Bug#396331: upgrade-reports: sarge to etch removes kernels
On Tue, Oct 31, 2006 at 08:57:25AM -0800, Kevin B. McCarty wrote:
> > Upgrade went well, except for one rather big problem. If I do a
> > straight "aptitude -f dist-upgrade", it removes kernel-image-* (IE,
> > kernel-image-2.6.8-3-686; I didn't try a 2.4 installation->upgrade).
> > Now, I understand why older kernels must be removed for etch (udev,
> > etc), but this is probably a problem for the average user. For the
> > release notes, I would recommend the following procedure:
> > 1. Edit sources.list
> > 2. apt-get update
> > 3. aptitude -f install linux-image-2.6-[arch]
> > 4. dpkg --purge hotplug
> > 5. reboot
> > 6. aptitude -f dist-upgrade
> > Installing the new kernel first means the old kernels will be removed,
> > udev will be installed, only a few necessary packages are upgraded
> > (libc6, etc), and a new, hopefully working kernel is installed in its
> > place. The user can then reboot and verify the new kernel works before
> > completely upgrading to etch. Of course, if the new kernel DOESN'T
> > work, the user doesn't have anything to fall back on, but at least he
> > knows early on.
> This problem (automatic removal of old kernel packages) is apparently
> fixed in the version of aptitude in Sid, 0.4.4-1. If this version was
> allowed to pass into Etch (currently aptitude in Etch is only one
> version behind Sid, at 0.4.3-1), then the release notes would only have
> to say something to the effect of "Install the aptitude from Etch
> *before* dist-upgrading." (The Sarge release notes contained a similar
> instruction, BTW.)
Wow, what? First of all, how is there anything buggy in the current
aptitude removal to justify "fixing"? If the old kernel-image package is
marked in aptitude as auto-installed, aptitude is *supposed* to remove it,
this is a feature not a bug! (It's a feature which has non-obvious
consequences to many users, but I don't believe there's any sane way to
"fix" it.)
Second, the bug submitter is correct, old 2.6 kernels are not usable in etch
because they're incompatible with current udev. So I don't see why we
should go out of our way to keep them around anyway.
I'm happy to consider requests from the maintainer for a freeze exception
for aptitude (if nothing else the new version seems to include a number of
l10n/i18n improvements), but the rationale you've given here sounds to me
like a regression, not a bugfix...
--
Steve Langasek Give me a lever long enough and a Free OS
Debian Developer to set it on, and I can move the world.
vorlon@debian.org http://www.debian.org/
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