I made a big mistake: dependency hell!

[Dotan Cohen]

On Mon, Jan 24, 2011 at 01:17, Tom H <tomh0665 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> I always use gdebi to install things that I get from sources other than
>>> the repositories, such as virtualbox. I don't use it often but it seems
>>> to make a decent attempt at resolving dependencies and installing the
>>> extra packages.
>>
>> Thank you for the insight Dave but please do not hijack this thread to
>> discuss best practices. I need this thread to remain coherent so that
>> I might resolve this critical issue. Thanks.
>
> What a ridiculous reply! He's suggesting a preventive measure for the
> future so he's not hijacking anything!
>

It is not a preventative measure as I was deliberately fooling with
unsupported packages from a different distro version. There were no
repos to query, I was mixing and matching packages, I could do that
with any tool. Furthermore, I do not need a preventative measure, I
need to fix this install.


> In fact, he's pointed you at a solution; re-installing with a an
> application that'll install the correct dependencies.
>

Another apt front end. In fact, one that does not have a fix mode
(such as apt-get and aptitude have). In any case, as there is no fix
mode I tried to use it reinstall the digikam .deb and it complained
about a missing dependency, with no attempt to resolve.


> I know nothing about gdebi but I'd suggest that you set up
> sources.list and apt.conf properly for maverick and natty with pinning
> and re-install whatever you installed with dpkg with "apt-get -t natty
> install package" or  "apt-get -t natty install --reinstall package" to
> pull in the dependencies.
>

Thank you, I did not realise that one could configure apt for using
both sets of repos. I have in the past added N+1 main repos to pull in
dependencies when upgrading specific packages, but I thought that it
was a hack and certainly not supported. In any case, in this install I
do not want to install any more Natty packages, I need to get it back
to a stable Maverick install. I may have to reinstall, but I'd like to
avoid that.


-- 
Dotan Cohen

http://gibberish.co.il
http://what-is-what.com