[Bug 1315342] Re: Stop appending 3rd party PPA names with warnings

[Peter Cordes]

Yes, the comments compound, if I recall correctly.

IDK why you don't just edit the text files (/etc/apt/sources.list, and
/etc/apt/sources.list.d/*.list) with an editor, esp. if the GUI sucks.

 It's pretty common practice for tools that mess with your config files
to leave extra comments showing what they did.

 They're only useless if you're re-enabling stuff right away after an
upgrade, when you still remember what happened.  If you had forgotten
that you had something from a PPA, and think of it months after an
upgrade, it might be a useful reminder to see that you used to have a
PPA enabled, but now you don't.

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1315342

Title:
  Stop appending 3rd party PPA names with warnings

Status in “ubuntu-release-upgrader” package in Ubuntu:
  Confirmed

Bug description:
  Greetings Developers,

  This isn't exactly a bug report in as much as it is a request to cease
  utterly unneccissary and counter productive proceedures during a in-
  place upgrade. Specifically the practice of appending the words
  'disabled on upgrade to…' to any third-party PPA disabled during the
  upgrade.

  I realise of course that there is a geniune need to disable all third-
  party PPAs, but the process of re-enabeling them is arduous enough
  with the tools provided (namely software-properties-gtk) without
  having to also remove these ammendments. For reasons that I won't go
  into, I keep a stable of nearly 100 PPAs (although that includes
  source PPAs) and software-properties-gtk is woefully ill designed for
  managing large numbers of PPAs (e.g. enabeling via the tick box takes
  a good 4-5 seconds, thereafter the display resets to the top of the
  list, one cannot both enable a PPA and edit it's name in the same
  action, etc…).

  If you really must add a warning message, could you not patch
  software-properties-gtk to display a warning pop-up the first time
  software-properties-gtk is opened post upgrade? Although personally,
  the pop-up which appears during the in-place upgrade process warning
  users about the fact that these third-party PPA's are to be disabled
  is warning enough for me.

  Regards,

  Lee.

  P.S. I realise that there is likely a way to automate the process of
  enabeling disabled PPA's and scrubing your 'disabled on upgrade to…'
  ammendments. Alas, every script and software package I've tried thus
  far has failed to do either. I'll no doubt investigate writing a
  working script from scratch, but I really don't see why I should be in
  the situation where I *need* to in the first place. The type of Ubuntu
  user confident enough to use third-party PPAs isn't the kind of Ubuntu
  user that *needs* or *wants* hand holding to this extent.

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