[nzlug] Edgy Upgrade

[Craig Box]

Dominic Scheirlinck wrote:
> I had trouble in that the nvidia-glx package pulled in the linux-386
> kernel, rather than the generic one, and didn't pull in any of the
> restricted modules. So, X didn't start, but it was pretty clear why.  
> In the end I got frustrated with the Eclipse packages on one of the
> boxes, and decided to do a clean install. This was an install from
> Hoary, so the cruft was really starting to build up - even so, I
> didn't really _need_ to reinstall, I just wanted to.   

This is a problem with apt.

Imagine this situation: (package names are not necessarily correct)

nvidia-glx depends on linux-restricted-modules, which is not installed.
linux-restricted-modules is a metapackage, provided by either
linux-restricted-modules-386 or linux-restricted-modules-686.
linux-restricted-modules-386 depends on linux-image-386.

nvidia-glx says "I have to install a linux-restricted-modules".  The first
one it sees is -386, which drags in a new kernel that you don't want.

The general solution is have the 'linux-686' package installed, which always
depends on linux-image-686 and linux-restricted-modules-686.  The manual
solution is to look at the dependencies (apt-cache show nvidia-glx) and
manually install the right version.

Craig