Bug 1788480 - Remove libdb dependency from postfix
Summary: Remove libdb dependency from postfix
Keywords:
Status: CLOSED ERRATA
Alias: None
Product: Fedora
Classification: Fedora
Component: postfix
Version: 38
Hardware: Unspecified
OS: Unspecified
unspecified
unspecified
Target Milestone: ---
Assignee: Jaroslav Škarvada
QA Contact: Fedora Extras Quality Assurance
URL:
Whiteboard:
Depends On: 2242898
Blocks: 1778802
TreeView+ depends on / blocked
 
Reported: 2020-01-07 10:29 UTC by Filip Januš
Modified: 2023-10-09 16:49 UTC (History)
4 users (show)

Fixed In Version: postfix-3.8.2-2.fc40
Doc Type: If docs needed, set a value
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Clone Of:
Environment:
Last Closed: 2023-10-09 16:49:10 UTC
Type: Bug
Embargoed:


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Description Filip Januš 2020-01-07 10:29:00 UTC
Description of problem:
According to more restrictive libdb licence policy exists effort to remove libdb's dependencies.
Postfix package is now built with libdb requirement, this package supports various databases. SQLite seems to be good alternative.


Actual results:
postfix need libdb package

Expected results:
postfix will run without libdb package

Comment 1 Jaroslav Škarvada 2020-01-15 16:19:02 UTC
It seems it's possible to build postfix without libdb, but it will lose "hash" and "btree" map support, where IMHO the "hash" is one of the most used map types.

Comment 2 Robert Scheck 2020-01-16 00:28:50 UTC
Based on https://archive.fosdem.org/2014/schedule/event/postfix_lessons_learned_and_recent_developments/attachments/slides/508/export/events/attachments/postfix_lessons_learned_and_recent_developments/slides/508/postfix_fosdem_slides.pdf by upstream, I wonder whether lmdb was evaluated ("First persistent Postfix database that safely supports multiple writers such as postscreen") alternatively to sqlite.

Comment 3 Ben Cotton 2020-02-11 17:35:19 UTC
This bug appears to have been reported against 'rawhide' during the Fedora 32 development cycle.
Changing version to 32.

Comment 4 Filip Januš 2020-11-24 09:53:53 UTC
We would like to move a step forward by getting rid of libdb. So I would like to ask, which problems do you see with changing backend from BDB to some other database? I want to summarize as much as possible problems with this change across components, so we can find the best possible solution.

Comment 5 Jaroslav Škarvada 2020-11-24 11:13:29 UTC
(In reply to Filip Januš from comment #4)
> We would like to move a step forward by getting rid of libdb. So I would
> like to ask, which problems do you see with changing backend from BDB to
> some other database? I want to summarize as much as possible problems with
> this change across components, so we can find the best possible solution.

Postfix supports multiple databases through dynamically loaded "plugins". BDB is one of the supported database, so we will lose one supported database (namely the "hash" and "btree" map hashes support). Users using BDB could migrate to different database, but it's something they would have to do themselves. Regarding LMDB, we already build postfix with the LMDB support, so postfix users could migrate to LMDB. But it's not drop in replacement for BDB. So there is probably no hard blocker at the moment - users would have to change their configurations (if they are using BDB) and migrate their databases.

Comment 6 Fedora Program Management 2021-04-29 16:01:35 UTC
This message is a reminder that Fedora 32 is nearing its end of life.
Fedora will stop maintaining and issuing updates for Fedora 32 on 2021-05-25.
It is Fedora's policy to close all bug reports from releases that are no longer
maintained. At that time this bug will be closed as EOL if it remains open with a
Fedora 'version' of '32'.

Package Maintainer: If you wish for this bug to remain open because you
plan to fix it in a currently maintained version, simply change the 'version' 
to a later Fedora version.

Thank you for reporting this issue and we are sorry that we were not 
able to fix it before Fedora 32 is end of life. If you would still like 
to see this bug fixed and are able to reproduce it against a later version 
of Fedora, you are encouraged  change the 'version' to a later Fedora 
version prior this bug is closed as described in the policy above.

Although we aim to fix as many bugs as possible during every release's 
lifetime, sometimes those efforts are overtaken by events. Often a 
more recent Fedora release includes newer upstream software that fixes 
bugs or makes them obsolete.

Comment 7 Ben Cotton 2021-05-25 15:15:19 UTC
Fedora 32 changed to end-of-life (EOL) status on 2021-05-25. Fedora 32 is
no longer maintained, which means that it will not receive any further
security or bug fix updates. As a result we are closing this bug.

If you can reproduce this bug against a currently maintained version of
Fedora please feel free to reopen this bug against that version. If you
are unable to reopen this bug, please file a new report against the
current release. If you experience problems, please add a comment to this
bug.

Thank you for reporting this bug and we are sorry it could not be fixed.

Comment 8 Ben Cotton 2023-02-07 15:09:52 UTC
This bug appears to have been reported against 'rawhide' during the Fedora Linux 38 development cycle.
Changing version to 38.

Comment 10 Jaroslav Škarvada 2023-10-09 16:22:25 UTC
I created PoC (postfix-3.8.2-2.fc40) moving postfix to lmdb by default for RHEL. It seems to work, but unfortunately, it's not straightforward change, we also need selinux update.

Comment 11 Jaroslav Škarvada 2023-10-09 16:31:50 UTC
Selinux bug 2242898.

Comment 12 Jaroslav Škarvada 2023-10-09 16:33:22 UTC
Keeping the bug open as the main tracker for postfix, until the selinux issue is resolved.

Comment 13 Fedora Update System 2023-10-09 16:39:13 UTC
FEDORA-2023-3d6ef4009b has been submitted as an update to Fedora 40. https://bodhi.fedoraproject.org/updates/FEDORA-2023-3d6ef4009b

Comment 14 Fedora Update System 2023-10-09 16:49:10 UTC
FEDORA-2023-3d6ef4009b has been pushed to the Fedora 40 stable repository.
If problem still persists, please make note of it in this bug report.


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