conffile prompt during release upgrade

I also tried this in a chroot and encountered the same issue.

/etc/gprofng.rc is not conffile in kinetic...

Just ran into this on a test upgrade of the raspi desktop image. The card was originally flashed with kinetic and I noted /etc/gprofng.rc was *not* present initially (@zhsj is correct this doesn't *ship* with kinetic), but appeared after the initial upgrade required before do-release-upgrade (in other words /etc/gprofng.rc is introduced by the version of binutils-common in kinetic-updates).

The /etc/gprofng.rc file was unmodified before proceeding to do-release-upgrade, yet I was prompted to merge changes during the upgrade (which was otherwise uneventful), despite there being no local changes to the file, and the only diff being that shown in the description above (a change in the copyright notice in the header).

Some issue in the configuration merge mechanism, perhaps? Or maybe something iffy being done to the config file in the binutils-common maintscripts (if any)?

We think the problem is that in kinetic, binutils did not declare /etc/gprofng.rc as a conffile (although it was shipped), but in Lunar debian/binutils-common.conffiles was added. This means that dpkg thinks the existing /etc/gprofng.rc was created by the user.

I am waiting on a PPA build to test a fix.

@enr0n ah, that makes sense (and apologies to @zhsj; I suspect I misinterpreted comment 2!)

I tested the attached patch using my PPA https://launchpad.net/~enr0n/+archive/ubuntu/lp2015778/+packages, and I did not get the conffile prompt during upgrade.

root@kinetic:~# apt-cache policy binutils-common
binutils-common:
  Installed: 2.39-3ubuntu1.1
  Candidate: 2.39-3ubuntu1.1
  Version table:
 *** 2.39-3ubuntu1.1 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu kinetic-updates/main amd64 Packages
        500 http://security.ubuntu.com/ubuntu kinetic-security/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     2.39-3ubuntu1 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu kinetic/main amd64 Packages
root@kinetic:~# do-release-upgrade -d --allow-third-party
[ ... ]
root@kinetic:~# head /etc/gprofng.rc
# Copyright (C) 2021-2023 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
#
# This file is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
# it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
# the Free Software Foundation; either version 3 of the License, or
# (at your option) any later version.
#
# This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
# but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
# MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
root@kinetic:~# apt-cache policy binutils-common
binutils-common:
  Installed: 2.40-2ubuntu4~ppa2
  Candidate: 2.40-2ubuntu4~ppa2
  Version table:
 *** 2.40-2ubuntu4~ppa2 500
        500 https://ppa.launchpadcontent.net/enr0n/lp2015778/ubuntu lunar/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     2.40-2ubuntu3 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu lunar/main amd64 Packages

I have changed the patch to hardcode the expected md5sum instead.

The attachment "binutils_2.40-2ubuntu4.debdiff" seems to be a debdiff. The ubuntu-sponsors team has been subscribed to the bug report so that they can review and hopefully sponsor the debdiff. If the attachment isn't a patch, please remove the "patch" flag from the attachment, remove the "patch" tag, and if you are member of the ~ubuntu-sponsors, unsubscribe the team.

[This is an automated message performed by a Launchpad user owned by ~brian-murray, for any issue please contact him.]

This bug was fixed in the package binutils - 2.40-2ubuntu4

---------------
binutils (2.40-2ubuntu4) lunar; urgency=medium

  * debian/binutils-common.preinst: remove /etc/gprofng.rc if it has not been
    modified to avoid unnecessary conffile prompt on upgrade (LP: #2015778)

 -- Nick Rosbrook <email address hidden> Thu, 13 Apr 2023 16:38:40 -0400