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[Solved] [O/S] Are these packages safe to Autoremove with Apt?

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tired-owl
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[Solved] [O/S] Are these packages safe to Autoremove with Apt?

#1 Post by tired-owl »

Hello, apt is asking me to autoremove some packages, I am unsure if these packages are safe to autoremove.

Wondering if I could get a second pair of eyes to look over these packages and see if anything important is being removed.

System specs
My system is Debian 11 stable, it's a desktop with XFCE.

The output of uname -r is:

Code: Select all

5.10.0-23-amd64

Output of what apt is asking to autoremove

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ant-contrib aspell-eu-es blt cpp-8 fcitx-chewing fcitx-googlepinyin 
  fcitx-sunpinyin fcitx-table-wubi fonts-nanum-coding fonts-noto-hinted
  fonts-roboto-slab fonts-sipa-arundina geoip-database gtk2-engines-xfce
  haveged libasan5 libbind9-161 libboost-atomic1.67.0 libboost-chrono1.67.0
  libboost-date-time1.67.0 libboost-filesystem1.67.0 libboost-iostreams1.67.0
  libboost-locale1.67.0 libboost-system1.67.0 libboost-thread1.67.0
  libbrlapi0.6 libcdio18 libcodec2-0.8.1 libcroco3 libcrystalhd3 libcupsimage2
  libdc1394-22 libdns1104 libdns1110 libdouble-conversion1 libdvdread4
  libegl1-mesa libept1.5.0 libevent-2.1-6 libexiv2-14 libfluidsynth1
  libgail-3-0 libgeoip1 libgooglepinyin0 libgssdp-1.0-3 libgtkglext1
  libgupnp-1.0-4 libhavege1 libhavege2 libicu63 libigdgmm5 libilmbase23
  libindicator3-7 libisc1100 libisc1105 libisccc161 libisccfg163 libisl19
  libjim0.77 libjs-modernizr libjte1 libllvm7 liblouis17 liblwres161 libmng1
  libmpdec2 libmpx2 libmysofa0 libopenexr23 libopengl0 liborcus-0.14-0
  libpango-perl libpango1.0-0 libpangox-1.0-0 libperl5.28 libpgm-5.2-0
  libpipewire-0.2-1 libplymouth4 libpoppler82 libprotobuf17 libpython2-stdlib
  libpython2.7 libpython2.7-minimal libpython2.7-stdlib libpython3.7
  libpython3.7-minimal libpython3.7-stdlib libqt5opengl5 libraw19 libreadline5
  libreadline7 libreoffice-avmedia-backend-gstreamer libsane libsdl1.2debian
  libsisu-guice-java libsisu-ioc-java libsnmp30 libsunpinyin3v5 libtcl8.6
  libtk8.6 libu2f-udev libunique-1.0-0 libusbmuxd4 libvpx5 libwnck-common
  libwnck22 libx264-155 libx265-165 libxcb-util0 libzinnia0
  linux-headers-4.19.0-13-common linux-headers-4.19.0-17-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-11-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-11-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-12-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-12-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-13-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-13-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-14-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-14-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-15-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-15-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-16-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-16-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-17-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-17-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-18-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-18-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-19-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-19-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-20-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-20-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-21-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-21-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-8-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-8-common
  linux-headers-5.10.0-9-amd64 linux-headers-5.10.0-9-common
  linux-image-4.19.0-17-amd64 linux-image-5.10.0-11-amd64
  linux-image-5.10.0-12-amd64 linux-image-5.10.0-13-amd64
  linux-image-5.10.0-14-amd64 linux-image-5.10.0-15-amd64
  linux-image-5.10.0-16-amd64 linux-image-5.10.0-17-amd64
  linux-image-5.10.0-18-amd64 linux-image-5.10.0-19-amd64
  linux-image-5.10.0-20-amd64 linux-image-5.10.0-21-amd64
  linux-image-5.10.0-8-amd64 linux-image-5.10.0-9-amd64 linux-kbuild-4.19
  manpages-pt perl-modules-5.28 python-pkg-resources python-six python-tk
  python2 python2-minimal python2.7 python2.7-minimal python3.7-minimal qdbus
  qdbus-qt5 qtchooser qtcore4-l10n sunpinyin-data tcl tcl8.6 tix tk8.6-blt2.5
I was reading how apt autoremove works, it should only uninstall packages that were pulled in as dependencies and no longer needed. The packages would also have been marked as automatic installed in apt.

Space is not an issue on my system.

Packages like python 2 or old Linux kernels should definitely be removed.

Are there any tips or things to look out for when using autoremove? It's a bit tricky to know what packages my system needs, but worst case I should be able to re-install a package if I need it.

