tlp shouldn't recommend linux-tools

Hello Adam, or anyone else affected,

Accepted tlp into bionic-proposed. The package will build now and be available at https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/tlp/1.1-2ubuntu1 in a few hours, and then in the -proposed repository.

Please help us by testing this new package. See https://wiki.ubuntu.com/Testing/EnableProposed for documentation on how to enable and use -proposed.Your feedback will aid us getting this update out to other Ubuntu users.

If this package fixes the bug for you, please add a comment to this bug, mentioning the version of the package you tested and change the tag from verification-needed-bionic to verification-done-bionic. If it does not fix the bug for you, please add a comment stating that, and change the tag to verification-failed-bionic. In either case, without details of your testing we will not be able to proceed.

Further information regarding the verification process can be found at https://wiki.ubuntu.com/QATeam/PerformingSRUVerification . Thank you in advance!

Verified that the resulting binaries now Suggest "linux-tools-generic | linux-tools" and no longer Recommend "linux-tools".

The verification of the Stable Release Update for tlp has completed successfully and the package has now been released to -updates. Subsequently, the Ubuntu Stable Release Updates Team is being unsubscribed and will not receive messages about this bug report. In the event that you encounter a regression using the package from -updates please report a new bug using ubuntu-bug and tag the bug report regression-update so we can easily find any regressions.

This bug was fixed in the package tlp - 1.1-2ubuntu1

---------------
tlp (1.1-2ubuntu1) bionic; urgency=medium

  * Demote linux-tools Recommends to Suggests and prefer generic (LP: #1783455)

 -- Adam Conrad <email address hidden> Tue, 24 Jul 2018 20:00:47 -0600

NO.

This is not about cpupower. TLP recommends linux-tools on Ubuntu (and linux-cpupower on Debian) for the x86_energy_perf_policy binary, which is needed for some reporting functions (look in tlp-stat and tlp-functions). This is stated quite clearly in the comments at the top of the debian/rules file (line 6 !!).

I don't know how things are usually done in Ubuntu, but reporting a (so-called) bug and uploading a (misguided) patched version six minutes later without even notifying the package maintainer or asking for his/her advice (let alone asking for permission...) is clearly not appropriate.

I'll be frank, I'm quite upset with the Ubuntu community these days, between the dozens of reports about bugs already fixed long ago, the "bug" wishing for a KDE GUI (a simple Google search would be sufficient to explain the state of things about TLP ans GUIs), and now this.

Next time such a thing happen, I'll definitely stop caring about Ubuntu, Launchpad bugs or the merging/syncing state of the package, and focus exclusively on Debian, letting you (you the Ubuntu community as a whole, not you Adam Conrad) manage it on your own.

I agree with Raphael about the inapproriate procedure. Ask your upstream(s) first, please!

> 1) linux-tools is a virtual, provided by many linux-tools packages, and we have no way of knowing which one matches the kernel you have installed.

Then what's the proper way to install linux-tools-* matching the installed kernel? Maybe a bug report against linux-tools would have been more appropriate than tinkering with the tlp package?

Regards, Thomas (TLP's author)

There is no "proper way" for a package to depend on linux-tools in Ubuntu, currently. A bug on linux-tools wouldn't have solved that problem retroactively.

And no, we're not going to ask our upstreams every time we make a change to a package. If we did, there would be no Ubuntu, no Debian, no Fedora, arguably no meaningfully usable Free Software distributions at all.

And, it turns out, sometimes people who understand the inner workings (and failings, in this case) of a specific distribution know what's better for it than the people demanding we ask their permission before we exercise the rights given to us by the software's license.

I don't dispute that my initial analysis was incorrect and tlp can indeed make use of linux-tools, but that doesn't change my conclusion. It's not a hard dependency, the functionality is not required for the package to work, and pulling in several megabyte of a potentially useless perf (because it's for the wrong kernel ABI) just to get at one small utility is not reasonable with the state of the Ubuntu archive.

If we split out linux-cpupower into a binary that it's tied to kernel ABI, as Ben has done in Debian, then this dep would make more sense for us, but for now it does not.

Le 05/08/2018 à 05:34, Adam Conrad a écrit :
> And no, we're not going to ask our upstreams every time we make a change
> to a package. If we did, there would be no Ubuntu, no Debian, no
> Fedora, arguably no meaningfully usable Free Software distributions at
> all.

Not necessarily, but the very least would have been to ask the package
maintainer (me) for advice. It would have prevented your wrong initial
analysis that TLP doesn't need linux-tools at all (because you thought
it was about cpupower) whereas it really does (because it uses
x86_energy_perf_policy). In any case, that's how we do it in Debian.

> And, it turns out, sometimes people who understand the inner workings
> (and failings, in this case) of a specific distribution know what's
> better for it than the people demanding we ask their permission before
> we exercise the rights given to us by the software's license.

Again, I can't speak for Thomas, but in my case, I was not upset by your
changing the package; I was upset because it's been done in a matter of
minutes, based on a wrong analysis, and without even asking me or
upstream for advice.

> I don't dispute that my initial analysis was incorrect and tlp can
> indeed make use of linux-tools, but that doesn't change my conclusion.
> It's not a hard dependency, the functionality is not required for the
> package to work, and pulling in several megabyte of a potentially
> useless perf (because it's for the wrong kernel ABI) just to get at one
> small utility is not reasonable with the state of the Ubuntu archive.

On the contrary. Allow me to quote your very words:

"Recommends are meant as weak dependencies (you really want this, but we
can work around it not being there)"

IMHO, this describes pretty well the relationship between TLP and
x86_energy_perf_policy, so the Recommends seems perfectly justified to me.

This behavior, along with LP #1758798, make me suspect that lighten the
dependencies for Ubuntu Budgie has become some kind of long-term goal,
which I'm not sure that vanilla Ubuntu will benefit from.

Anyway, as it seems that the Ubuntu project is determined to change
package dependencies as they see fit (which I find perfectly reasonable)
against both upstream's and original maintainer's advice (which I find
less reasonable), I guess you won't mind if I simplify the Debian
packaging by removing the Ubuntu tweaks we took care of implementing in
debian/rules and debian/control, since you circumvent them anyway.

Regards,

--
Raphaël Halimi