Re: [Bug-tar] GNU Tar 1.28 configuration test for deep directory hierarchy failing on Mac OS X 10.11 El Capitan

[Paul Eggert]

On 10/12/2015 02:00 PM, Jonathan Leffler wrote:
> 1. Has anyone else seen anything similar on El Capitan?
> 2. Does anyone have an idea how to get rid of the trashed directories?
> 3. How can we modify the test so it doesn't fail catastrophically like 
> this on El Capitan?
> 4. Do I need to report a bug to Apple separately from this report to 
> GNU Tar?

For (4), OS X is clearly busted here. A user-mode application shouldn't 
be able to create a directory that 'rm -fr' can't remove. Please feel 
free to report the bug to Apple. The problem will occur with many GNU 
tools' installation procedure, as they're all using Gnulib and Gnulib 
tries to check for getcwd bugs like this one.

For (2) I suggest using coreutils; 'rm -fr directory should do the trick 
if you're using GNU rm.

For (3) we need to figure out why the test doesn't clean up after itself 
on El Capitan.  It's supposed to.  Please compile and run the attached 
test program in a place where you don't mind having long directory 
chains.  On my GNU/Linux host, I can do something like this:

  gcc t.c
  strace ./a.out

and the 'strace' output contains the following, showing that the test 
program cleans up after itself. Please find out why it's not doing so 
under El Capitan. OS X lacks strace, but you can use a debugger or 
dtruss or whatever your favorite tool is. Thanks.

mkdir("confdir-14B---", 0700)           = 0
chdir("confdir-14B---")                 = 0
mkdir("confdir-14B---", 0700)           = 0
chdir("confdir-14B---")                 = 0
...
mkdir("confdir-14B---", 0700)           = 0
chdir("confdir-14B---")                 = 0
getcwd(0x1736010, 4096)                 = -1 ENAMETOOLONG (File name too 
long)
[a whole bunch of other stuff, which eventually succeeds. Now comes 
cleanup time....]
rmdir("confdir-14B---")                 = -1 ENOENT (No such file or 
directory)
chdir("..")                             = 0
rmdir("confdir-14B---")                 = 0
chdir("..")                             = 0
...
chdir("..")                             = 0
rmdir("confdir-14B---")                 = 0
exit_group(0)                           = ?

t.c
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