reassign 559194 aptitude,apt thanks Same problem occurs when you upgrade a stable system (like from lenny to squeeze). Some packages don't get removed although they are marked as automatically installed and no other package depends on them. I also guess those packages don't get removed by any package tool because they are set to priority "required". It affects apt, aptitude and other package tools like deborphan.
If you don't want to remove packages with priority "required" directly because of stability reasons than maybe resolve the problem by policy: To remove a required package always add a transitional package with reduced priority so that package tools can remove the package with standard mechanisms. Regards Uwe Package libcap1 as an example: # aptitude search libcap1 i A libcap1 - support for getting/setting POSIX.1e capab ==> the package is installed and marked as automatically installed # aptitude why libcap1 Unable to find a reason to install libcap1. ==> no other package depends on it, recommends or suggests it # aptitude search '~o'|grep libcap1 i A libcap1 - support for getting/setting POSIX.1e capab # apt-cache policy libcap1 libcap1: Installed: 1:1.10-14 Candidate: 1:1.10-14 Version table: *** 1:1.10-14 0 100 /var/lib/dpkg/status ==> the package is obsolete and not in the debian repository anymore # aptitude upgrade No packages will be installed, upgraded, or removed. 0 packages upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded. Need to get 0 B of archives. After unpacking 0 B will be used. Do you want to continue? [Y/n/?] ==> but it still doesn't get removed # apt-get autoremove Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done 0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded. ==> apt also ignores it # deborphan --guess-all ==> even deborphan does not recognise it # dpkg -s libcap1 Package: libcap1 Status: install ok installed Priority: required Section: libs [..] ==> package priority is "required", probably the reason for the special handling -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-bugs-dist-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org