Bug#1127624: grub2-common: upgrade yields inconsistent /usr/share/doc, breaking "dpkg -S"

[Vincent Lefevre]

Package: grub2-common
Version: 2.14-1
Severity: serious

After I upgraded grub from 2.12-9 to 2.14-1 and removed the resulting
grub-common dummy package, which gave the warning

dpkg: warning: while removing grub-common, directory '/usr/share/doc/grub-common' not empty so not removed

I now have

lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 11 2015-09-06 03:13:12 /usr/share/doc/grub2-common -> grub-common/

where grub-common contains the files, but this breaks "dpkg -S":

cventin:~> dpkg -S /usr/share/doc/grub-common
dpkg-query: no path found matching pattern /usr/share/doc/grub-common

grub2-common 2.12-9 had the above symlink:

lrwxrwxrwx root/root         0 2025-07-03 18:35:51 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common -> grub-common

but grub2-common 2.14-1 has

drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2026-02-05 11:50:50 ./usr/share/doc/
drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2026-02-05 11:50:50 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/
-rw-r--r-- root/root       669 2018-11-24 18:13:02 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/AUTHORS
-rw-r--r-- root/root       242 2026-02-05 11:50:50 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/NEWS.Debian.gz
-rw-r--r-- root/root      9594 2026-01-14 16:46:20 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/NEWS.gz
-rw-r--r-- root/root      1043 2021-06-08 14:15:20 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/README
-rw-r--r-- root/root      1398 2018-11-24 18:13:02 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/THANKS
-rw-r--r-- root/root       318 2018-11-24 18:13:02 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/TODO
-rw-r--r-- root/root     16905 2026-02-05 11:50:50 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/changelog.Debian.gz
-rw-r--r-- root/root    376801 2026-01-14 19:46:54 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/changelog.gz
-rw-r--r-- root/root     22963 2026-02-05 11:50:50 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/copyright
drwxr-xr-x root/root         0 2026-02-05 11:50:50 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/examples/
-rw-r--r-- root/root      1705 2018-11-24 18:13:02 ./usr/share/doc/grub2-common/examples/grub.cfg

So something bad occurred during the upgrade. I suppose that the
symlink /usr/share/doc/grub2-common should have been dropped first,
so that the above files could have been installed directly in a
real directory "/usr/share/doc/grub2-common".

-- System Information:
Debian Release: forky/sid
  APT prefers unstable-debug
  APT policy: (500, 'unstable-debug'), (500, 'stable-updates'), (500, 'stable-security'), (500, 'stable-debug'), (500, 'proposed-updates-debug'), (500, 'unstable'), (500, 'testing'), (500, 'stable'), (1, 'experimental')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)
Foreign Architectures: i386

Kernel: Linux 6.18.8+deb14-amd64 (SMP w/12 CPU threads; PREEMPT)
Kernel taint flags: TAINT_PROPRIETARY_MODULE, TAINT_OOT_MODULE, TAINT_UNSIGNED_MODULE
Locale: LANG=C.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=C.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8), LANGUAGE not set
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /usr/bin/dash
Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)
LSM: AppArmor: enabled

Versions of packages grub2-common depends on:
ii  gettext-base        0.23.2-1
ii  libc6               2.42-12
ii  libdevmapper1.02.1  2:1.02.205-2
ii  libefiboot1t64      39-2
ii  libefivar1t64       39-2
ii  libfreetype6        2.14.1+dfsg-2
ii  libfuse3-4          3.18.1-1
ii  liblzma5            5.8.2-2

Versions of packages grub2-common recommends:
ii  os-prober  1.84

Versions of packages grub2-common suggests:
ii  console-setup  1.245
ii  desktop-base   14.0.0~pre2
pn  grub-emu       <none>
pn  mtools         <none>
pn  multiboot-doc  <none>
pn  xorriso        <none>

-- no debconf information

-- 
Vincent Lefèvre <vincent at vinc17.net> - Web: <https://www.vinc17.net/>
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Work: CR INRIA - computer arithmetic / Pascaline project (LIP, ENS-Lyon)