[Bug 2125010] [NEW] Removes packages not on the list displayed to the admin

[One Reporter]

Public bug reported:

do-release-upgrade has in its 2nd phase (as in 2nd block in history.log)
removed hundreads of packages which have not been displayed in the
initial "to be removed" list.

Amongth the removed packages are ubuntu-minimal, ubuntu-standard, ssh, parts of x11 and also sudo. Killing the graphical environment during the upgrade (which was done through ssh so it survived). Similar things have now happened twice to me on 2 separate machienes, in one case on a 20.04->22.04 upgrade and once on a 22.04->24.04 upgrade both machienes did NOT have a problem with the other upgrade they both where updated starting from 20.04 and ended at 24.04 in succession. In both cases the problem was resolved by reinstalling a lot of packages with apt install.
Obviously i must have done something uncommon or stupid to trigger this, but even so, I do believe do-release-upgrade should not continue without warning when for whatever reason ubuntu-minimal, ubuntu-standard, ubuntu-desktop-minimal or similar packages are going to be removed. It would be much easier for the admin to fix this if the 2nd stage errored out with an internal error than if, as it happened many packages get removed and need to be manually reinstalled on a half broken system

Again, iam not complaining that the upgrade failed, iam complaining that there is no sanity check that stops before removing key packages like ubuntu-minimal/ubuntu-desktop-minimal. Its much easier for the admin to look at it and fix the cause than to have to recover a system that has hundreads of key packages removed.
For the record, the root cause maybe was a 32bit openssh server on a otherwise amd64 system for one of the boxes, for the other i dont know. but iam not asking for that to be supported just for it not to have a catastrophic result

egrep 'ubuntu-minimal|ubuntu-standard|ubuntu-desktop' dist-upgrade/apt*
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  MarkInstall ubuntu-desktop-minimal:amd64 < 1.450.2 -> 1.481.4 @ii umU NPb Ib > FU=0
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing gnome-shell-extension-desktop-icons-ng as Depends of ubuntu-desktop-minimal
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing gnome-remote-desktop as Recommends of ubuntu-desktop-minimal
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing libpam-sss as Recommends of ubuntu-desktop-minimal
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing systemd-oomd as Recommends of ubuntu-desktop-minimal
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing xdg-desktop-portal-gnome as Recommends of ubuntu-desktop-minimal
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  MarkInstall ubuntu-standard:amd64 < 1.450.2 -> 1.481.4 @ii umU Ib > FU=0
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing media-types as Depends of ubuntu-standard
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing nftables as Depends of ubuntu-standard
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  MarkInstall ubuntu-minimal:amd64 < 1.450.2 -> 1.481.4 @ii umU IPb > FU=0
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing usrmerge as Recommends of ubuntu-minimal
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing ubuntu-desktop-minimal (1.450.2) ...
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing ubuntu-standard (1.450.2) ...
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing ubuntu-minimal (1.450.2) ...
 
egrep 'ubuntu-minimal|standard|sudo' dist-upgrade/apt*
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  MarkInstall ubuntu-standard:amd64 < 1.481.4 -> 1.539.2 @ii umU IPb > FU=0
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing ethtool:amd64 as Recommends of ubuntu-standard:amd64
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing numactl:amd64 as Recommends of ubuntu-standard:amd64
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing sysstat:amd64 as Recommends of ubuntu-standard:amd64
dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing trace-cmd:amd64 as Recommends of ubuntu-standard:amd64
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log: gnome-sudoku depends on libglib2.0-0 (>= 2.43.92).
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log: gnome-sudoku depends on libgtk-3-0 (>= 3.24).
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing gnome-sudoku (1:42.0-1) ...
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing ubuntu-minimal (1.481.4) ...
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing sudo (1.9.9-1ubuntu2.5) ...
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:You have asked that the sudo package be removed,
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Without sudo, you may not be able to gain administrative privileges.
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:you must set a root password with "sudo passwd".
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Refusing to remove sudo.
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:dpkg: error processing package sudo (--remove):
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log: installed sudo package pre-removal script subprocess returned error exit status 1
dist-upgrade/apt-term.log: sudo

Both systems are now:
lsb_release -rd
No LSB modules are available.
Description:	Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS
Release:	24.04

** Affects: ubuntu-release-upgrader (Ubuntu)
     Importance: Undecided
         Status: New

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/2125010

Title:
  Removes packages not on the list displayed to the admin

Status in ubuntu-release-upgrader package in Ubuntu:
  New

Bug description:
  do-release-upgrade has in its 2nd phase (as in 2nd block in
  history.log) removed hundreads of packages which have not been
  displayed in the initial "to be removed" list.

