[Debconf-devel] Bug#635032: debconf: question data loss in some frontends (teletype, readline, at least)

[Thorsten Glaser]

severity 635032 serious
thanks

Why does this issue still exist? I nearly broke an important
server right now because I had set the debconf priority to low
intermediately and just did a regular dist-upgrade and thus was
re-asked some questions, all good so far, but DUE TO THE USE OF
CLUSTER-SSH, I HAD A VERY SMALL TERMINAL, SO I DID NOT GET THE
DIALOG FRONTEND, leading to *DATA LOSS* IN DEBCONF.

Luckily, thanks to apt-preconfigure, I was able to recognise
the issue and ^C out, then resize the xterm and restart the
dist-upgrade so I got asked them questions with the dialog
frontend, where I could just hit Enter to keep the current
values.

I repeat: this issue causes data loss in debconf, which can
and will render the system broken, even if it worked before,
in some scenarios that aren’t even rare, like Cluster-SSH.

bye,
//mirabilos
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