[Aptitude-devel] Bug#721426: aptitude: packages are sometimes selected for upgrade by default just after aptitude is started

[Vincent Lefevre]

Package: aptitude
Version: 0.6.8.2-1.2
Severity: normal

When I start "aptitude" (no arguments, curses interface), packages are
sometimes selected for upgrade by default, for no apparent reason.
Since this behavior is not documented in the man page, I assume that
this is a bug.

Such packages are sometimes in a broken state, which is annoying.

-- Package-specific info:
Terminal: xterm-debian
$DISPLAY is set.
which aptitude: /usr/bin/aptitude

aptitude version information:
aptitude 0.6.8.2 compiled at Aug 25 2013 12:37:10
Compiler: g++ 4.8.1
Compiled against:
  apt version 4.12.0
  NCurses version 5.9
  libsigc++ version: 2.2.10
  Ept support enabled.
  Gtk+ support disabled.
  Qt support disabled.

Current library versions:
  NCurses version: ncurses 5.9.20130608
  cwidget version: 0.5.16
  Apt version: 4.12.0

aptitude linkage:
	linux-vdso.so.1 (0x00007fffe8dc3000)
	libapt-pkg.so.4.12 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libapt-pkg.so.4.12 (0x00007ffbd1aa6000)
	libncursesw.so.5 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libncursesw.so.5 (0x00007ffbd1876000)
	libtinfo.so.5 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libtinfo.so.5 (0x00007ffbd164c000)
	libsigc-2.0.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libsigc-2.0.so.0 (0x00007ffbd1447000)
	libcwidget.so.3 => /usr/lib/libcwidget.so.3 (0x00007ffbd1147000)
	libept.so.1.aptpkg4.12 => /usr/lib/libept.so.1.aptpkg4.12 (0x00007ffbd0ea6000)
	libxapian.so.22 => /usr/lib/libxapian.so.22 (0x00007ffbd0ac3000)
	libz.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libz.so.1 (0x00007ffbd08ab000)
	libsqlite3.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libsqlite3.so.0 (0x00007ffbd05f9000)
	libboost_iostreams.so.1.54.0 => /usr/lib/libboost_iostreams.so.1.54.0 (0x00007ffbd03df000)
	libpthread.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpthread.so.0 (0x00007ffbd01c3000)
	libstdc++.so.6 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6 (0x00007ffbcfebf000)
	libm.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libm.so.6 (0x00007ffbcfbc1000)
	libgcc_s.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgcc_s.so.1 (0x00007ffbcf9ab000)
	libc.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libc.so.6 (0x00007ffbcf5fe000)
	libutil.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libutil.so.1 (0x00007ffbcf3fb000)
	libdl.so.2 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libdl.so.2 (0x00007ffbcf1f7000)
	libbz2.so.1.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libbz2.so.1.0 (0x00007ffbcefe6000)
	libuuid.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libuuid.so.1 (0x00007ffbcefe0000)
	librt.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/librt.so.1 (0x00007ffbcedd7000)
	/lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00007ffbd242e000)

-- System Information:
Debian Release: jessie/sid
  APT prefers unstable
  APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (500, 'testing'), (500, 'stable'), (1, 'experimental')
Architecture: amd64 (x86_64)
Foreign Architectures: i386

Kernel: Linux 3.10-2-amd64 (SMP w/2 CPU cores)
Locale: LANG=POSIX, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/dash

Versions of packages aptitude depends on:
ii  aptitude-common           0.6.8.2-1.2
ii  libapt-pkg4.12            0.9.11.1
ii  libboost-iostreams1.54.0  1.54.0-2+b1
ii  libc6                     2.17-92
ii  libcwidget3               0.5.16-3.4
ii  libept1.4.12              1.0.9
ii  libgcc1                   1:4.8.1-9
ii  libncursesw5              5.9+20130608-1
ii  libsigc++-2.0-0c2a        2.2.10-0.2
ii  libsqlite3-0              3.7.17-1
ii  libstdc++6                4.8.1-9
ii  libtinfo5                 5.9+20130608-1
ii  libxapian22               1.2.15-2
ii  zlib1g                    1:1.2.8.dfsg-1

Versions of packages aptitude recommends:
ii  apt-xapian-index                0.46
ii  aptitude-doc-en [aptitude-doc]  0.6.8.2-1.2
ii  libparse-debianchangelog-perl   1.2.0-1
ii  sensible-utils                  0.0.9

Versions of packages aptitude suggests:
pn  debtags  <none>
ii  tasksel  3.17

-- no debconf information