[Pkg-sysvinit-devel] Bug#786469: sysvinit-utils, util-linux: can't upgrade - 'installation run will require temporarily removing the essential package'

[Martin Pitt]

Control: tag -1 confirmed

Hey James,

James Cowgill [2015-05-22  0:18 +0100]:
> I have a system running sid which I haven't upgraded for a few weeks. I
> was greeted with this just now (apt-get upgrade fails as well, but I
> used install to make the output smaller).
> E: This installation run will require temporarily removing the essential package util-linux:i386 due to a Conflicts/Pre-Depends loop. This is often bad, but if you really want to do it, activate the APT::Force-LoopBreak option.

Ah, thanks for your report! I hit a similar error yesterday on our
initial attempt with using the usual Breaks+Replaces, which causes apt
to blow up like that. We fixed that by using Depends+Replaces instead.

I'm fairly sure this upgrade error would already have affected the
previous util-linux 2.26.2-3, as that introduced something similar:
Breaks:/Replaces: sysvinit-utils (<< 2.88dsf-59.1~)

I'm now doing some experiments whether changing the Breaks: into a
Depends: works in all cases (upgrade from jessie, testing, and
previous unstable); if it does, we can use that (although it's
conceptually a bit weird, util-linux does not really need
sysvinit-utils), otherwise we'll just use Replaces: only; that will
avoid any Breaks/Depends which confuse apt, and will technically work
although it doesn't satisfy the letter of the Debian policy.

Martin
-- 
Martin Pitt                        | http://www.piware.de
Ubuntu Developer (www.ubuntu.com)  | Debian Developer  (www.debian.org)
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