Bug#648042: purging gdm deletes /etc/X11/Xsession which is a file needed by other packages

[Michael Biebl]

[Please always CC the bug report 648042 at bugs.debian.org]
Am 08.11.2011 23:49, schrieb J G Miller:
> At 15:56h, on Tuesday, November 08, 2011,
> in message <4EB9432E.4000108 at debian.org>,
> on the subject of "Re: Bug#648042: purging gdm
> deletes /etc/X11/Xsession which is a file	needed by other
> packages", you wrote -
> 
>  > Am 08.11.2011 15:48, schrieb J G Miller:
>  > > Package: gdm
>  > > Version: 2.20.11-4
>  > > Severity: normal
>  > > 
>  > > gdm sadly exists no more in "Testing" and so after today's upgrade,
>  > > it was necessary to purge the configuration files.
>  > > 
>  > > This caused /etc/X11/Xsession to be deleted which should not have
>  > > happened because this file is also part of x11-common, xdm, and
>  wdm. > 
>  > I'm pretty sure gdm does not delete that file.
>  > 
>  > gdm never owned that file nor does it have any maintainer scripts,
>  which > remove that file.
>  > Is it possible you meant /etc/gdm/Xsession?
> 
> Further investigation reveals that because of my highly customized
> setup, /etc/gdm/Xsession was a link to /etc/X11/Xsession, similarly the
> the files /etc/gdm/Init/Default, /etc/gdm/PostSession/Default
> /etc/gdm/PreSession/Default were symbolic links to files in
> /etc/X11/dm, and had forgotten about this when I made the bug report.
> 
> So what I would have expected to happen is that dpkg --purge would
> have removed the symbolic links and the /etc/gdm files but not the
> files themselves in the other directories.
> 
> Perhaps I am expecting too much, in which case the bug report
> should be closed as being an unreasonable expectation, and that
> I should have unlinked the files before doing a purge.

Are you saying that dpkg removed the file the symlink was pointing at,
i.e. you changed
/etc/gdm/Xsession → /etc/X11/Xsession
with /etc/gdm/Xsession being owned by the gdm package.
On purge dpkg removed not only the symlink but also /etc/X11/Xsession?

I highly doubt that dpkg is doing that. But I'm CCing the dpkg
maintainers just in case.

Michael

-- 
Why is it that all of the instruments seeking intelligent life in the
universe are pointed away from Earth?

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