[Debian-ha-maintainers] Bug#576511: Info received (Bug#576511: drbd8-utils: Ships with violent default actions)

[Josip Rodin]

On Mon, Oct 29, 2012 at 11:02:39AM +0100, Philipp Hug wrote:
> > In fact, if you had been listening to me from day one, you'd realize
> > that I'm not even asking you to actually fix this problem.
> > I'm merely asking you to make the users who aren't using your personally
> > preferred use case, but are nevertheless using an apparently valid and
> > supported use case, aware that these otherwise undocumented defaults are
> > going to be causing them data loss.
> 
> As I said before, please go ahead and submit a possible solution (e.g. patch)
> If you can live with a disclaimer at the top of /etc/drbd.conf: like
> ## WARNING
> ##
> ## Please review the defaults in /etc/drbd.d/global_common.conf,
> ## especially the error handlers, as they reboot the machine in case
> of drbd failure,
> ## before enabling any drbd resources.
> ##
> 
> that would be perfectly fine to me.
> 
> > In retrospect, all this is really ridiculous. I've made every good-faith
> > effort to be constructive in this bug report, and in turn you've just thrown
> > condescending platitudes at me in an apparent effort to avoid doing anything
> 
> I had to use google translate to figure out what you're saying..
> That was for sure not my intention. I was just worried, that changing
> the default makes things worse. And I assumed that's what you wanted.
> As I said before, I'm fine changing comments in the configs to warn users.
> 
> > about this in wheezy (otherwise, what's the point of using a non-RC
> > severity?). I suppose you can continue to do so, but that will simply force
> > me to request that this package is removed from wheezy elsewhere, given that
> > it's unfit for release both because of a software problem and because of a
> > human problem.
> 
> Well, yes, IMO, this is a wishlist bug, that's how I set the severity
> initially, because changing the defaults could make it worse and needs
> further discussion.
> wishlist
>     for any feature request, and also for any bugs that are very
> difficult to fix due to major design considerations.
> 
> So, please answer me if adding the comment is an acceptable solution
> for you and I'll upload a new version.

I'm not sure if you realize it or not, but you've managed to treat me with
pure condescension once again. If you "had to use google translate to figure
out what I was saying", I really have to suggest at this point that you
steer clear of maintaining packages, because English comprehension is
supposed to be a required skill in interacting with bug reporters.
(That goes double for complex software such as DRBD, that entails
non-trivial bug reports.) I admit I'm not a native English speaker,
but my messages here all consisted of reasonably simple English.

And just so I don't get accused of complete failure to be constructive at
this point, even in these circumstances where I'm being repetitively
insulted: to answer your specific suggestion - do we have any reason to
believe that all users who don't want the reboots/halts will take a look at
the specific /etc/drbd.conf file? The generic location seems reasonable
enough, but doing just that still means putting potentially critical
information in a single file that may not be read, and contradicting the
other available documentation that I've referenced earlier. Specifically, in
case of drbd.conf, I for one remember creating my /etc/drbd.d/*.res files
without looking at either drbd.d/global_common.conf or drbd.conf, because
I had assumed that on a clean installation there wouldn't be any worrying
aspects in the bare defaults.

If we want to continue applying these harmful defaults, we should be telling
that to people in all the relevant documentation. It won't mean we
completely prevented harm to them, but at least then we can say we made
an effort.

-- 
     2. That which causes joy or happiness.