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posted by chromas on Friday June 15 2018, @10:24AM   Printer-friendly
from the #!/bin/bash dept.

El Reg reports

Microsoft had to emit a hasty update for its R Open analysis tool after developers found the open-source package was not playing nice with some Linux systems.

The issue was brought to light earlier this week by developer Norbert Preining, who found[1] that the Debian GNU/Linux version of Open R[2]--Microsoft's open-source implementation of the R statistics and data science tool--was causing headaches when it was installed on some systems.

In particular, Preining noted that the shell instructions Microsoft used to install the software would fail on a computer where another version of R is already installed. Worse, the script would delete whatever is at /bin/sh and override it with Bash, changing the system's command interpreter.

[...] Additionally, Preining found, the script Microsoft used to uninstall R Open would cause further problems, one being that it would delete files without checking where they actually pointed

[...] Fortunately, it looks as though Redmond was listening, and Microsoft's dev team was quick to act. Within two days of Preining's blog post going up, he reported that R Open had been patched by the Windows giant to resolve the issues and properly install and remove itself on Debian systems.

"Thanks Microsoft for the quick fix, it is good news that those playing with Open R will not be left with a hosed system", Preining noted.

[1] Text highlighting and scrollwheel scrolling on the page work now. Mouse actions were broken June 13. (Scrolling was mentioned down in the comments there.)
[2] Content is behind scripts.


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  • (Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 15 2018, @02:06PM (2 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 15 2018, @02:06PM (#693487)

    Debian has had preinst and postinst scripts for 20 years, RPM has something similar. It's far better than a tarball deployed with "installMe.sh"

    That doesn't change the fact that an installer based on running a random script or executable is exactly what package managers were intended to avoid. It just means that Debian and Redhat failed at building a package manager.

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  • (Score: 2) by lentilla on Saturday June 16 2018, @01:05AM

    by lentilla (1770) on Saturday June 16 2018, @01:05AM (#693796)

    It just means that Debian and Redhat failed at building a package manager.

    Possible - just extremely unlikely. I sincerely hope you were trolling.

  • (Score: 2) by Bot on Sunday June 17 2018, @06:48PM

    by Bot (3902) on Sunday June 17 2018, @06:48PM (#694315) Journal

    > It just means that Debian and Redhat failed at building a package manager.

    Hello there, you seem lost. Here's a quick map.

    Microsoft Infinite monkeys at infinite typewriters = systemd Apple modern shoddy FOSS Linux userland and drivers other unices and the Apple of yore = linux kernel openbsd.

    --
    Account abandoned.