Updating from 15.10 to 16.04 installs irrelevant packages

Support & Help Requests
#1

Hello,
When trying to update from Ubuntu 15.10 to 16.04 beta (not sure the final version is out there yet), the update manager wants to install some packages from Gnome/Unity that are not supposed to be part of Mate. Like Nautilus, some packages related to Gnome online accounts, parts of Unity and Gnome Control Center and so on. I first thought it was an issue on my system but I’ve tried a fresh 15.10 install in a VM and it does the same when upgrading.

Is it a known issue? is it still there when upgrading to Ubuntu Mate 16.04 final?

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#2

No, I have not heard of this behavior, but this is day one of our new version.

#3

Hi,

did you you install the Mate DE via another flavour of Ubuntu? (Unity or Gnome base), that might explain it if you did?. :smiley:

#4

On my system, I did (though I tried to clean it up from the non-Mate packages as much as possible), but as stated in my post, I’ve tried to upgrade a fresh install of Ubuntu Mate 15.10 (in a VM) and the same problem happens.

#5

The only thing Nautilus related on my 16.04 is “libraries for nautilus components - runtime version”, as far as Gnome goes, there are only a couple of packages with “gnome” included in them!. :smiley:

#6

From an upgraded 15.10 or a fresh 16.04 install?

#7

A fresh 16.04 install!, I do realise you are talking about a problem with updating 15.10 but don’t know why you are having to install bits of Unity and Nautilus?. :smiley:

#8

Yup, I’m really talking about upgrading, I doubt there would be a problem with a fresh 16.04 install. I guess it has to do with cascading dependencies and it might even be related to the order in which Mate installs the packages; i.e. if the new packages were installed in the right order, I’m pretty sure that a problematic dependancy would no trigger and install a lot of unrelated stuff.

I’ve just tried again in my VM in order to take pictures of the list of 329 new packages it wants to install with the upgrade. I’m pretty sure these ones shouldn’t be there:

  • account-plugin-facebook (-flickr, -google)
  • cheese, cheese-common
  • evolution-data-server (-common, -online-accounts)
  • a bunch of fonts that are probably installed on the standard Ubuntu but not derivatives
  • gnome-menu, gnome-session-bin (there are also other gnome-* packages but they could be apps chosen by the Mate team)
  • nautilus, nautilus-data, nautilus-sendto
  • ubuntu-core-launcher (for snappy apps − not sure it’s supposed to be part of variants)
  • unity-asset-pool (don’t think it’s supposed to be on variants)
  • unity-control-center-faces (part of the Unity Control Center so probably shouldn’t be there)
  • unity-settings-daemon

That’s for the ones that seem suspicious to me but there might be others in the list (especially in the long list of libs).

#9

Sorry but I honestly don’t know, wait for the 16.04 final and do a clean install, that’s what I would do in this case!. :smiley:

#10

I can’t do a clean install, would have too much data to backup. I’ll do the upgrade anyway, it’s not a big issue, I’m only trying to get info on the problem because I’d like to avoid losing two hours after the upgrade cleaning up my system for stuff that has nothing to do there.

#11

I’ll hold on upgrading for now. Dont want no junk on my small HDD.

#12

I also came to this same situation with my netbook, so I’ll hold off the upgrade there.

I presume there is a package somewhere that is now depending on GNOME/Unity packages. If only we know what it was. :neutral_face:

#13

My first guesses would be either topmenu-gtk3 that would have dependencies on Gtk3 stuff which in turn adds Gnome packages, or an indicator (I’ve seen 3 of them in the list I think).

Anyway, I’m a bit surprised the Ubuntu Mate team didn’t notice the issue before the release.

#26

I informed and had a quick discussion with @Wimpy (Project Leader) yesterday. He’s not seen this happen with his many upgrades. :confused:

I’m upgrading my netbook as we speak and will find which package(s) are depending on them. I’ll outline here which unwanted packages can be safely removed.

I assume you’ve been upgrading from the terminal with this command:

sudo do-release-upgrade

I was told the command above is really designed for servers and that the GUI tool is preferred as it knows about the desktop flavours and has heuristics to determine how to upgrade cleanly.

update-manager -d
#27

That’s weird that he didn’t encountered the same situation as it happens here with a brand new Ubuntu Mate 15.10 when trying to upgrade. The only thing specific to my installation would eventually be that my OS is in french so it has a few language packages added during installation, but I doubt they’d mess things up.

As for the upgrade, I used the GUI with update-manager -d, didn’t try the do-release-upgrade command.

#28

Upgrade complete. The upgrade automatically removes those useless packages at the end, like gnome-xxx and unity-xxx, so I guess it’s just a false alarm. :slight_smile:

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#29

Oh, that’s cool then. I’ll do the upgrade this week-end. I’ll still double check afterwards for some packages just in case. :wink:

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#30

Just did the upgrade. Some packages still need to be removed manually afterwards, like nautilus. Not sure evolution-data-server-* is needed either. And probably a few more.

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#31

Ok, so, after installing a brand new Ubuntu Mate 16.04 in a VM to check, here are the packages that were added during the upgrade, not removed and are not on a base 16.04:

  • evolution-data-server, evolution-data-server-online-accounts (warning: the -common is installed on Mate, don’t remove it)
  • mousetweaks
  • nautilus, nautilus-data, nautilus-sendto
  • zeitgeist, zeitgeist-core, zeitgeist-data-hub

So not too bad in the end. I haven’t checked the various fonts, libs and python packages. Most of them, if useless, should be removed by apt-get autoremove.

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