Alex Schuilenburg via Mailman-users writes:
If a mailman-web dpkg update also updated the database, then Debian's update clearly did not properly log the changes.
If you can reproduce any of these problems in a Mailman install from source (preferably contemporary release tags) or PyPI, we have something to talk about. I can't reproduce them, though. The evidence is very strong that the problems are in Debian packaging, or perhaps even vendored patches. Please talk to Debian about them.
Updating on a new machine involved copying over not just the database, but some other files that provide db state?
It shouldn't. That's the point of using a database, have the dynamic data in one place.
I should mention that I had to re-apply and rework some of my old patches back into Debian's libs.
https://gitlab.com/mailman/hyperkitty/-/issues/322.
Sad that I am now of the age where I search for an issue only to discover I provided a patch for it 2 years ago ;-(
In that GitLab issue, IMO Mark went above and beyond, identifying an upstream issue previously reported *and* two forks that address it. That's as far as we can usefully go.
I understand that you're frustrated because Mailman wasn't working as you expected it to work, but at some point you need to take the issues to projects that can solve them.