Tony Godshall wrote:
According to Marty,Basajaun wrote: >For understanding what version you are running, and what packages will >get updated (or not), take a look at "man apt_preferences". Good point. Specifically, the apt conffile /etc/apt/apt.conf must indicate the debian version. e.g. mine contains: APT::Get::Show-Upgraded "true"; APT::Default-Release "sarge"; APT::Cache-Limit 25165824;Oddly, I have no such file. None of my machines do. What does that mean?
Maybe you accidentally removed it. Here is my result from running "dlocate apt.conf": debconf: /etc/apt/apt.conf.d debconf: /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/70debconf apt: /usr/share/man/fr/man5/apt.conf.5.gz apt: /usr/share/man/ja/man5/apt.conf.5.gz apt: /usr/share/man/man5/apt.conf.5.gz apt: /usr/share/man/es/man5/apt.conf.5.gz apt: /usr/share/doc/apt/examples/apt.conf This means it's an conffile of the package "apt". Running "dpkg --no-act -P apt" gives me this: dpkg: dependency problems prevent removal of apt: wajig depends on apt. apt-utils depends on libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3; however: Package libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is not installed. Package apt which provides libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is to be removed. gnome-apt depends on libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3; however: Package libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is not installed. Package apt which provides libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is to be removed. python-apt depends on libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3; however: Package libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is not installed. Package apt which provides libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is to be removed. libapt-pkg-dev depends on libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3; however: Package libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is not installed. Package apt which provides libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is to be removed. aptitude depends on libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3; however: Package libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is not installed. Package apt which provides libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is to be removed. synaptic depends on libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3; however: Package libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is not installed. Package apt which provides libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is to be removed. libapt-pkg-perl depends on libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3; however: Package libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is not installed. Package apt which provides libapt-pkg-libc6.3-5-3.3 is to be removed. So it looks like unless you have apt-related packages your systems should be fine. apt is just a dpkg front end, so theoretically you could manage fine without it, but it's a lot more work, and upgrades become problematic.