Software updater snuck in a package that is unwanted

[Liam Proven]

On 17 October 2017 at 18:54, Bret Busby <bret at busby.net> wrote:
>
> I have had to create this reply using the source code to the message to
> which I am responding, as the message to whioch I am responding, is not
> using plain text format, which is used by my email application, and, thence,
> the message to which I am responding, appears as an attachment to the reply
> that I am writing and posting.

You could still have trimmed it, Bret.


de.
> After this operation, 348 kB disk space will be freed.
> Do you want to continue? [Y/n]
> "
>
> Therein lies the rub.
>
> To remove the package;
> :~$ sudo apt-get purge unattended-upgrades
> requires the removal of the user interface.

Have you actually bothered to read the masses of text you posted?

348 KILOBYTES of code.

Do you really think that the entire Maté desktop is under 350 kB in size?

Don't be silly. Of course it isn't. It is many hundreds of megabytes.

The only things being removed are metapackages, not the actual desktop.

Go Google "debian metapackage" and learn what that means.

As I have told you about THREE TIMES now, "unattended-upgrades" is...

[1] *Built in*. It has always been there. That's why removing it
breaks the metapackage: because it is an integral part. It has always
been there; you have only just _noticed_.

[2] Not a piece of software. It is a schedule entry. A tiny text file
that schedules an activity. Nothing more. Don't remove it. Just
disable it.

> That is why I regard the package as a trojan.

Wrong.

> It can not be simply and easily and cleanly, removed.

Wrong. Yes it can and your computer is telling you so.

> Its design hooks it into other packages, to prevent its removal.

No. It is BUILT IN. It has always been there.

> It is like a cancer with secondaries in the brain - attempts to remove,
> simply aggravate the damage.

Please stop with the paranoid ranting. It is not useful, productive or welcome.

-- 
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