09/05/2007

apt-get install sucks so much sometimes

I was given an old debian machine to do some stuff. I had some networking problems so I thought I could install tcpdump to see what’s happening. Take a _good_ look at the result…

# apt-get update
Get:1 http://security.debian.org stable/updates/main Packages [62.2kB]
Get:2 ftp://ftp.ntua.gr stable/main Packages [5638kB]
Get:3 http://security.debian.org stable/updates/main Release [97B]
Get:4 ftp://ftp.ntua.gr stable/main Release [95B]
Get:5 ftp://ftp.ntua.gr stable/main Sources [1653kB]
Get:6 ftp://ftp.ntua.gr stable/main Release [97B]
Fetched 7353kB in 38s (191kB/s)
Reading Package Lists... Done
# apt-get install tcpdump
Reading Package Lists... Done
Building Dependency Tree... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
libc6 libc6-dev libpcap0.8 libssl0.9.8 locales tzdata
Suggested packages:
glibc-doc
The following packages will be REMOVED:
base-config initrd-tools kernel-image-2.4.27-2-386
The following NEW packages will be installed:
libpcap0.8 libssl0.9.8 tcpdump tzdata
The following packages will be upgraded:
libc6 libc6-dev locales
3 upgraded, 4 newly installed, 3 to remove and 266 not upgraded.
Need to get 14.9MB of archives.
After unpacking 21.5MB disk space will be freed.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n] n

# uname -a
Linux XXXXXX 2.4.27-2-386 #1 Wed Aug 17 09:33:35 UTC 2005 i686 GNU/Linux

Does it want to remove the kernel I am using??? Why ?

D0h!

* Filed by kargig at 01:09 under Linux
* 6 Comments | 6,127 views

6 Responses to “apt-get install sucks so much sometimes”

  1. db0
    May 10th, 2007 | 10:31
    Using Mozilla Firefox Mozilla Firefox 2.0 on Windows Windows XP

    You probably have Emacs installed and it figured the kernel unnecessary 😛

  2. ubuntu-geek
    June 6th, 2007 | 08:08
    Using Mozilla Firefox Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.4 on Ubuntu Linux Ubuntu Linux

    try ubuntu 🙂

  3. Steve
    June 6th, 2007 | 17:59
    Using Mozilla Firefox Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.4 on Windows Windows XP

    Scary!

    Have you tried a different repository? It so8unds like the Athens University one you’re using is a bit …… confused!

  4. fot
    June 7th, 2007 | 20:06
    Using Safari Safari 419.3 on Mac OS Mac OS

    Just an idea, since you mention you have an old debian. When you do apt-get update it fetches the sources from the http://ftp.ntua.gr but for the stable distribution, which now is Debian 4.0 (aka. etch). That means it fetches packages for a newer version than the one you have installed (check your /etc/debian_version) . Therefore you either have to update your /etc/apt/sources.list to fetch binaries from the old-stable or let it upgrade your packages (through dist-upgrade and all ofcourse). Upgrading your packages means new glibc etc. and propably a new kernel.

    What apt-get is trying to do might look stupid at first … but, really, it’s not! 🙂

    Have fun!

  5. site admin
    June 7th, 2007 | 20:59
    Using Mozilla Firefox Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.3 on Linux Linux

    @fot: that’s what I finally did…dist-upgrade. And it did work like a charm (a lot of distros have serious problems upgrading from one version to another…debian does not).

    My original “problem” with apt-get is that it should never-ever-Ever-EVER prompt you to uninstall your current kernel as a “dependency” of a package without first prompting you to install another.
    It would be fine by me if it told me to install first a newer kernel or told me that it can’t move on to install the package due to kernel related dependencies.

  6. she
    February 17th, 2008 | 23:54
    Using Debian IceWeasel Debian IceWeasel 2.0.0.6 on Linux Linux

    I dont think there should ever be a breakage between different versions.

    The guilty party is apt here. It should figure things out.

    But then again I dont use any debian or rpm based distribution since so many years, I am actually glad that I find other people have problems too *grin*

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