[Bug 1306736] [NEW] update-notifier upstart job should be silent by default

[Steve Langasek]

Public bug reported:

I happened to be looking in my ~/.cache/upstart directory, and noticed
that I had quite a few logs from update-notifier-crash.

$ ls ~/.cache/upstart/update-notifier-crash-_var_crash_* | wc -w
477
$

These logs get rotated, but are never expired out for old crashes if
there's no new log... so you wind up with a large number of log files
here, at least one for each application that has ever crashed.  I think
we should avoid this by being silent by default.  If we need to log
activity, perhaps we should use logger instead to send these messages to
syslog.

Example log output:

Mon Feb 24 21:53:23 PST 2014 crash report /var/crash/linux-
image-3.13.0-8-generic.257633.crash detected

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04
Package: update-notifier 0.154.1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.13.0-19.40-generic 3.13.6
Uname: Linux 3.13.0-19-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.14.1-0ubuntu1
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: Unity
Date: Fri Apr 11 10:25:04 2014
InstallationDate: Installed on 2010-09-24 (1295 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04.1 LTS "Lucid Lynx" - Release amd64 (20100816.1)
SourcePackage: update-notifier
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to trusty on 2013-10-23 (170 days ago)
upstart.update-notifier-cds.log:
 Thu Apr 10 23:13:46 PDT 2014 CD found at /dev/sdd
 CD mounted at
upstart.update-notifier-release.log:
 Wed Apr  9 22:24:07 PDT 2014 new release available
 Wed Apr  9 22:24:08 PDT 2014 new release available
 Wed Apr  9 22:25:37 PDT 2014 new release available

** Affects: update-notifier (Ubuntu)
     Importance: Undecided
         Status: New


** Tags: amd64 apport-bug trusty

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1306736

Title:
  update-notifier upstart job should be silent by default

Status in “update-notifier” package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  I happened to be looking in my ~/.cache/upstart directory, and noticed
  that I had quite a few logs from update-notifier-crash.

  $ ls ~/.cache/upstart/update-notifier-crash-_var_crash_* | wc -w
  477
  $

  These logs get rotated, but are never expired out for old crashes if
  there's no new log... so you wind up with a large number of log files
  here, at least one for each application that has ever crashed.  I
  think we should avoid this by being silent by default.  If we need to
  log activity, perhaps we should use logger instead to send these
  messages to syslog.

  Example log output:

  Mon Feb 24 21:53:23 PST 2014 crash report /var/crash/linux-
  image-3.13.0-8-generic.257633.crash detected

  ProblemType: Bug
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 14.04
  Package: update-notifier 0.154.1
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.13.0-19.40-generic 3.13.6
  Uname: Linux 3.13.0-19-generic x86_64
  ApportVersion: 2.14.1-0ubuntu1
  Architecture: amd64
  CurrentDesktop: Unity
  Date: Fri Apr 11 10:25:04 2014
  InstallationDate: Installed on 2010-09-24 (1295 days ago)
  InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04.1 LTS "Lucid Lynx" - Release amd64 (20100816.1)
  SourcePackage: update-notifier
  UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to trusty on 2013-10-23 (170 days ago)
  upstart.update-notifier-cds.log:
   Thu Apr 10 23:13:46 PDT 2014 CD found at /dev/sdd
   CD mounted at
  upstart.update-notifier-release.log:
   Wed Apr  9 22:24:07 PDT 2014 new release available
   Wed Apr  9 22:24:08 PDT 2014 new release available
   Wed Apr  9 22:25:37 PDT 2014 new release available

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