As a 2nd look this is actually 2 bugs: - renaming the library broke nearly all 3rd party drivers - some drivers were additionally broken by a upstream change.
Perhaps we should split the bug into two parts: Creating a "libsane" that does nothing but depend on "libsane1" will fix the 1st of these bugs. The second one might require help of the sane developers, though... ** Description changed: Impact ====== - The Debian maintainer renamed libsane to libsane1-experimental "to match with the soname". This apparently fixes a Lintian warning. Also the soname change might be justified by the new version breaking most 3rd party plug-ins even if the library version number doesn't any bigger change than any ordinary new version of the library: + + 1) The Debian maintainer renamed libsane to libsane1-experimental "to + match with the soname". This apparently fixes a Lintian warning, but + makes installing 3rd-party plug-ins hard, as they typically depend on + "libsane", not on "libsane1". The first try to add a "Provides: libsane" + to libsane1 (which created a virtual package) didn't make drivers + installable that claim to depend on a minimum version of libsane as + virtual packages are ignored in this case. + + 2) The soname change might be justified by the new version breaking + (several? most?) 3rd party plug-ins even if the library version number + doesn't indicate any bigger change than any ordinary new version of the + library - which might indicate that this phenomenon might be an upstream + bug. libsane 1.0.25 in zesty includes libsane.so.1.25 libsane1 1.0.27 in artful includes libsane.so.1.27 - The breaking of all plug-ins might be an upstream bug - which is allowed in an experimental package, but is unfortunate as in Ubuntu this package went mainstream; The library rename is an additional factor that makes it impossible to install any scanner drivers for libsane that are distributed as a .deb unless the driver distributors recompiles against Ubuntu 17.10+. - It is to note that depending on the manufacturer for many old scanners there won't be new versions of the plug-ins that are recompiled like this; Adding a Provides: libsane to the library might therefore make some plug-ins work, perhaps. + It is to note that depending on the manufacturer for many old scanners + there won't be new versions of the plug-ins that are recompiled like + this. Test Case ========= Visit http://support.epson.net/linux/en/iscan_c.html Download the amd64 deb .tar.gz Unzip it. Install the iscan .deb from the core folder. It won't install before this SRU because it Depends: libsane Regression Potential ==================== The fix here was proposed to the Debian maintainer in July but there's been virtually zero response on it. In the meantime the workaround that was proposed initially has started to result in automatically uninstalling gtk - which makes the system basically useless. It doesn't seem like adding the Provides will make things any worse for third-party drivers but it has a goodme chance of making things better for some. Impossibility of workarounds ============================ Just installing an old version of libsane is impossible as it uninstalls libgtk (which depends on libsane1 which conflicts with libsane) making the system basically useless. Original Bug Report =================== I don't know if that can be prevented in the long run. But both brscan (for my brother scanner) and iscan (for my epson scanners) have been broken by the change from libsane to libsane1. For iscan I have unpackaged the debian package, changed the dependency it contains from libsane to libsane1 and installed the changed package. But even then my epson scanners no more work leaving me without any scanner => Reporting a bug. ProblemType: Bug DistroRelease: Ubuntu 17.10 Package: libsane1 1.0.27-1~experimental1ubuntu2 Uname: Linux 4.13.0-041300rc2-lowlatency x86_64 ApportVersion: 2.20.6-0ubuntu4 Architecture: amd64 Date: Sat Jul 29 08:38:15 2017 EcryptfsInUse: Yes SourcePackage: sane-backends UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install) -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Desktop Packages, which is subscribed to sane-backends in Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1707352 Title: the change from libsane to libsane1 broke many (all?) 3rd party plug- ins for sane Status in sane-backends package in Ubuntu: Fix Committed Status in sane-backends source package in Artful: Fix Committed Status in sane-backends package in Debian: New Bug description: Impact ====== 1) The Debian maintainer renamed libsane to libsane1-experimental "to match with the soname". This apparently fixes a Lintian warning, but makes installing 3rd-party plug-ins hard, as they typically depend on "libsane", not on "libsane1". The first try to add a "Provides: libsane" to libsane1 (which created a virtual package) didn't make drivers installable that claim to depend on a minimum version of libsane as virtual packages are ignored in this case. 2) The soname change might be justified by the new version breaking (several? most?) 3rd party plug-ins even if the library version number doesn't indicate any bigger change than any ordinary new version of the library - which might indicate that this phenomenon might be an upstream bug. libsane 1.0.25 in zesty includes libsane.so.1.25 libsane1 1.0.27 in artful includes libsane.so.1.27 It is to note that depending on the manufacturer for many old scanners there won't be new versions of the plug-ins that are recompiled like this. Test Case ========= Visit http://support.epson.net/linux/en/iscan_c.html Download the amd64 deb .tar.gz Unzip it. Install the iscan .deb from the core folder. It won't install before this SRU because it Depends: libsane Regression Potential ==================== The fix here was proposed to the Debian maintainer in July but there's been virtually zero response on it. In the meantime the workaround that was proposed initially has started to result in automatically uninstalling gtk - which makes the system basically useless. It doesn't seem like adding the Provides will make things any worse for third-party drivers but it has a goodme chance of making things better for some. Impossibility of workarounds ============================ Just installing an old version of libsane is impossible as it uninstalls libgtk (which depends on libsane1 which conflicts with libsane) making the system basically useless. Original Bug Report =================== I don't know if that can be prevented in the long run. But both brscan (for my brother scanner) and iscan (for my epson scanners) have been broken by the change from libsane to libsane1. For iscan I have unpackaged the debian package, changed the dependency it contains from libsane to libsane1 and installed the changed package. But even then my epson scanners no more work leaving me without any scanner => Reporting a bug. ProblemType: Bug DistroRelease: Ubuntu 17.10 Package: libsane1 1.0.27-1~experimental1ubuntu2 Uname: Linux 4.13.0-041300rc2-lowlatency x86_64 ApportVersion: 2.20.6-0ubuntu4 Architecture: amd64 Date: Sat Jul 29 08:38:15 2017 EcryptfsInUse: Yes SourcePackage: sane-backends UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install) To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/sane-backends/+bug/1707352/+subscriptions -- Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages Post to : desktop-packages@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
