How can I report a bug when ubuntu-bug crashes?
ongun@ongun-ubuntu:~$ ubuntu-bug python
ERROR: /etc/apport/crashdb.conf is damaged: No default database
bug-reportingpython
How can I report a bug when ubuntu-bug crashes?
ongun@ongun-ubuntu:~$ ubuntu-bug python
ERROR: /etc/apport/crashdb.conf is damaged: No default database
Best Answer
When Apport--which
ubuntu-bug
is part of--doesn't work, it's often best to try to fix the problem with Apport. However, it is possible to report bugs without Apport.I don't know if the specific error described here is due to a bug or misconfiguration or some other problem. Users who see that exact message should try the workaround Rinzwind described. Somewhat more generally, though not applicable to the error message shown here, the
apport-cli
command will sometimes work whenubuntu-bug
doesn't.But the answer to "How can I report a bug when ubuntu-bug crashes?" (or otherwise cannot be used) is that bugs can be reported directly via Launchpad's web interface, and that such a bug report may be useful so long as the reporter describes the problem carefully and meticulously includes all information reasonably related to it.
Reporting bugs without Apport (when you must)
There are two major cases.
If you're reporting a non-crash bug by running
ubuntu-bug package
, then Apport wouldn't attach a stack trace and core dump to the bug report anyway. So it's reasonable to report the bug directly on Launchpad. As its_me's answer to How do I report a bug? says:That applies directly to the situation described in this question. Just make sure to include enough information to fully describe the bug, the system on which the bug occurs, and the packages relevant to the bug, including their exact versions. As always, users reporting bugs this way should first read ReportingBugs.
Reporting a bug that causes a crash without Apport is more laborious, but it can be done in the traditional manner. This consists of installing debug symbols for the program that crashed and the libraries it uses, opening the program in a debugger (for Ubuntu packages,
gdb
should typically be used), then attempting to reproduce the crash. The resulting stack trace, produced by runningbt
ingdb
after the crash, should be usable so long as all the relevant debug symbols were available.This isn't the situation described in the question here, and I don't intend to cover it thoroughly. I mainly mention it so readers who are trying to report crashes don't use the approach mentioned above without also including a stack trace. But basically, some packages have corresponding debug symbols in similarly named packages whose names end in
-dbg
, and most others have debug symbol packages available from separate repositories that can be enabled and used as described in Debug Symbol Packages.Users considering doing this should definitely read DebuggingProgramCrash as well as ReportingBugs.
Once Apport is working again...
If you do later get Apport working, you can still use it to add information automatically to the bug report. As v010dya's comment on that answer says:
This is most useful for crash bugs where there are stack trace and core dump files in
/var/crash
to attach.