man-db segmentation fault after processing trigger

Bug #1838871 reported by Aptivi
20
This bug affects 3 people
Affects Status Importance Assigned to Milestone
man-db (Debian)
Fix Released
Unknown
man-db (Ubuntu)
Fix Released
Critical
Colin Watson

Bug Description

Almost every time I tried to install a package which processes trigger for man-db at the end of the setting up phase using apt, I get the segfault. The message "Segmentation fault (Core dumped)" appears.

I expected mandb to finish repopulating the mandb database so all the manual pages can be accessed via the "man" command. Instead, I got segmentation faults whenever it tries to populate mandb database.

It seems that there are invalid characters passed somewhere, but it shouldn't cause segmentation faults like this.

Here's an example of man-db segfaulting whenever I try to install a package: https://paste.ubuntu.com/p/wXsnfWvs8t/

Here's the output of dmesg: https://termbin.com/wtfd

Here's the output of mandb --debug: https://paste.ubuntu.com/p/7RbFrFv5t9/

Output of lsb_release -rd:

Description: Ubuntu Eoan Ermine (development branch)
Release: 19.10

Output of apt-cache policy man-db:

man-db:
  Installed: 2.8.6-1
  Candidate: 2.8.6-1
  Version table:
 *** 2.8.6-1 500
        500 http://sy.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu eoan/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 19.10
Package: man-db 2.8.6-1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 5.2.0-8.9-generic 5.2.0
Uname: Linux 5.2.0-8-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.20.11-0ubuntu7
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: Budgie:GNOME
Date: Sun Aug 4 13:00:02 2019
InstallationDate: Installed on 2019-08-03 (0 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu-Budgie 19.10 "Eoan Ermine" - Alpha amd64 (20190801)
SourcePackage: man-db
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

Tags: amd64 eoan man-db
Revision history for this message
Aptivi (eofla) wrote :
Revision history for this message
Launchpad Janitor (janitor) wrote :

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

Changed in man-db (Ubuntu):
status: New → Confirmed
Revision history for this message
Kow (kow) wrote :

Reference upstream debian bug report for workaround.

Revision history for this message
Colin Watson (cjwatson) wrote :

Should be fixed upstream. I'll prepare an updated release shortly:

  https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/man-db.git/commit/?id=1332c29200c1770deef23b355f3589de924dfcb4

Changed in man-db (Ubuntu):
assignee: nobody → Colin Watson (cjwatson)
importance: Undecided → Critical
status: Confirmed → Fix Committed
affects: man-db → man-db (Debian)
Revision history for this message
Aptivi (eofla) wrote :

Thanks so much for the fix!

Revision history for this message
Launchpad Janitor (janitor) wrote :

This bug was fixed in the package man-db - 2.8.6.1-1

---------------
man-db (2.8.6.1-1) unstable; urgency=medium

  * New upstream release:
    - Fix missing memory copies in ult_src that caused segfaults in mandb
      (closes: #933802, LP: #1838871).

 -- Colin Watson <email address hidden> Mon, 05 Aug 2019 10:52:30 +0100

Changed in man-db (Ubuntu):
status: Fix Committed → Fix Released
Revision history for this message
Aptivi (eofla) wrote :

Thanks for fixing! Now man-db is stable. I can read all man-pages.

For everyone who has the defected version should do "sudo apt update" and "sudo apt dist-upgrade" to fix and repopulate all man-pages without failure.

Changed in man-db (Debian):
status: Unknown → Fix Released
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