[pkg-wicd-maint] Bug#881225: wicd-daemon: had to install net-tools manually to get wicd working

[Axel Beckert]

Hi again,

Axel Beckert wrote:
> Neels Hofmeyr wrote:
> > after upgrade to Debian 9 I installed wicd-gtk and saw wicd successfully
> > connecting (ping worked for like two seconds) and then disconnecting again
> > right away.
> > 
> > Looking at the logs I saw that it complained about 'ifconfig' not being
> > available. Indeed net-tools was not installed on the system by default.
> 
> Yes, this seems to have fallen through when net-tools had its Priority
> downgraded and hence no more guaranteed to be installed. :-/

Nope, it's not that trivial. The dependency on net-tools is there. It
just has alternatives:

Package: wicd-daemon
Architecture: all
Depends: […],
         net-tools | ethtool,
         net-tools | iproute2,
	 […]

So if both, iproute2 and ethtool are already installed, net-tools will
not be installed as the dependencies are already fulfilled.

Under Preferences → External Programs you can switch both "Wired Link
Detection" as "Route Table Flushing" between a tool included in
net-tools (mii-tool and route) and a tool which comes from a separate
package (ethtool and ip).

So my current suspicion is that the two mentioned dependencies
directly correspond to the choices under "External Programs" while
wicd also uses ifconfig (not listed as choice anywhere in Preferences)
without having ip as alternative yet as those wishlist bug reports show:

> https://bugs.debian.org/852333 and
> https://blueprints.launchpad.net/wicd/+spec/support-ip-iw

Will have to dig a little bit deeper…

My current suspicion is that instead of these alternative dependencies
we need:

* Hard dependency on net-tools
* Suggests on ethtool and iproute2 (Suggests and not Recommends as
  their usage doesn't seem to be default.)

		Regards, Axel
-- 
 ,''`.  |  Axel Beckert <abe at debian.org>, https://people.debian.org/~abe/
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