Re: 4.6.0-pre1: cpio errors on RPMs

[Moritz Barsnick <moritz barsnick net>]

Hi MCers, hi Pavel,

On Mon, Aug 26, 2002 at 12:23:35 -0400, Pavel Roskin wrote:

> shell/.cpio
>         Open=%cd %p#ucpio
>         View=%view{ascii} cat '%f' | cpio -ictv

Confirmed, and I have nothing blocking this in ~/.mc* .

First, this is what I have:

--snip--
eedmoba sun115:~ > which mc                                                    
/opt/proj/WDM/tools/bin/mc
eedmoba sun115:~ > ldd `which mc`                                              
        libslang.so.1 =>         /opt/proj/WDM/tools/lib/libslang.so.1
        libSM.so.6 =>    /usr/openwin/lib/libSM.so.6
        libICE.so.6 =>   /usr/openwin/lib/libICE.so.6
        libX11.so.4 =>   /usr/openwin/lib/libX11.so.4
        libsocket.so.1 =>        /usr/lib/libsocket.so.1
        libnsl.so.1 =>   /usr/lib/libnsl.so.1
        libiconv.so.2 =>         /opt/proj/WDM/tools/lib/libiconv.so.2
        libglib-1.2.so.0 =>      /opt/proj/WDM/tools/lib/libglib-1.2.so.0
        libc.so.1 =>     /usr/lib/libc.so.1
        libdl.so.1 =>    /usr/lib/libdl.so.1
        libm.so.1 =>     /usr/lib/libm.so.1
        libXext.so.0 =>  /usr/openwin/lib/libXext.so.0
        libmp.so.2 =>    /usr/lib/libmp.so.2
        /usr/platform/SUNW,Ultra-2/lib/libc_psr.so.1
eedmoba sun115:~ > mc --version                                                
GNU Midnight Commander 4.6.0-pre1
Virtual File System: tarfs, extfs, ftpfs, mcfs
With builtin Editor
Using system-installed S-Lang library with terminfo database
With subshell support as default
With support for background operations
With mouse support on xterm
With support for X11 events
With multiple codepages support
--snip--

> 1) Describe what you did (write "I pressed F3", NOT "I entered the file")

a) I ran "mc" without any options.
b) I changed into a directory containing some archives, among them RPMs
   and SRPMs.
c) I moved the file selector/cursor to "autotrace-0.28-mn1.src.rpm".
d) I pressed the "Enter" key and got the RPM/SRPM display (as
   expected):

   /..
   /INFO
   HEADER
  *INSTALL
  *UPGRADE
   CONTENTS.cpio
   autotrace-0.28.tar.gz
   autotrace.spec

   (I did _not_ expect to see anything special when pressing "Enter" on
   "CONTENTS.cpio", perhaps I should configure mc so that it displays
   files which are bound to special features in a different way. Am I
   hinting at things which you don't understand again? Please just
   ignore.)

e) I moved the file selector/cursor to "CONTENTS.cpio"
f) I pressed "F3" (obviously bound to "File -> View").
g) I got a popup "window" (in red btw.) saying:
   ------------ Error ------------
   |                             |
   | cpio: premature end of file |
   |                             |
   -------------------------------

   (Please excuse the imitation of line drawing characters in this
   email. The popup actually has proper lines.)
h) Further:
   alternative I) I clicked with the mouse into the mc window (which in
   in an xterm). The popup disappeared.

   alternative II) I pressed "Escape" twice (my usual way to escape
   from unwanted menus, popups or anything on can escape from), and
   another popup window appeared:
   -------------- Error ---------------
   |                                  |
   |  Empty output from child filter  |
   |                                  |
   ------------------------------------

   This window I either got closed clicking my mouse once inside
   mc's xterm or pressing "Escape" twice.

> 2) Describe what you expect to get ("I expect a listing to appear)

My expectations were not fulfilled in the described steps following
"f)", i.e. in "g)" and "h)". I do _not_ know what to expect when
pressing "F3" on a cpio file. On any "regular" (not specially handled)
file, I expect to see the contents of the file, as ASCII or perhaps as
Hex, ar whatever any automatic mechanism might want to do to display a
file's contents. Perhaps, knowing that cpio is handled just like other
archive formats, I would/should have expected to see a content listing
somewhat like what "cpio -itv" produces.

> 3) Describe what you got (quote error messages _exactly_, don't rephrase 
> them).

That's what I did in my original mail, I wrote I got "cpio: premature
end of file" and "Empty output from child filter" in succession. I now
realize that there are ways to get and ways not to get these messages.
Glad you asked for "1)".  :-)

Just to go sure, here output from _inside_ mc (just to ensure that GNU
cpio is being used):

$ which cpio
/home/eedmoba/sun5/bin/cpio
$ cpio --version
GNU cpio version 2.4.2

> There was no reply to my last e-mail, not even in private.  That's very
> characterisic for many users of Midnight Commander - as soon as there is
> another way to do something (Enter vs. F3), nobody cares why the original
> approach (pressing F3 on cpio archives) didn't work.

That's characteristic of people who have a life i.e. work beside
debugging useful tools. I try to help, but my company better not even
know about it... (Too late now, they're throwing me out. ;->>)

> That's one of the reasons why some problems remain unfixed for years.

I honor your high opinion of open source development, but my experience
is often that I find bugs, find workarounds/fixes, report them (in a
friendly manner IMO), and they never get commented, let alone fixed. I
have two recent examples pending which I tried to revive yesterday, one
with the build of "mutt" on Solaris 2.6, one with the build of "file"
on any platform. No response for months! I'm glad you're different. :-)

> And that, in turn, may be one of the reasons why so many bugreports for
> Midnight Commander (compared to other projects) don't include its version
> number - people think that nothing changes between versions after seeing
> the same bugs over and over again!

I will not quote the subject of this thread here ;-) but I assume you
didn't mean me. :)

Thanks for listening,
Moritz