Created attachment 139109 [details] [review]
use the lsb informations to get the distribution

Solaris also meet similar problem, refer to http://defect.opensolaris.org/bz/show_bug.cgi?id=10760

Checking the code, it is because it only checks some kinds os release files.

1253 static const char *known_etc_info_files [] = {
1254         "redhat-release",
1255         "SuSE-release",
1256         "gentoo-release",
1257         "arch-release",
1258         "debian_version",
1259         "mandriva-release",
1260         "slackware-version",
1261         NULL
1262 };      

These need to be extended for Ubuntu(/etc/lsb-release) and OpenSolaris(/etc/release).

halton@hp-dv2000:$ cat /etc/lsb-release 
DISTRIB_ID=Ubuntu
DISTRIB_RELEASE=9.10
DISTRIB_CODENAME=karmic
DISTRIB_DESCRIPTION="Ubuntu karmic (development branch)"

-bash-3.2$ cat /etc/release 
                       OpenSolaris Development snv_116 X86
           Copyright 2009 Sun Microsystems, Inc.  All Rights Reserved.
                        Use is subject to license terms.
                             Assembled 15 June 2009

For Ubuntu, file_read_one_line() does not work to satisfy the /etc/lsb-release style. My idea is extend redefine this function to

file_read_line(const char *filename, int line_no, const char *cmd)

if line_no > 1
  read content of line_no
else
  execute cmd
fi

Comments?

Well you should not read a given line number, you need to parse the file as the order of info is not guaranted.
Especially if you want it to handle other distros too.

$ cat /etc/lsb-release 
LSB_VERSION=lsb-3.1-ia32:lsb-3.1-noarch
DISTRIB_ID=MandrivaLinux
DISTRIB_RELEASE=2009.0
DISTRIB_CODENAME=zarapha
DISTRIB_DESCRIPTION="Mandriva Linux 2009.0"

I think that, when available, lsb-release should be used first

Sorry I had not seen the proposed patch.

My comments on it:

- You should strip the "" in the result (I don't have Ubuntu to test but I think you will get "Ubuntu karmic (development branch)" with the quotes included in the string)

[pterjan@n4 SOURCES]$ lsb_release -d
Description:	Mandriva Linux 2010.0
[pterjan@n4 SOURCES]$ lsb_release -sd
"Mandriva Linux 2010.0"

- I would not add the return but maybe move if (version != NULL) break; to the beginning of the for

Fixed in master.  Thanks!