Resetting file list in aptitude
Quick question for those who don't have time to read the whole saga
below: aptitude shows all packages selected for deletion (don't know
how I got it into that state.) How do I unselect all the packages
for deletion?
More details....
I did a recent install of debian on my iMac 233. I've been using
aptitude to find and install packages. My recent adventure was to
find and install a java plugin for the browsers, Mozilla in particular.
During this process I somehow entered a command that selected all of
the packages for deletion! I tried undo, and searched the menus for
other commands, but I could not figure out how to reset aptitude to a
clean state.
I typed 'g' and aptitude indicated that all of the packages would be
deleted because they were not longer required and would recover 1.7
GB of storage. The list was in magenta (not quite red). At this
point I quit aptitude and reran, but the files were still selected.
I changed to root and ran aptitude. Quick summary, I tried to undo
the selection used 'g' to verify. Still selected for deletion,
tried some other commands, and typed 'g' to verify if I had
unselected the packages for deletion and b o o o o m. All the
packages were deleted.
Basic question how could I reset the file selection list?
On with the story. I let the process continue figuring I'd need to
do a re-install anyway. So, it looks like it removed most of the
packages and left me a core system. I rebooted with no problems and
had to do an apt-get to get the aptitude package. After getting
aptitude and running, it still had more packages selected to be
deleted! I think I remembered that aptitude uses a database as the
store for information on package handling. I was able to use the
'add' command to clear the delete flag on a package, but I didn't
want to go through a few 100, or 1000 packages doing this. I thought
what the heck, and I let aptitude delete the rest of the packages.
This time around it warned in no uncertain terms that deleting the
kernel was a very bad idea and allowed me to opt out of this
package. However, it went ahead a deleted the remaining packages
including yaboot.
With most of the packages gone, aptitude now reported the kernel
package was broken because it was missing some packages. So, I added
all the missing packages back for install, and installed them using
aptitude. The system rebooted fine and I guess I have a very core
system at this point. So my basic question is the same: what should
I have done when I saw aptitude had everything selected for
deletion? I think I'll put this question at the very beginning for
those who don't want to read the saga of using aptitude.
Despite the problem, I'm impressed with aptitude and Debian. Even at
a bare bones the system is functional. I think I'll become really
adventurous. What else can I screw up anyway?
Thanks,
Terry
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