Autoremove autoremoved too much. Sheesh.

[p.s.]

I ran sudo apt-get autoremove to clear out some unnecessary packages I thought might be sitting around. The list that started running down the screen was looking a little fishy (and large) and when I saw gedit go by I knew something was wrong.

I canceled the process, and my system still runs, but it removed an enormous chunk of packages.

It seems to me that the optimal solution is to run sudo apt-get install all-those packages-that got-removed etc-etc.

So right now I'm trying to figure out a good way to generate this list, without doing it by hand.

I scrolled up in the terminal and copied the list that the terminal was making of what had been removed. I also started digging around in var/log to try and find the exact apt-get remove list so I could just copy and paste it. I found something almost like it in var/log/apt, but it has a lot of other characters (a :i386 is appended to every package, and there's a set of parentheses with a version number) and when I copy that list into apt-get install it can't read it.

Anyone have any thoughts on this? I guess some sort of script could maybe remove all the extraneous stuff from the log entry I have and format the packages with a single space between them, but I'm no scripting wizard. Ideally there's an already formatted list of what got removed somewhere in the logs and I just can't find it? Or a "reverse x" command that I don't know about? Or something?

I've attached the two lists that I currently have.

Dell Inspiron 1521
Debian Squeeze

[bab1]

...So right now I'm trying to figure out a good way to generate this list, without doing it by hand.

You can always run apt-get with the -s switch to preview what will happen. If you direct the output to a file you can open it in you favorite text editor. This will redirect the output to a file in you home directory named autoremove.file

sudo apt-get -s  autoremove > autoremove.file

[p.s.]

Are you saying that this is a way to reverse what I did?

Or that it's a way that I could have previewed what I did before I did it, and should do that next time?

Thanks for your help and interest either way, I'm just not sure I understand.

[bab1]

Are you saying that this is a way to reverse what I did?

Or that it's a way that I could have previewed what I did before I did it, and should do that next time?

Thanks for your help and interest either way, I'm just not sure I understand.

I said

You can always run apt-get with the -s switch to preview what will happen...

I don't know of anyway to undo what you have done. When you use sudo you are acting as the superuser root. No action will be questioned including potentially destructive actions. But... The apt-get scripts have been used for many years by thousands of users. I doubt that the script is at fault for what happened. Have you modified the install in any way?

[PaulW2U]

From the apt-get man page

autoremove
autoremove is used to remove packages that were automatically installed to satisfy dependencies for other packages and are now no longer needed.

So why do you want to re-install packages that you no longer need?

If most of the packages have :i386 appended to their name I am presuming you have a 64-bit system. May be you installed a 32-bit package at some time which automatically installed all the 32-bit dependencies?

If everything works then apt-get is correctly removing unwanted packages. By removing them the number of packages that you might need to update in the future has been reduced.

[SlugSlug]

sudo apt-get install abiword-common gnome-user-share libapache2-mod-dnssd apache2.2-bin software-center aptdaemon baobab binfmt-support additional bogofilter bogofilter-bdb bogofilter-common cheese cheese-common chromium-browser-inspector tomboy libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil libndesk-dbus-glib1.0-cil libndesk-dbus1.0-cil libndesk-dbus1.0-cil libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil libmono-addins-gui0.2-cil libmono-addins0.2-cil libmono-addins0.2-cil libgnomepanel2.24-cil libgnomepanel2.24-cil libgnome2.24-cil libgnome2.24-cil libglade2.0-cil libglade2.0-cil libgtk2.0-cil libgtk2.0-cil libgnome-vfs2.0-cil libgnome-vfs2.0-cil libgconf2.0-cil libgconf2.0-cil libart2.0-cil libart2.0-cil libgmime2.4-cil libgmime2.4-cil libglib2.0-cil libglib2.0-cil cli-common dasher dasher-data dmz-cursor-theme using dnsmasq-base ekiga empathy nautilus-sendto-empathy empathy-common eog epiphany-extensions espeak gok gnome-orca libgnome-speech7 libespeak1 espeak-data evolution-common evolution-plugins evolution-webcal file-roller freedesktop-sound-theme gnome-games python-gtkglext1 python-opengl freeglut3 gcalctool gconf-editor gconf-defaults-service gdebi gdebi-core gedit-plugins gedit gedit-common geoclue-yahoo geoclue-manual geoclue-localnet geoclue-hostip geoclue gnome-accessibility-themes gnome-backgrounds gnome-bluetooth gnome-games-data gnome-cards-data gnome-codec-install gnome-disk-utility gnome-games-extra-data gnome-mag gnome-nettool gnome-screenshot gnome-search-tool gnome-session-canberra gnome-system-log gnome-system-tools gnome-themes gnome-themes-extras gnome-themes-more gnuchess-book gnuchess gnumeric-common

might work :/

[arpanaut]

From "man apt-get"

autoremove
autoremove is used to remove packages that were automatically
installed to satisfy dependencies for other packages and are now no
longer needed.

Are you sure that apt was not just removing old or obsolete versions of said packages, that were dependences at one time but no longer needed.
As said above, it would be unusual for apt to hose the system unless your system is set up in an unusual manner or is in an inconsistent or broken state.
Check the version numbers of the packages removed as compared to what you have installed.
Have you added PPA's or removed PPA's without using PPA-purge?
Have you done a release upgrade recently and opted not to remove "old packages"

Just throwing out some ideas here...

[p.s.]

Bab1: I haven't modified the installation in any way that seems relevant. I did install xfce recently just to try it out, and I read that debian is moving to xfce in the next version, so maybe by installing it somehow thought that all of the gnome packages needed to go?

Either way, I'm definitely not saying the script is somehow "at fault". I'm just trying to figure out a way of generating a list of removed packages from the output of apt-get remove that will be readable by apt-get install. The alternative would be my hand-typing all the package names (onerous even with autocomplete and uneducational) or reinstalling (annoying and uneducational).

PaulW2U: It removed many packages that I want. (Gedit, eog, gnome-screenshot, etc.) Gedit isn't just some library that's no longer required. I can't think of any good reason why the system would decide that gedit should be removed unless I told it to remove it. That makes me feel like something went awry.

[p.s.]

SlugSlug! Mind telling us how you did that?

[SlugSlug]

are you on unity now?

maybe just a

apt-get install --reinstall ubuntu-desktop