[Bug 1624644] Re: Unable to automatically remove packages that become unused in conjunction with updating by other software

[Jarno Suni]

I think removing "newly unused" packages is an ugly hack. Deciding which
packages are excessive or unneeded should not depend on how some
packages were removed previously. If the reason for this automatic
remove thing is to get rid of excessive kernels, a specific tool for
that could be used. I have written such a tool. It is called linux-purge
(https://launchpad.net/linux-purge)

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1624644

Title:
  Unable to automatically remove packages that become unused in
  conjunction with updating by other software

Status in unattended-upgrades package in Ubuntu:
  Opinion
Status in update-manager package in Ubuntu:
  New
Status in unattended-upgrades source package in Artful:
  Opinion
Status in update-manager source package in Artful:
  New

Bug description:
  When using default settings for unattended-upgrades i.e.
  Unattended-Upgrade::Remove-Unused-Dependencies "false"; 
  # default "false"
  Unattended-Upgrade::Remove-New-Unused-Dependencies "true"; 
  # default "true"
  in configuration file /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/50unattended-upgrades,
  U-U is unable to remove packages that become unused in conjunction with updating by other software such as update-manager or apt full-upgrade. This is because U-U compares the list of unneeded packages before and after it upgrades packages to detect which packages are new unused ones.

  ProblemType: Bug
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 16.04
  Package: unattended-upgrades 0.90
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.4.0-36.55-generic 4.4.16
  Uname: Linux 4.4.0-36-generic i686
  ApportVersion: 2.20.1-0ubuntu2.1
  Architecture: i386
  CurrentDesktop: XFCE
  Date: Sat Sep 17 11:28:44 2016
  InstallationDate: Installed on 2016-09-05 (11 days ago)
  InstallationMedia: Mythbuntu 16.04.1 LTS "Xenial Xerus" - Release i386 (20160719)
  PackageArchitecture: all
  SourcePackage: unattended-upgrades
  UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

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