Ubuntu
systemd package

systemd-coredump install fails

Asked by Georg P

Hi,

I am trying to install systemd-coredump, using `sudo apt install systemd-coredump` but it fails with the following error message:
```
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:
 systemd-coredump : Depends: systemd (= 245.4-4ubuntu3)
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.
```
systemd --version gives:
systemd 245 (245.4-4ubuntu3.2)
+PAM +AUDIT +SELINUX +IMA +APPARMOR +SMACK +SYSVINIT +UTMP +LIBCRYPTSETUP +GCRYPT +GNUTLS +ACL +XZ +LZ4 +SECCOMP +BLKID +ELFUTILS +KMOD +IDN2 -IDN +PCRE2 default-hierarchy=hybrid

$uname -r
5.8.0-38-generic

My (admittedly uninformed) assumption is, that the systemd-coredump requires exactly systemd 245.4-4ubuntu3, whereas my systemd is verision 3.2. Does anyone have ideas how to fix this?

Thanks a lot,
Georg

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actionparsnip
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Revision history for this message
actionparsnip (andrew-woodhead666) said : 		#1

What is the output of:

lsb_release -a; uname -a; apt-cache policy systemd-coredump systemd

Thanks

Revision history for this message
Georg P (gepirk) said : 		#2

No LSB modules are available.
Distributor ID: Ubuntu
Description: Ubuntu 20.04.1 LTS
Release: 20.04
Codename: focal
Linux T14 5.8.0-38-generic #43~20.04.1-Ubuntu SMP Tue Jan 12 16:39:47 UTC 2021 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux
systemd-coredump:
  Installed: (none)
  Candidate: 245.4-4ubuntu3
  Version table:
     245.4-4ubuntu3 500
        500 http://at.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal/universe amd64 Packages
systemd:
  Installed: 245.4-4ubuntu3.2
  Candidate: 245.4-4ubuntu3.2
  Version table:
 *** 245.4-4ubuntu3.2 100
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     245.4-4ubuntu3 500
        500 http://at.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal/main amd64 Packages

Thanks

Revision history for this message
Best actionparsnip (andrew-woodhead666) said : 		#3

Ahh then I suggest you report a bug,. The dep hasn't been met. I suspect people that have systemd-coredump already installed will have the update marked as "held back". Alternatively, you can just wait til the required package version is available and it will install as you expect. Looks like an oversight on the version numbers here

Revision history for this message
Georg P (gepirk) said : 		#4

Thank you, i have created a bug report! (https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/systemd/+bug/1913061)

Revision history for this message
Georg P (gepirk) said : 		#5

Thanks actionparsnip, that solved my question.

Revision history for this message
Manfred Hampl (m-hampl) said : 		#7

I assume that at a certain point in time you had the focal-updates repository activated.

Look at https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/systemd and you will see that version 245.4-4ubuntu3.2 is already superseded by version 245.4-4ubuntu3.4

Suggestion for solution:

Re-activeate focal-updates and run
sudo apt update && sudo apt full-upgrade
This should update both systemd and systemd-coredump to version 245.4-4ubuntu3.4

OR

Revert systemd (and all other package with direct dependency on its version) to 245.4-4ubuntu3
Then the installation of systemd-coredump will work.

Revision history for this message
Georg P (gepirk) said : 		#8

yeah, that seems about right now that i think about it...
i fixed this by completely wrecking my ubuntu installation trying to downgrade some packages during a similar problem that had nothing to do with systemd but more with my broken software sources (i think i know how i managed to mess them up: i had added some extra repos, and then tried to delete some of them because i didnt use the software they provided anymore. must have disabled the focal-updates at that time too!). During the downgrading process, i managed to uninstall a lot of software that depended on that specific package, including my display manager amongst others... after that, i just got all of my files from the pc using the tty and installed ubuntu again - i had only set up this pc 2 weeks ago, so there werent a lot of files, and all of my dotfiles live in a git anyway.

I think i have learned a valuable lesson here - thanks for explaining it to me!