[Pkg-utopia-maintainers] Bug#1004593: network-manager: [global-dns] searches=... configuration variable appears to have no effect

[Norbert Bollow]

Package: network-manager
Version: 1.30.0-2, 1.34.0-2
Severity: normal
X-Debbugs-Cc: nb at bollow.ch

Dear Maintainer,

I'm whether this might be a usability bug with the documentation or a
fuctional buf with the software itself:

According to 'man NetworkManager.conf', I expected that creating a
configuration file /etc/NetworkManager/conf.d/deeperpurpose.conf with contents

[global-dns]
searches=example.org

would result in /etc/resolv.conf in a line like

search example.org

However, adding that configuration file has proved ineffective (i.e. it
does not result in any change to /etc/resolv.conf), although it appears
that NetworkManager reads it.
[Syslog entry:
Jan 30 20:19:22 quill NetworkManager[806]: <info>  [1643570362.0630] Read config
: /etc/NetworkManager/NetworkManager.conf (lib: no-mac-addr-change.conf) (etc: d
eeperpurpose.conf)
]

The /etc/resolv.conf file which NetworkManager generates is exactly the
same independently of whether or not that configuration file is added:

# Generated by NetworkManager
search home
nameserver 192.168.1.1
nameserver fe80::125a:f7ff:fe4f:1417%enp14s0

By contrast, I have found that the following are effective ways for adding
a domain name to the "search" line in /etc/resolv.conf or adding to it:
- adding it to /etc/hostname (that adds it to the "search" line after
  the "home" — found out about through taking a look at the source code of
  NetworkManager, see line 1263 and following in
  NetworkManager-1.30.0/src/core/dns/nm-dns-manager.c — is that
  behavior documented at all in the man pages for NetworkMananger?)
- using nm-connection-editor (putting the domain name I want in the
  "additonal search domains" field actually *replaces* the "home"
  which is precisely what I wanted, even though that does not quite
  correspond to the "additonal search domains" field description.) 

The issue came up during a fresh install of Debian 11.2 on a laptop
computer. I have also tested (using a separate test system) the
version 1.34.0-2 which is in testing and unstable and found the exact
same behavior.

I suggest that at the very least, the man pages should be updated
with information that explains how to get a desired domain name into
the "search" line of /etc/resolv.conf .

Best regards,

-- System Information:
Debian Release: 11.2
  APT prefers stable-updates
  APT policy: (500, 'stable-updates'), (500, 'stable-security'), (500, 'stable')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)

Kernel: Linux 5.10.0-11-amd64 (SMP w/8 CPU threads)
Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8), LANGUAGE=en_US:en
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /usr/bin/dash
Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)
LSM: AppArmor: enabled

Versions of packages network-manager depends on:
ii  adduser          3.118
ii  dbus             1.12.20-2
ii  libaudit1        1:3.0-2
ii  libbluetooth3    5.55-3.1
ii  libc6            2.31-13+deb11u2
ii  libcurl3-gnutls  7.74.0-1.3+deb11u1
ii  libglib2.0-0     2.66.8-1
ii  libgnutls30      3.7.1-5
ii  libjansson4      2.13.1-1.1
ii  libmm-glib0      1.14.12-0.2
ii  libndp0          1.6-1+b1
ii  libnewt0.52      0.52.21-4+b3
ii  libnm0           1.30.0-2
ii  libpsl5          0.21.0-1.2
ii  libreadline8     8.1-1
ii  libselinux1      3.1-3
ii  libsystemd0      247.3-6
ii  libteamdctl0     1.31-1
ii  libudev1         247.3-6
ii  libuuid1         2.36.1-8+deb11u1
ii  policykit-1      0.105-31+deb11u1
ii  udev             247.3-6
ii  wpasupplicant    2:2.9.0-21

Versions of packages network-manager recommends:
ii  dnsmasq-base [dnsmasq-base]  2.85-1
ii  iptables                     1.8.7-1
ii  libpam-systemd               247.3-6
ii  modemmanager                 1.14.12-0.2
ii  ppp                          2.4.9-1+1
ii  wireless-regdb               2020.04.29-2

Versions of packages network-manager suggests:
ii  isc-dhcp-client  4.4.1-2.3
pn  libteam-utils    <none>

-- no debconf information