know that we have some other udebs that have their priority currently overrided, and if debian-cd is not going to be fixed, I will need to make a practice of checking over all such udebs for problems. -- see shy jo
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