Re: Broke /etc/apt/preferences when trying to use just one package from unstable.

[Bob Cox <debian-user@lists.bobcox.com>]

On Sat, Jul 26, 2008 at 12:51:42 +0100, James Youngman (jay@gnu.org) wrote: 

> I modified /etc/apt/{preferences,sources.list} to get just
> flashplugin-nonfree from unstable.      That seemed to work.
> However, now I find that  "apt-get install libsdl1.2-dev" results in
> this error:
> 
> # apt-get install libsdl1.2-dev
> Reading package lists... Done
> Building dependency tree
> Reading state information... Done
> Package libsdl1.2-dev is not available, but is referred to by another package.
> This may mean that the package is missing, has been obsoleted, or
> is only available from another source
> E: Package libsdl1.2-dev has no installation candidate
> 
> Could somebody take a look at my preferences and sources.list files
> and explain to me what I broke and how?    I attach both files
> (/etc/apt/sources.list.d is empty).

To eliminate your /etc/apt/preferences file as the source of the
problem, how about temporarily renaming or removing it, then do an
aptitude update then try again?

The package you want is available in both testing and unstable:

bob@trantor:~$ apt-cache policy libsdl1.2-dev
libsdl1.2-dev:
  Installed: (none)
  Candidate: 1.2.13-2
  Version table:
     1.2.13-2 0
        500 http://ftp.uk.debian.org lenny/main Packages
        500 http://ftp.uk.debian.org sid/main Packages

(Having temporarily added sid to my sources file just to check).

-- 
Bob Cox.  Stoke Gifford, near Bristol, UK.
Registered user #445000 with the Linux Counter - http://counter.li.org/