Source: linux
Version: 6.8.11-1
Severity: normal

Dear maintainer,

Upon investigating why Debian's linux-perf does not support debuginfod,
I found the following excerpt on its rules file[1]:

    # perf can link against libdebuginfod if available, but the result is
    # undistributable for the same reason.  Override detection of
    # libdebuginfod.
    MAKE_PERF += NO_LIBDEBUGINFOD=1

This picked my attention, as I am not aware of any licensing issues that
might prevent linux-perf from linking against libdebuginfod.

While looking at debuginfod source files[2], I found that libdebuginfod
is actually composed of a single file[3]:

    libdebuginfod_a_SOURCES = debuginfod-client.c
    libdebuginfod_pic_a_SOURCES = debuginfod-client.c

and that debuginfod-client.c is dual-licensed GPL-3+ and GPL-2+[4]:

   This file is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
   it under the terms of either

     * the GNU Lesser General Public License as published by the Free
       Software Foundation; either version 3 of the License, or (at
       your option) any later version

   or

     * the GNU General Public License as published by the Free
       Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at
       your option) any later version

   or both in parallel, as here.

debuginfod.h, which is included from debuginfod-client.c, is also
dual-licensed[5].

Out of an abundance of caution, I contacted debuginfod's upstream
developers and confirmed that the dual-licensing scheme was chosen
exactly in order to allow tools like perf to link against libdebuginfod.
I've also confirmed that Fedora's perf does support debuginfod.

Given all of the above, I would like to request that debuginfod support
be enabled on Debian's linux-perf.  That would be very useful for our
users.

Thank you,

[1]: 
https://salsa.debian.org/kernel-team/linux/-/blob/master/debian/rules.d/tools/perf/Makefile?ref_type=heads#L13-16
[2]: https://sourceware.org/cgit/elfutils/tree/debuginfod
[3]: 
https://sourceware.org/cgit/elfutils/tree/debuginfod/Makefile.am?id=915776dc4ab9308a5c62c42e72b5bd15b7012753#n83
[4]: 
https://sourceware.org/cgit/elfutils/tree/debuginfod/debuginfod-client.c?id=915776dc4ab9308a5c62c42e72b5bd15b7012753
[5]: 
https://sourceware.org/cgit/elfutils/tree/debuginfod/debuginfod.h.in?id=915776dc4ab9308a5c62c42e72b5bd15b7012753

-- 
Sergio
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