[Aptitude-devel] Bug#1033532: aptitude: forgets upgrade action(s) to experimental after becoming root

[Kevin Locke]

Package: aptitude
Version: 0.8.13-5
Severity: normal

Dear Maintainer,

When running aptitude 0.8.13-5 as a non-root user, if an installed
package is marked for upgrade to a version from experimental, aptitude
forgets about the action after becoming root.  To reproduce, starting
from a fresh installation of Debian testing, as root:

echo 'deb https://deb.debian.org/debian experimental main' >/etc/apt/sources.list.d/debian-experimental.list
apt update
apt install aptitude

Then as a non-root user:

1. Run aptitude.
2. Mark an installed package for upgrade to the version from experimental.
   (e.g. upgrade mawk 1.3.4.20200120-3.1 to 1.3.4.20230203-1~exp1)
3. Press g to start an install run.
4. Become root when prompted.

Observe that after becoming root, the package upgrade is no longer
pending and the following message appears:

> No packages are scheduled to be installed, removed or upgraded.

Instead, the upgrade action should still be pending so it can be
completed as root.

Thanks,
Kevin

Note: This issue appears similar to https://bugs.debian.org/398956
where purge actions are forgotten after becoming root.


-- Package-specific info:
Terminal: xterm-256color
$DISPLAY is set.
which aptitude: /usr/bin/aptitude

aptitude version information:
aptitude 0.8.13
Compiler: g++ 12.1.0
Compiled against:
  apt version 6.0.0
  NCurses version 6.3
  libsigc++ version: 2.10.8
  Gtk+ support disabled.
  Qt support disabled.

Current library versions:
  NCurses version: ncurses 6.4.20221231
  cwidget version: 0.5.18
  Apt version: 6.0.0

aptitude linkage:
	linux-vdso.so.1 (0x00007fff085eb000)
	libapt-pkg.so.6.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libapt-pkg.so.6.0 (0x00007fbf327df000)
	libncursesw.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libncursesw.so.6 (0x00007fbf327a5000)
	libtinfo.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libtinfo.so.6 (0x00007fbf32773000)
	libsigc-2.0.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libsigc-2.0.so.0 (0x00007fbf32e2f000)
	libcwidget.so.4 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libcwidget.so.4 (0x00007fbf32681000)
	libsqlite3.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libsqlite3.so.0 (0x00007fbf32522000)
	libboost_iostreams.so.1.74.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libboost_iostreams.so.1.74.0 (0x00007fbf3250a000)
	libxapian.so.30 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxapian.so.30 (0x00007fbf32200000)
	libpthread.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpthread.so.0 (0x00007fbf32e28000)
	libstdc++.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6 (0x00007fbf31e00000)
	libm.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libm.so.6 (0x00007fbf32121000)
	libgcc_s.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgcc_s.so.1 (0x00007fbf324ea000)
	libc.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libc.so.6 (0x00007fbf31c1f000)
	libz.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libz.so.1 (0x00007fbf324cb000)
	libbz2.so.1.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libbz2.so.1.0 (0x00007fbf324b8000)
	liblzma.so.5 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/liblzma.so.5 (0x00007fbf32489000)
	liblz4.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/liblz4.so.1 (0x00007fbf32463000)
	libzstd.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libzstd.so.1 (0x00007fbf32065000)
	libudev.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libudev.so.1 (0x00007fbf32436000)
	libsystemd.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libsystemd.so.0 (0x00007fbf31b50000)
	libgcrypt.so.20 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgcrypt.so.20 (0x00007fbf31a09000)
	libxxhash.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libxxhash.so.0 (0x00007fbf32050000)
	/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00007fbf32e3a000)
	libuuid.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libuuid.so.1 (0x00007fbf32046000)
	libcap.so.2 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libcap.so.2 (0x00007fbf3203a000)
	libgpg-error.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgpg-error.so.0 (0x00007fbf319e1000)

-- System Information:
Debian Release: 12.0
  APT prefers testing-debug
  APT policy: (990, 'testing-debug'), (990, 'testing'), (500, 'unstable-debug'), (500, 'testing-security'), (500, 'stable-debug'), (500, 'unstable'), (101, 'experimental'), (1, 'experimental-debug')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)
Foreign Architectures: i386

Kernel: Linux 6.3.0-rc3-dirty (SMP w/4 CPU threads; PREEMPT)
Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8), LANGUAGE not set
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /usr/bin/dash
Init: systemd (via /run/systemd/system)
LSM: AppArmor: enabled

Versions of packages aptitude depends on:
ii  aptitude-common           0.8.13-5
ii  libapt-pkg6.0             2.6.0
ii  libboost-iostreams1.74.0  1.74.0+ds1-20
ii  libc6                     2.36-8
ii  libcwidget4               0.5.18-6
ii  libgcc-s1                 12.2.0-14
ii  libncursesw6              6.4-2
ii  libsigc++-2.0-0v5         2.12.0-1
ii  libsqlite3-0              3.40.1-2
ii  libstdc++6                12.2.0-14
ii  libtinfo6                 6.4-2
ii  libxapian30               1.4.22-1

Versions of packages aptitude recommends:
ii  libdpkg-perl    1.21.21
ii  sensible-utils  0.0.17+nmu1

Versions of packages aptitude suggests:
pn  apt-xapian-index                <none>
ii  aptitude-doc-en [aptitude-doc]  0.8.13-5
pn  debtags                         <none>
pn  tasksel                         <none>

-- no debconf information