weird updates with zero bytes

[leotux]

First of all good morning good evening and good night I have been using kubuntu for the last 5 Years it's always been solid 2 weeks ago more or less I decided to install ubuntu 22.04.2 i have /home partition and a / which I formatted everything was working fine until 2 days ago I started receiving some weird updates with zero bytes with kernel updates and many nvidia updates which changed my grub menu. now for me to boot into kubuntu I have to choose kernel versions 5.19.0.50-generic because none of the other ones work since they have zero bytes I don't know if it's a kubuntu problem or a Ubuntu problem I did a Google search before posting here and I saw a Reddit post with people with the same problem it looks like a bug is there a way to fix it on my end or is it something that has to be done on kubuntu or Ubuntu end

[claydoh]

Why the microscopic font size??

I saw a Reddit post with people with the same problem

Can you link to the other reports on this you saw in Reddit?

Where are you seeing 'zero bytes', exactly? We really need examples, or as much information as you have.
5.19.0.50 is the latest official kernel in 22.04.

I am going to guess you may have been bitten by an Ubuntu bug that installed some non-standard kernels , ones that have 'oem' and 'nvidia' in the names. There are numerous instance here of this. Do any look similar to what you see?

[dejjanku]

They are more frequently pushing needless updates that only brake the system...

[leotux]

Here are screen shots from my nextcloud vps

https://drive.leojung.cloudns.ph/ind...LGAopPei9TWq5g
https://drive.leojung.cloudns.ph/ind...REcCKJ7n5g4psi
https://drive.leojung.cloudns.ph/ind...cWEgGNWRssyJoo

[claydoh]

If you look at some of the topics in her, and on other *buntu places, you should just need to use Muon or Synaptic to uninstall all kernel packages (linux-image-) that contain the words 'nvidia', 'oem', or 'lowlatency'.
6.2.0-26-generic and 5.19.0-50-generic are the two most recent official Ubuntu kernels, so make sure you are booted to one of those first.
Removing those should also remove these oddball packages as well, but you may need to search for and remove those as well.


I can't say why these are shown as zero bytes, unless they are 'virtual' packages, (doesn't look to be the case), or Discover not showing the file size, and maybe just showing the extra space it takes, or (my guess) is that this has already been downloaded in the background because they are security updates, and has zero to download?
My other thought was that these are meta-packages (basically just lists of dependencies) but even these have a small number of Kb. Maybe they are small enough in some cases to round down to zero? I see some for me show zero, and others show a few Kb, as expected.

[Schwarzer Kater]

They are more frequently pushing needless updates that only brake the system...

I understand your frustration, but IMHO there are no "needless updates" - they are either feature updates, bug-fixes or security updates.
That something does not work anymore as intended after an update can happen in any system, no matter if e.g. macOS, Linux or Windows.
People can make mistakes unfortunately and in Linux most of those people additionally work for free.

And this is not Windows - you don't have to update your system at all or at a specific time in Linux. Nobody forces you to.
But if your computer is connected to any other system in any way - especially to the internet - I would strongly suggest to at least install security updates (which are included in e.g. web browser updates and kernel updates most of the time).

[leotux]

I know the problem seems to be discover which is is installing packages I didn't ask to install like lowlatency kernel and oem.

From now on I'm only going to do sudo apt upgrade and just forget discover

[claydoh]

I know the problem seems to be discover which is is installing packages I didn't ask to install like lowlatency kernel and oem.

This is a bug in the packaging for something, not in Discover
.

From now on I'm only going to do sudo apt upgrade and just forget discover

As Discover is actually using apt, the outcome would be exactly the same.
Just be sure to inspect what either one proposes before confirming.

Also, if using apt, it is safest to use apt full-upgrade, most especially if you have added any extra external software sources, like PPAs.

[dejjanku]

This is what I am talking about for a month now, I think. Updates for Kubuntu have gone insane.

[Martin B]

I have Kubuntu 22.04 with KDE-Plasma 5.24.7 and Kernel 5.15.0-101-generic 64-bit with NVIDIA GeForce GT 710 and NVIDIA Driver Version 470.239.06

Today (2024-04-08) I saw the info about pending updates and found 12 updates where only 4 have a file size and old + new version information,
8 have a file size of 0 and only old version information : see Screenshot 1 (Photo)

I double checked with Muon and found the same information: see part of Screenshots 2 to 5

Because there is no difference between Discover and Muon this doesn't seem to be a program related issue but is
maybe a change in the way updates are delivered from Canonical - I don't see a Kubuntu issue but a *übuntu-with-Nvidia-issue?

If installing the update(s) will lead to the problems described in this post first:
- can somebody tell how to handle this?
- is it a good idea to have only the 4 updates installed that have new versions?
- can I be sure to after doing a full install resulting in a not running system I will be able to successfully start the system with grub and the previous kernel ?

Thanks in advance for your helpful answers!