Bug#625771: libxml-libxml-perl: error during installation

[Niko Tyni]

On Thu, May 05, 2011 at 10:57:17PM +0200, Christoph Anton Mitterer wrote:
> Package: libxml-libxml-perl
> Version: 1.70.ds-1+b1
> Severity: normal
 
> The following happens during installation:
> Preparing to replace libxml-libxml-perl 1.70.ds-1 (using .../libxml-libxml-perl_1.70.ds-1+b1_i386.deb) ...
> Can't locate File/Basename.pm in @INC (@INC contains: /etc/perl /usr/local/lib/perl/5.10.1 /usr/local/share/perl/5.10.1 /usr/lib/perl5 /usr/share/perl5 /usr/lib/perl/5.10 /usr/share/perl/5.10 /usr/local/lib/site_perl .) at /usr/share/perl5/XML/SAX.pm line 15.
> BEGIN failed--compilation aborted at /usr/share/perl5/XML/SAX.pm line 15.
> Compilation failed in require at /usr/bin/update-perl-sax-parsers line 18.
> BEGIN failed--compilation aborted at /usr/bin/update-perl-sax-parsers line 18.
> dpkg: warning: subprocess old pre-removal script returned error exit status 2
> dpkg - trying script from the new package instead ...
> dpkg: ... it looks like that went OK.
> Unpacking replacement libxml-libxml-perl ...

This is because the prerm script gets executed at a point when perl-base
is still at 5.10 but perl and perl-modules have already been upgraded
to 5.12. It's trying to unregister XML::LibXML from the XML::SAX parsers
database and failing that.

The "new" prerm script succeeds because it doesn't retry the
unregistration when given a 'failed-upgrade' argument.

> Is this "normal"?

It's ugly, but I don't think it actually breaks anything.

Could you please check whether XML::LibXML::SAX and
XML::LibXML::SAX::Parser are now mentioned twice in your
/etc/perl/XML/SAX/ParserDetails.ini or only once? (The latter is the
correct behaviour.)

Not sure what can be done about this. Possibly the update-perl-sax-parsers
calls should be moved to the postrm. Even so, making sure the fix
will apply to squeeze->wheezy upgrades may need a Conflicts/Breaks
in perl-base or something like that.

Thanks for the report,
-- 
Niko Tyni   ntyni at debian.org