Tired-owl
Last edited by tired-owl on 2023-06-17 18:06, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: [O/S] Are these packages safe to Autoremove with Apt?

#2 Post by Random_Troll »

That list looks fine to me, it seems to be mostly oldstable packages. Use https://www.debian.org/distrib/packages to go through each one and see if they're all obsolete or check

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apt -s purge '~o'
^ That will show a list of obsolete packages. Run it again as root and without the -s option to remove them for real.

You can also read this thread to better understand the so-called "metapackage problem" in respect of autoremove:

viewtopic.php?f=16&t=104157
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Re: [Solved] [O/S] Are these packages safe to Autoremove with Apt?

#3 Post by tired-owl »

Solved, thank you that worked. I ran the above commands, I reviewed the packages and proceeded. They were all packages from the Debian 10 distribution. (I'm on Debian 11)

The link was also very helpful in understanding autoremove.

Tired-owl

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Re: [O/S] Are these packages safe to Autoremove with Apt?

#4 Post by sunrat »

Random_Troll wrote: 2023-05-25 05:44 That list looks fine to me, it seems to be mostly oldstable packages. Use https://www.debian.org/distrib/packages to go through each one and see if they're all obsolete or check

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apt -s purge '~o'
^ That will show a list of obsolete packages. Run it again as root and without the -s option to remove them for real.
Scary command that one. For me it shows 22 obsolete packages, 17 of which are locally installed and I do not wish to be removed.

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apt -s autoremove
shows only one package autoremovable, which is a dependency of another package I wish to keep.
Be careful out there! :shock: :wink:
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Re: [O/S] Are these packages safe to Autoremove with Apt?

#5 Post by fabien »

sunrat wrote: 2023-06-18 00:17

Code: Select all

apt -s autoremove
shows only one package autoremovable, which is a dependency of another package I wish to keep.
Sounds not logical to me since autoremovable packages are precisely packages that have no more dependency upon. What package and version, and what is the package and version that has a dependency on it?

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Re: [O/S] Are these packages safe to Autoremove with Apt?

#6 Post by sunrat »

fabien wrote: 2023-06-19 19:59
sunrat wrote: 2023-06-18 00:17

Code: Select all

apt -s autoremove
shows only one package autoremovable, which is a dependency of another package I wish to keep.
Sounds not logical to me since autoremovable packages are precisely packages that have no more dependency upon. What package and version, and what is the package and version that has a dependency on it?
It's complicated. The package is sordi which is a dependency of lv2-dev which is needed to compile lv2 plugins. I originally had lv2-dev and sordi from 3rd party KXStudio repository but recently tried to compile a plugin and it failed due to not providing a needed file which was provided by the Debian version so I replaced the KX one with Debian one but didn't replace sordi and put lv2-dev on hold.
As you see here, lv2-dev wants to be upgraded to the KX version but it is on hold:

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$ apt list -i sordi lv2-dev
lv2-dev/oldstable,now 1.18.2-1 amd64 [installed,upgradable to: 5:1.18.2+git20210918.4]
sordi/focal,now 6:0.16.10-1kxstudio1 amd64 [installed,automatic]
After replacing sordi with Debian version, both on hold now:

Code: Select all

lv2-dev/oldstable,now 1.18.2-1 amd64 [installed,upgradable to: 5:1.18.2+git20210918.4]
sordi/oldstable,now 0.16.8-2 amd64 [installed,upgradable to: 5:0.16.2+git20190907]
Now not showing as autoremovable, just "2 not upgraded"

sordi:
Description: Lightweight RDF storage utilities
Lightweight C library for storing RDF data in memory.
Ah, the pitfalls of 3rd party repos. There is only one package from there which I really need, a plugin host called Carla, but my attempts at apt pinning to block all other packages from there have had mixed success. I don't want to remove the repo as Carla gets regular updates.
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Re: [Solved] [O/S] Are these packages safe to Autoremove with Apt?

#7 Post by stevepusser »

I recently backported lv2 to a Buster base because an MX 19 user saw that I managed to build Audacity 3.3.3 for MX 21 and 23, and asked, "I'd sure like that on my release!", so it involved six more backports than I had to do for Bullseye, sord and serd and sratom, plus whatever.

Carla's been in Ubuntu repos from jammy-backports on up, but I managed to build it recently on Buster through Bookworm with a little tweaking of its build-depends and the debian/rules file. https://mxrepo.com/mx/testrepo/pool/test/c/carla/
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Re: [Solved] [O/S] Are these packages safe to Autoremove with Apt?

#8 Post by sunrat »

@stevepusserThanks. I'm using your Audacity and just upgraded it - works well.
Carla is working OK from KX atm for me but I'll keep it in mind
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Those who have lost data
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