[Pkg-utopia-maintainers] Bug#916187: network-manager-gnome no longer creates system connections for netdev group

[Dean Serenevy]

Package: network-manager-gnome
Version: 1.8.18-2
Severity: normal

Dear Maintainer,

Hello, it seems that upstream changes have broken part of
Allow-to-create-connections-without-admin-privileges.patch (written to
address bug 696256).

Upstream commit 0c92debe9 marks all WiFi connections as user
connections by default, where the Debian patch checks whether the user
has the org.freedesktop.NetworkManager.settings.modify.system
permission and only creates a user connection if the permission check
fails.

Unfortunately, the user vs system connection issue has a lot of
history and the default behavior seems to bounce around as different
use situations are emphasized. The nice thing about the Debian patch
is that it solves the problem for multiple use cases, any user in the
netdev group creates system connections, other users create user-only
connections.

I've attached a patch which could be rolled into
Allow-to-create-connections-without-admin-privileges.patch to restore
the functionality of that patch. It simply removes the line added by
upstream which unconditionally marks the connection as a user
connection, allowing the Debian logic to apply. The other alternative,
of course, is to remove that patch (entirely or in part) and continue
using the upstream behavior.

Our particular usage situation requires less-technical users to create
a network connecction for system use, so being able to create system
connections by default significantly eases the burden of our support
staff.  If connections are not system-wide by default, we have to walk
each user through the process of checking the "All users may connect
to this netowrk" box. Therefore, we would definitely prefer that the
patch be updated rather than just removed.


Thanks,
Dean Serenevy



-- System Information:
Debian Release: buster/sid
  APT prefers testing
  APT policy: (500, 'testing')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 4.18.0-3-amd64 (SMP w/4 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8), LANGUAGE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash
Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)
LSM: AppArmor: enabled

Versions of packages network-manager-gnome depends on:
ii  dbus-user-session [default-dbus-session-bus]  1.12.10-1
ii  dbus-x11 [dbus-session-bus]                   1.12.10-1
ii  dconf-gsettings-backend [gsettings-backend]   0.30.1-1
ii  libatk1.0-0                                   2.30.0-1
ii  libayatana-appindicator3-1                    0.5.3-4
ii  libc6                                         2.27-8
ii  libcairo2                                     1.16.0-1
ii  libgdk-pixbuf2.0-0                            2.38.0+dfsg-6
ii  libglib2.0-0                                  2.58.1-2
ii  libgtk-3-0                                    3.24.1-2
ii  libjansson4                                   2.11-1
ii  libmm-glib0                                   1.8.2-1
ii  libnm0                                        1.14.4-4
ii  libnma0                                       1.8.18-2
ii  libnotify4                                    0.7.7-3
ii  libpango-1.0-0                                1.42.4-4
ii  libpangocairo-1.0-0                           1.42.4-4
ii  libsecret-1-0                                 0.18.6-3
ii  libselinux1                                   2.8-1+b1
ii  network-manager                               1.14.4-4
ii  policykit-1-gnome [polkit-1-auth-agent]       0.105-7

Versions of packages network-manager-gnome recommends:
ii  gnome-keyring                        3.28.2-1
ii  iso-codes                            4.1-1
ii  mobile-broadband-provider-info       20170903-1
ii  notification-daemon                  3.20.0-3
ii  xfce4-notifyd [notification-daemon]  0.4.2-1

Versions of packages network-manager-gnome suggests:
pn  network-manager-openconnect-gnome  <none>
pn  network-manager-openvpn-gnome      <none>
pn  network-manager-pptp-gnome         <none>
pn  network-manager-vpnc-gnome         <none>

-- no debconf information
-------------- next part --------------
Index: network-manager-applet-1.8.18/src/applet-device-wifi.c
===================================================================
--- network-manager-applet-1.8.18.orig/src/applet-device-wifi.c
+++ network-manager-applet-1.8.18/src/applet-device-wifi.c
@@ -481,7 +482,6 @@ wifi_new_auto_connection (NMDevice *devi
 
 	/* Make the new connection available only for the current user */
 	s_con = (NMSettingConnection *) nm_setting_connection_new ();
-	nm_setting_connection_add_permission (s_con, "user", g_get_user_name (), NULL);
 	nm_connection_add_setting (connection, NM_SETTING (s_con));
 
 	ssid = nm_access_point_get_ssid (ap);