Xandros and APT

Fixing broken dpkg or APT

Getting errors in APT or dkpg, saying things about a broken package? Try these steps:

First Things to Try

Run as root:

dpkg --configure -a 
apt-get -f install

Overwrite Problems

Example (formatted for readability):

dpkg: error processing /var/cache/apt/archives/libcupsys2-dev_1.1.23-3_i386.deb
      (--unpack): trying to overwrite `/usr/share/man/fr/man1/cups-config.1.gz',
      which is also in package cupsys Errors were encountered while processing:
      /var/cache/apt/archives/libcupsys2-dev_1.1.23-3_i386.deb

Solution:

Force the installation of that specific package.

dpkg -i --force-overwrite /var/cache/apt/archives/libcupsys2-dev_1.1.23-3_i386.deb
Removing Badly Broken Package

Do this only if other methods fail. If you are still stuck, you might be able to restore things with this command:

# dpkg --purge --force-remove-reinstreq <package name>

• Find every file that was installed, then do a search and destroy.

dpkg --listfiles <package name>

• Edit the file /var/lib/dpkg/status and remove the package and the 4 or 5 linees following in the section following your badly broken package
• Edit the file /var/lib/dpkg/available and remove the section for your badly broken package if it exists
• Try "apt-get check" and everything should be OK. If not, either try this again or you'll have to reinstall because there isn't much else to do beside trying to reinstall the .deb of the broken package or manually trying to solve dependancies

How to Pin your APT preferences SAFELY

Adapted from   XandrosForums : 708

More useful info on APT pinning:

• http://www.argon.org/~roderick/apt-pinning.html
• http://people.debian.org/~osamu/downgrade.html
• http://jaqque.sbih.org/kplug/apt-pinning.html

How to review your current system policies and pinnings:

apt-cache policy

It should produce something like the following:

Package Files:
 100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     release a=now
 500 http://www.archlug.org xandros3/archlug Packages
     release o=ArchLUG,a=archlug-xandros3.0,l=ArchLUG APT Repository for Xandros 3.0,c=main
     origin www.archlug.org
 500 http://xnv3.xandros.com unsupported3.0-xn/non-free Packages
     release o=Debian,a=testing,l=Debian,c=non-free
     origin xnv3.xandros.com
 500 http://xnv3.xandros.com unsupported3.0-xn/contrib Packages
     release o=Debian,a=testing,l=Debian,c=contrib
     origin xnv3.xandros.com
 500 http://xnv3.xandros.com unsupported3.0-xn/main Packages
     release o=Debian,a=testing,l=Debian,c=main
     origin xnv3.xandros.com
 990 http://xnv3.xandros.com xandros3.0-xn/non-free Packages
     release o=Xandros Corporation,a=xandros3.0-xn,l=Xandros Networks,c=non-free
     origin xnv3.xandros.com
 990 http://xnv3.xandros.com xandros3.0-xn/contrib Packages
     release o=Xandros Corporation,a=xandros3.0-xn,l=Xandros Networks,c=contrib
     origin xnv3.xandros.com
 990 http://xnv3.xandros.com xandros3.0-xn/main Packages
     release o=Xandros Corporation,a=xandros3.0-xn,l=Xandros Networks,c=main
     origin xnv3.xandros.com
Pinned Packages:

The above has no /etc/apt/preferences file, and below is the /etc/apt/sources.list used.

deb http://xnv3.xandros.com/3.0/pkg xandros3.0-xn main contrib non-free
deb http://xnv3.xandros.com/3.0/pkg unsupported3.0-xn main contrib non-free
deb http://www.archlug.org/apt xandros3 archlug

If you set your preferences, set them to something like the following:

Package: *
Pin: origin
Pin-Priority: 999

Package: *
Pin: origin xnv3.xandros.com
Pin-Priority: 900

Package: *
Pin: release a=dccri-3.0
Pin-Priority: 800

Package: *
Pin: release a=stable
Pin-Priority: 777

Package: *
Pin: release a=testing
Pin-Priority: 666

Package: *
Pin: release a=unstable
Pin-Priority: 555

Back to XandrosKwikis