[Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

Colonel Panic · 2019-10-05 16:36:33

Hi. I've just installed Debian 10.1 and to be honest I had a couple of problems with the installation, although they're mostly sorted now and are probably to do with using a 2006 computer (it wouldn't pick up my network card automatically, for a start).

One thing I did find though was that, unlike in earlier versions of Debian Stable such as Jessie and Stretch, gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Buster. You have to use "apt install <path to file>" for that.

Anyone else had the same issue, and found a solution for it?

Thanks in advance,

CP .

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2019-12-19 20:30:12)

Colonel Panic · 2019-10-05 16:38:10

I've found a discussion here on the Debian forums which shows that I'm not alone in having had this issue;

http://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=143249

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2019-10-05 16:39:41)

ohnonot · 2019-10-07 08:40:45

^ according to that it's nothing to do with non-free packages, but with wayland/gnome?

Colonel Panic · 2019-10-08 10:00:47

ohnonot wrote:

^ according to that it's nothing to do with non-free packages, but with wayland/gnome?

Thanks for replying ohnonot. You could be right; I'll try downloading some open source debian (FSF-approved) packages and see if they're any better.

Debian 10 didn't set up a sources.list file in /etc/apt when I installed it (difficulties in recognising my network card) and so I've had to try to figure it all out myself. I just noticed that the non-free ones weren't installing and assumed they weren't installing because they weren't free.

BTW, the version of Buster I've installed has cinnamon as its window manager rather than Gnome.

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2019-10-08 10:10:03)

ohnonot · 2019-10-09 06:58:56

^ well, are you running it on wayland?

Colonel Panic · 2019-10-09 08:18:42

It might be, I don't know. I didn't realise that Buster came with Wayland until you mentioned it; I thought it was just a Ubuntu thing.

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2019-10-09 09:04:13)

ceeslans · 2019-10-09 11:12:35

I noticed similar behaviour where gdebi was closing before asking root password.
A solution was offered on debian-based SolydXK forum: https://forums.solydxk.com/viewtopic.php?t=7531
Replaced gdebi and gdebi-core with SolyXK's updated version - and was able to install oceanaudio and its required dependencies for debian 10.

Colonel Panic · 2019-10-09 17:44:15

ceeslans wrote:

I noticed similar behaviour where gdebi was closing before asking root password.
A solution was offered on debian-based SolydXK forum: https://forums.solydxk.com/viewtopic.php?t=7531
Replaced gdebi and gdebi-core with SolyXK's updated version - and was able to install oceanaudio and its required dependencies for debian 10.
https://cdn.scrot.moe/images/2019/10/09/scrot_cl_20191009.th.png

Thanks! I'll have a look at that suggestion. I used an earlier version of SolydX (based on Stretch, I think) and it worked very well but the colour scheme, which used a lot of orange, wasn't really to my taste. That having been said, it's definitely one of the better Debian-based distros out there.

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2019-10-09 17:44:42)

Colonel Panic · 2019-10-15 19:49:23

Sorry, I have to admit defeat here. I downloaded the three biggest files in the SolydX directory;
-
[ ] gdebi-core_0.9.5.7+nmu3xk2_all.deb 2019-05-28 21:09 127K
[ ] gdebi_0.9.5.7+nmu3xk2.dsc 2019-05-28 21:09 810
[ ] gdebi_0.9.5.7+nmu3xk2.tar.xz 2019-05-28 21:09 198K
[ ] gdebi_0.9.5.7+nmu3xk2_all.deb

but I couldn't install the two .deb files without first installing gdebi_0.9.5.7+nmu3xk2.tar.xz, and the last one doesn't have a file that I can build a makefile from, so I've had to draw a blank.

Since apt install works to install any deb files I need (or has done so far anyway), I think my best bet is to just leave it until Debian issues an official update of gdebi, which it probably will soon, and then just update it as part of a general system update (which I should be doing regularly in any case).

Thanks for your help anyway,

CP .

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2019-10-15 20:01:57)

johnraff · 2019-10-16 07:07:58

TL:DR See bottom of post for a fix.

I hit this same (I think) issue with gdebi. Working from Thunar, it opens a .deb file fine, but when you click the "install" button, instead of putting up a pkexec password window it crashes, leaving a creepy error message in ~/.xsession-errors:

Refusing to render service to dead parents.

There is this Debian bug, but with no response so far.

Googling on the dead parents message only brings a few results eg this, but the message is that when pkexec is invoked it checks the PID of its parent process, and if it's 1 (ie init) then it (correctly) errors out. The bug is in whatever is invoking pkexec. Gdebi starts up with normal user permissions, then invokes pkexec when needed to do system work. (This is much more secure than running the whole app as root, as some people seemed to be advocating.)

To check the parent thing: in a terminal, run:

gdebi-gtk your_deb_file.deb

and it works fine because the terminal is providing the parent process. Gparted and synaptic avoid the issue by providing wrapper scripts. Gdebi could do the same, but in fact all that is needed is to add an extra sh process as parent.

