I'm not sure why you find it hard to reproduce. A quick snippet of IRC conversation from when I first noticed the bug and chatted about it randomly ...
<willy> aha. <willy> When dpkg runs out of space on the filesystem, it segfaults. <joeyh> obvious and useful behavior <joeyh> fill up the FS more with a core file <willy> yes, i really appreciated that. <joeyh> heh, I have seen that during d-i testing, I remember <joeyh> install to a 64 mb filesystem I have my corefile limit set to 0 so I don't have a core to send you. It doesn't seem to be terribly difficult to reproduce. In my situation, I was installing xlibmesa-dri-dbg_4.3.0-0pre1v5_ia64.deb over the same package version which was in a half-installed state. -- "Next the statesmen will invent cheap lies, putting the blame upon the nation that is attacked, and every man will be glad of those conscience-soothing falsities, and will diligently study them, and refuse to examine any refutations of them; and thus he will by and by convince himself that the war is just, and will thank God for the better sleep he enjoys after this process of grotesque self-deception." -- Mark Twain
