Wheezy->Jessie upgrade: udev (pre)install issue

[Matthijs <debian@vanaalten.net>]

Hi all,

Apologies in advance: I'm not a frequent mailing list user, but I seem 
to have messed up my system upgrade and hope someone here can help out 
with advice.

Basically I followed the normal recipe: change /etc/apt/sources.list to 
read 'jessie' instead of 'wheezy', then apt-get update, then apt-get 
dist-upgrade. That's how I've done it since 2003 or so, never any big 
issues.

After some time during the upgrade process I get the following error and 
upgrade stops:
--------------------
Unpacking replacement systemd ...
dpkg: considering deconfiguration of udev, which would be broken by 
installation of consolekit ...
dpkg: yes, will deconfigure udev (broken by consolekit)
Preparing to replace consolekit 0.4.5-3.1 (using 
.../consolekit_0.4.6-5_amd64.deb) ...
De-configuring udev ...
Unpacking replacement consolekit ...
Replacing files in old package udev ...
Preparing to replace udev 175-7.2 (using 
.../archives/udev_215-8_amd64.deb) ...
Since release 198, udev requires support for the following features in
the running kernel:

- inotify(2)            (CONFIG_INOTIFY_USER)
- signalfd(2)           (CONFIG_SIGNALFD)
- accept4(2)
- open_by_handle_at(2)  (CONFIG_FHANDLE)
- timerfd_create(2)     (CONFIG_TIMERFD)
- epoll_create(2)       (CONFIG_EPOLL)

Please upgrade your kernel before or while upgrading udev.

AT YOUR OWN RISK, you can force the installation of this version of udev
WHICH DOES NOT WORK WITH YOUR RUNNING KERNEL AND WILL BREAK YOUR SYSTEM
AT THE NEXT REBOOT by creating the /etc/udev/kernel-upgrade file.
There is always a safer way to upgrade, do not try this unless you
understand what you are doing!


dpkg: error processing /var/cache/apt/archives/udev_215-8_amd64.deb 
(--unpack):
 subprocess new pre-installation script returned error exit status 1
update-rc.d: warning: start and stop actions are no longer supported; 
falling back to defaults
update-rc.d: warning: start and stop actions are no longer supported; 
falling back to defaults
Processing triggers for man-db ...
Errors were encountered while processing:
 /var/cache/apt/archives/udev_215-8_amd64.deb
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
--------------------

The problem seems to be with unpacking the udev package. Googling a bit 
suggests to add "set -x" to the preinst script 
(/var/lib/dpkg/info/udev.preinst is the only one I could find, though 
I'm not entirely sure that's the right one) and then retry with "dpkg 
--configure --pending". But doesn't work:

--------------------
dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of systemd:
 systemd depends on udev (>= 208-8); however:
  Version of udev on system is 175-7.2.

dpkg: error processing package systemd (--configure):
 dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of libpam-systemd:amd64:
 libpam-systemd:amd64 depends on systemd (= 215-8); however:
  Package systemd is not configured yet.

dpkg: error processing package libpam-systemd:amd64 (--configure):
 dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
Errors were encountered while processing:
 systemd
 libpam-systemd:amd64
--------------------

I've also tried "apt-get -f install" to get it to fix itself. This then 
upgraded several other unrelated/innocent packages, but always at some 
point stopped and failed at udev.

Any suggestions?

Kind regards,
Matthijs