Bug#242738: apt_preferences: Cannot avoid a specific version of a specific package.

["Dr. Andreas Krüger" <nw.listadmin@dv-ratio.com>]

Package: apt
Version: 0.5.24

I was bitten by a particular bug by the current testing version 2.5-1 of package 
dnsmasq.  Downgrading back manually to version 2.2-1, which I had used 
previously and found in /var/cache/apt/archives, helped.  I filed a bug report, 
hope the problem will be fixed soon, and am willing to install and try out 
whatever next version of dnsmasq comes around.  However, as long as no new 
version is available, I want apt-get to not install version 2.5-1.

To this end, I tried the following lines in /etc/apt/preferences :

   Package: dnsmasq
   Pin: version 2.5-1
   Pin-Priority: -10

However, this did not help:

   # apt-get -s -V dist-upgrade
   Reading Package Lists... Done
   Building Dependency Tree... Done
   Calculating Upgrade... Done
   The following packages will be upgraded:
      dnsmasq (2.2-1 => 2.5-1)
   1 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
   Inst dnsmasq [2.2-1] (2.5-1 Debian:testing)
   Conf dnsmasq (2.5-1 Debian:testing)


While I cannot say "stay away from version 2.5-1", I have managed to say "stay 
with version 2.2-1":

   Package: dnsmasq
   Pin: version 2.2-1
   Pin-Priority: 1000

Now I get:

   # apt-get -s -V dist-upgrade
   Reading Package Lists... Done
   Building Dependency Tree... Done
   Calculating Upgrade... Done
   0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.

I think it weird that one works and the other doesn't.

Regards, and thank you for providing fine software,

Andreas Krüger