Can't remove virtual package. Is this a bug or am I doing something wrong?

[oshunluvr]

Reviewing a new install, I have a habit of removing anything I don't need. For example, too much stuff is installed for laptop users and I have a desktop and video and device drivers that will never be in my computer.

This morning I attempted to remove all the Wacom stuff - just 5-6 files - because I don't have a Wacom device and never will.

It cannot be done - try it. If I'm doing something wrong, I'd like to know.

[RANT] This sort of crap smacks of Winblows/OS developer overload. How big is your ego to decide that the whole world needs your crap device driver whether or not you want it? This is in direct opposition of what linux is supposed to be about and why I prefer linux. [/RANT]

What it boils down to is circular/false dependencies of the virtual package (libwacom2) and libwacom-common. Attempting to remove either results in:

stuart@office:~$ sudo apt remove libwacom2
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
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:
 khelpcenter : Depends: libkf5completion5 (>= 4.97.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5configgui5 (>= 4.97.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5configwidgets5 (>= 4.96.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5iconthemes5 (>= 4.96.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5kcmutils5 (>= 4.96.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5kdelibs4support5 (>= 4.96.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5khtml5 (>= 4.96.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5kiowidgets5 (>= 4.96.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5parts5 (>= 4.96.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5widgetsaddons5 (>= 4.96.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5windowsystem5 (>= 4.96.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libkf5xmlgui5 (>= 4.98.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                        libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed
               Depends: libqt5widgets5 (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libgrantlee-textdocument5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                      libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libkaccounts1 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                          libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
                 Recommends: kaccounts-providers but it is not going to be installed
 libkdecorations2-5v5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                                 libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libkdecorations2private5v5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                                       libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libkf5contacts5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                            libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libkf5emoticons-bin : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libkf5emoticons5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                             libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libkf5kdcraw5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                          libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libkf5people5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                          libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libkf5prison1 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                          libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libkf5waylandclient5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                 libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libkf5waylandserver5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                 libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libkwinxrenderutils7 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                 libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libkwinxrenderutils8 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                 libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libpoppler-qt5-1 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                             libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libqmenumodel0 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                           libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libqt5multimedia5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                              libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libqt5waylandclient5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                                 libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libqt5x11extras5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                             libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libubuntugestures5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                               libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
                      Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                               libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 qml-module-org-kde-activities : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                          libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
                                 Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                          libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 qml-module-ubuntu-layouts : Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                      libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 qt5-image-formats-plugins : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                                      libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed
 qtwayland5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                       libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed
E: Error, pkgProblemResolver::Resolve generated breaks, this may be caused by held packages.

While "...you are using the unstable distribution..." is a fair characterization, none of the rest of that stuff is true. There are no "held packages," etc.

Checking dependencies of libwacom2:

stuart@office:~$ sudo apt-cache depends libwacom2
libwacom2
  Depends: libc6
  Depends: libglib2.0-0
  Depends: libgudev-1.0-0
  Depends: libwacom-common
  Recommends: libwacom-bin
    libwacom-bin:i386

which is obviously BS. A virtual package like libwacom2 by it's definition contains nothing. libwacom-common show no depends but it can't be removed either, and that is likely the cause of the problem - it's a circular depends:

stuart@office:~$ sudo dpkg -r libwacom-common
dpkg: dependency problems prevent removal of libwacom-common:
 libwacom2:amd64 depends on libwacom-common (= 0.18-1).


dpkg: error processing package libwacom-common (--remove):
 dependency problems - not removing
Errors were encountered while processing:
 libwacom-common

Finally, a glimmer of fact:

stuart@office:~$ sudo dpkg -r libwacom2
dpkg: dependency problems prevent removal of libwacom2:amd64:
 libinput10:amd64 depends on libwacom2 (>= 0.15).


dpkg: error processing package libwacom2:amd64 (--remove):
 dependency problems - not removing
Errors were encountered while processing:
 libwacom2:amd64
stuart@office:~$

Shows libinput10 depends on libwacom2. Stupid dependency IMO, but why wasn't that reported at the beginning? And what good is this dependency when I can remove all the drivers and settings for the Wacom devices, just not the virtual package?

This just irks me.

[GreyGeek]

I ran into a similar situation a few months ago trying to remove a pkg I tried out. To remove it would remove my KDE desktop! I used rdepends to see its dependency tree, just like you did, and started at the bottom, removing them by force while preventing removal of dependencies. I worked my way up the tree and removed the app. Then I rebuilt the package cache and did a few
sudo apt-get -f install
sudo dpkg --configure -a
to clean things up. Then I used
sudo apt-get autoremove
to take out the trash.

I sympathize with your comments.