HOW TO: Revert installed packages to official release versions

[claydoh]

Well to muddy things for you a bit, just because a package has git in the file name does not necessarily mean it is something that is a problem. The issue before was that the PPA had been set up (in saucy 13.04) to grab and build daily snapshots of code from KDE's git. All of KDE, built very day automatically. The stoppage of these daily builds is what was causing the orphan packages after time. That problem is, I believe solved by Steve's instructions. Having daily builds running near and after final release was an error, something that should not have happened.


These packages had version names based on date and git revision numbers, so most, hence the "git" reference in the filenames. However normal package still might (rarely) have it if the code was pulled from git to fix a specific bug or something. The version naming used in this case takes into account future upgrades, so that in theory would not cause a problem down the road.

I do not see any 13.10 packages in the kubuntu updates PPA that contain "git" in the file name, but there are a couple hundred, so I might have missed some. There are no packages in the kubuntu backports ppa for Saucy 13.10 yet. If you can provide info on which packages you see that has this, I am sure we can see if it is an issue or not.

[doctordruidphd]

As of yesterday, I re-enabled the kubuntu ppas on my system, as I heard about a kde update. The update is indeed there, went fine, no problems with package versions, and no git packages. So all appears to be fixed.

[geoaraujo]

I believe you meant "saucy 13.10":

The issue before was that the PPA had been set up (in saucy 13.04) to grab and build daily snapshots of code from KDE's git

So that was an one-time error? But how can I know that is not happenning anymore? As I've said, I had kubuntu-ppa enabled and don't mind having git packages as long as they eventually got update to final release.

[doctordruidphd]

I believe you meant "saucy 13.10":

Yep, sorry.

I think (hope) it was a one-time mess-up.

I do my updates from the command line, so:

sudo apt-get -d dist-upgrade

downloads the packages to be updated. The file name will include git if it is a git package.

[SteveRiley]

In my approximately four year history with *buntu distros, I've encountered this problem two times previous to this occurrence. Eventually the problem self-resolves as newer package versions appear in either the PPA or one of the normal pockets.

However, I don't think it's wise for systems to remain in an "orphan" state. If some other packaging related problem surfaced, such a state would complicate troubleshooting. That's why I documented a method for returning to "normal."

Healthy computing starts with proper package hygiene!

[geoaraujo]

Healthy computing starts with proper package hygiene!

[millusions]

Love your work!!!

thanks so much for this information, took me a couple of hours of tinkering to find it!

but all is good now