Package: phpmyadmin Well I hit RET on the usual aptitude "safe-upgrade" without reading:
The following packages will be REMOVED: libjs-sphinxdoc{pu} (D: phpmyadmin) phpmyadmin{pu} The following packages will be upgraded: aptitude aptitude-common (aptitude D: aptitude-common) aptitude-doc-en dbconfig-common dbconfig-mysql gnupg-agent gnupg2 libapache2-mod-php libapache2-mod-php7.0 (libapache2-mod-php7.0P<- libapache2-mod-php) libcupsfilters1 libfreetype6 libgraphite2-3 libgstreamer-plugins-base1.0-0 libgstreamer1.0-0 libpng12-0 libssl1.0.2 (openssl D: libssl1.0.2) libxml-xpath-perl openssl php php-cli php-common (libapache2-mod-php7.0P<- libapache2-mod-php D: php7.0-common D: php-common, php7.0P<- php D: php7.0-common D: php-common, php7.0-cliP<- php-cli D: php7.0-common D: php-common, php7.0-jsonP<- php-json D: php-common, php7.0-mcryptP<- php-mcrypt D: php-common) php-json php-mcrypt php-mysql php-pear php7.0 (php7.0P<- php) php7.0-cgi php7.0-cli (php7.0-cliP<- php-cli) php7.0-common (libapache2-mod-php7.0P<- libapache2-mod-php D: php7.0-common, php7.0P<- php D: php7.0-common, php7.0-cliP<- php-cli D: php7.0-common, php7.0-jsonP<- php-json D: php7.0-common, php7.0-mcryptP<- php-mcrypt D: php7.0-common) php7.0-json (php7.0-jsonP<- php-json) php7.0-mcrypt (php7.0-mcryptP<- php-mcrypt) php7.0-mysql php7.0-opcache php7.0-readline The following packages are RECOMMENDED but will NOT be installed: dirmngr (R: gnupg2) gstreamer1.0-plugins-base (R: libgstreamer-plugins-base1.0-0, R: libwebkitgtk-1.0-0, R: libwebkitgtk-3.0-0, S: libgstreamer1.0-0) libparse-debianchangelog-perl (R: aptitude) And next thing you know I am looking at: Since you are removing phpmyadmin, it's possible that you no longer want the underlying database and │ │ the privileges for the user associated with this package. │ │ │ │ Please choose whether database removal and privilege revocation should be handled with dbconfig-common. │ │ │ │ If you choose this option, dbconfig-common will check if phpmyadmin provided scripts and database │ │ commands to undo package specific operations and run them if they exist. Then it will ask if you want │ │ to delete the phpmyadmin database and revoke the standard privileges for the user of phpmyadmin. If you │ │ don't want any of this, or if you want to handle this manually, you should refuse this option. │ │ │ │ Deconfigure database for phpmyadmin with dbconfig-common? │ │ │ │ <Yes> <No> Well from past experience with aptitude, ^C will not allow one to abort here. So I chose <No> and later reinstall phpmyadmin but of course things are still ruined. So please add <Yes> <No> <Do Not Remove phpmyadmin>