QUICK FIX:

cp /usr/share/applications/gdebi.desktop ~/.local/share/applications

Now find the Exec= line in your local copy of gdebi.desktop (around #155) and edit it to

Exec=sh -c "gdebi-gtk %f"

It Worked For Me™.

Colonel Panic · 2019-10-16 18:21:28

Thanks John. Sadly it didn't work for me; I got this error message;

dpkg: warning: 'ldconfig' not found in PATH or not executable
dpkg: warning: 'start-stop-daemon' not found in PATH or not executable
dpkg: error: 2 expected programs not found in PATH or not executable
Note: root's PATH should usually contain /usr/local/sbin, /usr/sbin and /sbin

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2019-10-16 18:21:51)

johnraff · 2019-10-17 06:49:36

What exactly did you do to see those error messages, and where did you see them? Also, have you removed all those non-Debian packages and gone back to the standard debian gdebi?

Colonel Panic · 2019-10-17 08:03:38

Hi John,

I did what you told me to do, but unfortunately with the same result.

cp /usr/share/applications/gdebi.desktop ~/.local/share/applications

and changed the line in gdebi.desktop to

Exec=sh -c "gdebi-gtk %f"

I uininstalled the SolydX gdebi packages, and reinstalled the originall, debian ones.

I saw the error messages in the terminal where I ran

gdebi-gtk your_deb_file.deb

Thunar is not installed in my system.

Many thanks for your help but it might be better to wait until the bug in Debian's gdebi package is fixed before trying to tackle this again. Particularly since I've now discovered another problem with Debian 10.1 - I've also tried and failed to install gparted in it.

Regards,

CP .

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2019-10-17 18:30:27)

johnraff · 2019-10-18 03:29:11

gdebi-gtk works fine for me in Debian 10.
gparted is installed in BL Lithium (Debian 10) by default, and works fine for me.

I think you have damaged your system.

Colonel Panic · 2019-10-18 07:44:09

Thanks for replying John.

Possibly, but I haven't done anything differently from what I usually do when I install a new (to me) distro so I don't know what's gone wrong this time. Maybe I'll reinstall it and see if I have the same problem again before jumping to conclusions about its being Debian's fault.

I installed Debian from a live disk (Cinnamon desktop) rather than from the 3 GB DVD1; I don't know if that's relevant to what's happened here.

Best,

CP .

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2019-10-18 08:16:19)

stevep · 2019-10-19 01:04:01

MX Linux ships with a custom Thunar action to install local debs with the apt command and sudo--one great advantage (besides not being broken like Debian's gdebi) is that it can install multiple debs in one go, so you don't get error messages like that which Col. Panic misinterpreted. (a deb will never need a tarball installed, it wanted the other deb package installed first) If you want it, I'm sure I can dig up the MX xml file.

Colonel Panic · 2019-10-20 07:05:55

stevep wrote:

MX Linux ships with a custom Thunar action to install local debs with the apt command and sudo--one great advantage (besides not being broken like Debian's gdebi) is that it can install multiple debs in one go, so you don't get error messages like that which Col. Panic misinterpreted. (a deb will never need a tarball installed, it wanted the other deb package installed first) If you want it, I'm sure I can dig up the MX xml file.

Thanks! I decided it was best to wipe the Debian partition and start again. I've got to get stuff done today though so I'm back in Bunsen. Would it be OK if I sent you a pm when I'm ready to use the file?

Thanks again and best wishes,

CP .

Last edited by Colonel Panic (2019-10-20 07:06:24)

hhh · 2019-10-21 00:03:57

stevep wrote:

If you want it, I'm sure I can dig up the MX xml file.

That would be cool.

Colonel Panic · 2019-11-21 15:06:33

A quick update on this; I've now discovered that typing "sudo" before either gdebi or apt in Debian 10 solves the problem and the packages install properly.

https://www.blackmoreops.com/2015/08/15 … -packages/

#1 2019-10-05 16:36:33

[Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#2 2019-10-05 16:38:10

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#3 2019-10-07 08:40:45

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#4 2019-10-08 10:00:47

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#5 2019-10-09 06:58:56

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#6 2019-10-09 08:18:42

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#7 2019-10-09 11:12:35

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#8 2019-10-09 17:44:15

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#9 2019-10-15 19:49:23

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#10 2019-10-16 07:07:58

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#11 2019-10-16 18:21:28

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#12 2019-10-17 06:49:36

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#13 2019-10-17 08:03:38

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#14 2019-10-18 03:29:11

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#15 2019-10-18 07:44:09

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#16 2019-10-19 01:04:01

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#17 2019-10-20 07:05:55

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#18 2019-10-21 00:03:57

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

#19 2019-11-21 15:06:33

Re: [Solved] Gdebi and dpkg won't install non-free packages in Debian 10

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