On Wed, Mar 19, 2025 at 06:05:23PM +0000, Simon wrote:
...
...
>
> If you take a step backwards and take a deep breath ...
>
> The vast majority of users, regardless of operating system, like the idea
> that they can plug their computer into a network and it will
> “just work” - and “works”
> really means “has working DNS resolution".

Like the vast majority of users, even a Devuan user, just wanted
DNS resolution to work, even when I walked into a coffee shop
and connected to the local wifi.

>
> The vast majority of users (even Linux ones but perhaps not such an
> overwhelming proportion) will be happy with the defaults -

I was happy, too, until a routine upgrade failed, unable to access
the Devuan site that held the updated packages.

> otherwise they have strange problems where it doesn’t work
> and they have to perform arcane rituals and incant strange commands.

It turns out that connman had been installed by a previous update.

The problem wasn't that connman respected the ISP-provided DNS address.
The problem wasn't that connman took over DNS lookups itself by
redirecting DNS to itself at local host. (though this would have been a problem if connman were ever not running.)

The problem was that connman cached DNS lookups and that somehow
it has cached a dud package mirror.

All our round-robin set of package mirrors were useless because connman
would refuse to contact them because it already had the cached answer.

Connman appears to hve no mechnism whatsoever to clear the cache.
Years after, it is still sending me to a dud mirror whenever I upgrade.

> And it’s something you can over-ride easily if the default
> is not to your liking - unlike the other commercial OS’s.

So of course I edit /etc/resolv.conf before doing upgrades.

A Linux beginner might have trouble figuring this out.
It took me a few days. But postponing a routine update wasn't
a big deal.

-- hendrik