[Pkg-matrix-maintainers] matrix-synapse_0.34.0~rc2-1 startup fails with TypeError

[anon at sigil.red]

Hi

I'm having trouble starting up the latest synapse (python3 version) on 
debian sid. Is this a known issue?

The error is:

|Traceback (most recent call last): File "/usr/lib/python3.7/runpy.py", 
line 183, in _run_module_as_main mod_name, mod_spec, code = 
_get_module_details(mod_name, _Error) File 
"/usr/lib/python3.7/runpy.py", line 109, in _get_module_details 
__import__(pkg_name) File 
"/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/synapse/app/__init__.py", line 
python_dependencies.check_requirements() File 
"/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/synapse/python_dependencies.py" if 
LooseVersion(version) < LooseVersion(required_version): File 
"/usr/lib/python3.7/distutils/version.py", line 304, in __init_ 
self.parse(vstring) File "/usr/lib/python3.7/distutils/version.py", line 
312, in parse components = [x for x in self.component_re.split(vstring) 
TypeError: cannot use a string pattern on a bytes-like object |

The issue can be easily reproduced with the following dockerfile:

FROM debian:sid
RUN apt update && apt upgrade -y && apt install -y matrix-synapse
RUN /usr/bin/python3 -m synapse.app.homeserver 
--config-path=/etc/matrix-synapse/homeserver.yaml 
--config-path=/etc/matrix-synapse/conf.d/ --generate-keys

Could it be that the dependencies are out of date and don't really 
support python3?

See also: https://github.com/matrix-org/synapse/issues/4311

Best regards
Märt