The problem with debconf needs a little explanation. As show, the command that caused the failure was:
/usr/bin/perl -w /usr/share/debconf/frontend /var/lib/dpkg/info/man- db.postinst triggered /usr/share/man The 'frontend' perl script determines which type of debconf frontend to display. In this case, the gnome frontend was selected. debconf then goes to some pains to ensure that the gtk bindings work. However, because of the gsettings schema problem, as soon as any perl script called 'use Gtk2;', the schema was queried, which resulted in the crash. Since the master debconf process calls 'use Gtk2;' unconditionally, the schema problem caused debconf (technically the perl interpreter) to crash. And since debconf re-execs the original caller (in this case '/var/lib/dpkg/info/man-db.postinst') as itself, this stopped debconf from falling back to other frontends as it should as it was now effectively dead. The fix is for debconf to only 'use Gtk2;' when it has proven that this operation can be performed without impacting the perl interpreter. This allows it to fall back gracefully to alternative frontends. -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Desktop Packages, which is subscribed to gsettings-desktop-schemas in Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1060249 Title: frontend crashed with signal 5 in free_pending_nulls() Status in “debconf” package in Ubuntu: Confirmed Status in “gsettings-desktop-schemas” package in Ubuntu: Fix Released Status in “debconf” source package in Precise: Invalid Status in “debconf” source package in Quantal: Won't Fix Status in “gsettings-desktop-schemas” source package in Quantal: Fix Released Bug description: Crashed during upgrade from Precise to Quantal without any visible effect TEST CASE 1: 1. Install Precise 12.04.1 2. Upgrade to Quantal TEST CASE 2: This test case is used to reproduce the debconf crash: 1. Install Precise 12.04.1 and apply updates 2. Enable apt repository for Quantal 3. Install gsettings-desktop-schemas from Quantal: $ sudo apt-get install gsettings-desktop-schemas/quantal 4. Run man-db trigger manually with: $ sudo DEBIAN_FRONTEND=gnome \ /usr/bin/perl -w /usr/share/debconf/frontend \ /var/lib/dpkg/info/man-db.postinst triggered \ /usr/share/man => Verify that debconf crashes Actually any gtk based application will crash. ACTUAL RESULT This crash is reported on first login after upgrade. ProblemType: Crash DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.10 Package: debconf 1.5.46ubuntu1 ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.5.0-16.25-generic 3.5.4 Uname: Linux 3.5.0-16-generic x86_64 ApportVersion: 2.6.1-0ubuntu1 Architecture: amd64 Date: Tue Oct 2 14:59:09 2012 ExecutablePath: /usr/share/debconf/frontend InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 12.04 LTS "Precise Pangolin" - Release amd64 (20120425) InterpreterPath: /usr/bin/perl PackageArchitecture: all ProcCmdline: /usr/bin/perl -w /usr/share/debconf/frontend /var/lib/dpkg/info/man-db.postinst triggered /usr/share/man ProcEnviron: TERM=xterm PATH=(custom, user) LANG=fr_FR.UTF-8 SHELL=/bin/bash Signal: 5 SourcePackage: debconf StacktraceTop: ?? () from /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libglib-2.0.so.0 g_node_copy_deep () from /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libglib-2.0.so.0 ?? () from /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libglib-2.0.so.0 ?? () g_signal_emit_valist () from /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgobject-2.0.so.0 Title: frontend crashed with signal 5 in g_node_copy_deep() UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to quantal on 2012-10-02 (0 days ago) UserGroups: To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/debconf/+bug/1060249/+subscriptions -- Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages Post to : desktop-packages@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
