Missing packages when upgrading wheezy -> jessie -> sid

[thegeko]

I decided to upgrade wheezy on my primary desktop, because...well...it is ancient and I needed to run some new software. So I backed up a system disk image just to be safe, but want to use it only as a last resort.

Warning: I am not in a good mood, as always when upgrading frequently used debian running desktop machine.

I changed sources.list to contain the following contents:

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# deb cdrom:[Debian GNU/Linux 6.0.3 _Squeeze_ - Official amd64 NETINST Binary-1 20111008-19:52]/ squeeze main

deb http://ftp.cvut.cz/debian/ testing main non-free contrib
deb-src http://ftp.cvut.cz/debian/ testing main non-free contrib

deb http://security.debian.org/ testing/updates main non-free contrib
deb-src http://security.debian.org/ testing/updates main non-free contrib


Then I ran

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apt-get update && apt-get upgrade

which went through fine. Then I tried apt-get dist-upgrade, which complained about some dependencies for network-manager-gnome and modemmanager (if I recall correctly).
Well, I remembered that usually people recommend removing desktop manager before upgrade, so I went ahead and removed with

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apt-get remove gdm3

Then dist upgrade succeeded.

The new problem was, that I could not install gnome back, because of the same unmet dependencies. Well, OK, Jessie refuses to work, I was stuck, thought to have a clean system only without desktop manager, so I decided to upgrade further to sid. Everything went smoothly, but same problem persist. I cannot install gnome. Heck, I cannot even install XFCE.

My current sources.list:

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# deb cdrom:[Debian GNU/Linux 6.0.3 _Squeeze_ - Official amd64 NETINST Binary-1 20111008-19:52]/ squeeze main

deb http://ftp.cvut.cz/debian/ sid main non-free contrib
deb-src http://ftp.cvut.cz/debian/ sid main non-free contrib

#deb http://security.debian.org/ sid/updates main
#deb-src http://security.debian.org/ sid/updates main


Some samples:

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root@asgard:~# apt-get install gdm3
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
or been moved out of Incoming.
The following information may help to resolve the situation:

The following packages have unmet dependencies:
 gdm3 : Depends: libcanberra-gtk3-0 (>= 0.25) but it is not going to be installed
        Depends: libgtk-3-0 (>= 3.0.0) but it is not going to be installed
        Depends: gnome-session-bin (>= 3.10) but it is not going to be installed
        Depends: gnome-settings-daemon (>= 3.2) but it is not going to be installed
        Depends: gnome-shell (>= 3.10.1-2~) but it is not going to be installed
        Depends: accountsservice (>= 0.6.12) but it is not installable
        Recommends: zenity
        Recommends: gnome-icon-theme but it is not going to be installed
        Recommends: gnome-icon-theme-symbolic but it is not going to be installed
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.


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root@asgard:~# apt-get install accountsservice
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Package accountsservice is not available, but is referred to by another package.
This may mean that the package is missing, has been obsoleted, or
is only available from another source

E: Package 'accountsservice' has no installation candidate


Now, how is it possible that such a popular desktop manager has a dependency accountsservice, and at the same time accountsservice is missing in both sid and testing repositories???

[stevepusser]

Accountsservice is in Sid, and in that repo, I surfed into it...I'm trying to think of why you don't see it. I notice you did not mention that you ran apt-get update after changing the repos to Sid. You can also check what versions of accountsservice can be seen with

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apt-cache policy accountsservice

Also, I'm curious which new software you wanted updated. It's often possible to find a backported version that will run on Wheezy.

[thegeko]

Thanks for reply. Yes, I did run apt-get update after changing to sid.

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root@asgard:~# apt-cache policy accountsservice
accountsservice:
  Installed: (none)
  Candidate: (none)
  Package pin: (not found)
  Version table:
     0.6.37-3+b1 -1
        500 http://ftp.cvut.cz/debian/ sid/main amd64 Packages
     0.6.21-8 -1
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status


[thegeko]

I apologize, I found some lines in /etc/apt/preferences, which defined some versions for packages starting with a*. Thanks though, it probably would not cross my mind to check preferences without your comment.

[eddyagain]

Have you tried apt-get clean inbetween those upgrades?
Also gdm3 is only ythe window manager have you tried purging gnome?

[stevepusser]

Ummm--the OP found that he had certain packages pinned in apt/preferences. Releasing them allowed a clean upgrade.

[a6oozar]

I have a same problem.
It seems that it's a bug and there is a problem in gnome packaging!

[kiyop]

It seems that it's a bug and there is a problem in gnome packaging!

I do not think that it is simply due to a bug, because

I apologize, I found some lines in /etc/apt/preferences, which defined some versions for packages starting with a*. Thanks though, it probably would not cross my mind to check preferences without your comment.

and
Release Notes for Debian 8 (jessie), 64-bit PC; Chapter 4. Upgrades from Debian 7 (wheezy)
https://www.debian.org/releases/stable/ ... pt-pinning

If you have configured APT to install certain packages from a distribution other than stable (e.g. from testing), you may have to change your APT pinning configuration (stored in /etc/apt/preferences and /etc/apt/preferences.d/) to allow the upgrade of packages to the versions in the new stable release. Further information on APT pinning can be found in apt_preferences(5).