Re: Single broken package blocks whole package management

[Dan Ritter <dsr@randomstring.org>]

Urs Thuermann wrote: 
> "Andrew M.A. Cater" <amacater@einval.com> writes:
> 
> > Raspbian _isn't_ Debian. Wolfram-engine is a third party (commercial) app -
> > Wolfram Mathematica which the Raspberry Pi foundation licences with a 
> > special educational arrangement.
> > 
> > You might be able to force a reinstall of wolfram-engine to produce
> > something consistent to then remove but this is probably wasted
> > effort.
> 
> Yes, and my question should be about dpkg & friends how to get out of
> that state where a single corrupted package blocks everything.
> 

Here's the dangerous way:

In /var/lib/dpkg/info, dpkg and therefore apt keep the install
and removal scripts for all packages.

You could download a copy of the wolfram-engine .deb manually,
use ar to pull out a copy of the package list, confirm that it
is unmunged and replace the broken one in /var/lib/dpkg/info.

Then remove it, do your upgrades, and try reinstalling it.

-dsr-