  Amongth the removed packages are ubuntu-minimal, ubuntu-standard, ssh, parts of x11 and also sudo. Killing the graphical environment during the upgrade (which was done through ssh so it survived). Similar things have now happened twice to me on 2 separate machienes, in one case on a 20.04->22.04 upgrade and once on a 22.04->24.04 upgrade both machienes did NOT have a problem with the other upgrade they both where updated starting from 20.04 and ended at 24.04 in succession. In both cases the problem was resolved by reinstalling a lot of packages with apt install.
  Obviously i must have done something uncommon or stupid to trigger this, but even so, I do believe do-release-upgrade should not continue without warning when for whatever reason ubuntu-minimal, ubuntu-standard, ubuntu-desktop-minimal or similar packages are going to be removed. It would be much easier for the admin to fix this if the 2nd stage errored out with an internal error than if, as it happened many packages get removed and need to be manually reinstalled on a half broken system

  Again, iam not complaining that the upgrade failed, iam complaining that there is no sanity check that stops before removing key packages like ubuntu-minimal/ubuntu-desktop-minimal. Its much easier for the admin to look at it and fix the cause than to have to recover a system that has hundreads of key packages removed.
  For the record, the root cause maybe was a 32bit openssh server on a otherwise amd64 system for one of the boxes, for the other i dont know. but iam not asking for that to be supported just for it not to have a catastrophic result

  egrep 'ubuntu-minimal|ubuntu-standard|ubuntu-desktop' dist-upgrade/apt*
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  MarkInstall ubuntu-desktop-minimal:amd64 < 1.450.2 -> 1.481.4 @ii umU NPb Ib > FU=0
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing gnome-shell-extension-desktop-icons-ng as Depends of ubuntu-desktop-minimal
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing gnome-remote-desktop as Recommends of ubuntu-desktop-minimal
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing libpam-sss as Recommends of ubuntu-desktop-minimal
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing systemd-oomd as Recommends of ubuntu-desktop-minimal
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing xdg-desktop-portal-gnome as Recommends of ubuntu-desktop-minimal
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  MarkInstall ubuntu-standard:amd64 < 1.450.2 -> 1.481.4 @ii umU Ib > FU=0
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing media-types as Depends of ubuntu-standard
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing nftables as Depends of ubuntu-standard
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  MarkInstall ubuntu-minimal:amd64 < 1.450.2 -> 1.481.4 @ii umU IPb > FU=0
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing usrmerge as Recommends of ubuntu-minimal
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing ubuntu-desktop-minimal (1.450.2) ...
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing ubuntu-standard (1.450.2) ...
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing ubuntu-minimal (1.450.2) ...
   
  egrep 'ubuntu-minimal|standard|sudo' dist-upgrade/apt*
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  MarkInstall ubuntu-standard:amd64 < 1.481.4 -> 1.539.2 @ii umU IPb > FU=0
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing ethtool:amd64 as Recommends of ubuntu-standard:amd64
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing numactl:amd64 as Recommends of ubuntu-standard:amd64
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing sysstat:amd64 as Recommends of ubuntu-standard:amd64
  dist-upgrade/apt.log:  Installing trace-cmd:amd64 as Recommends of ubuntu-standard:amd64
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log: gnome-sudoku depends on libglib2.0-0 (>= 2.43.92).
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log: gnome-sudoku depends on libgtk-3-0 (>= 3.24).
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing gnome-sudoku (1:42.0-1) ...
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing ubuntu-minimal (1.481.4) ...
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Removing sudo (1.9.9-1ubuntu2.5) ...
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:You have asked that the sudo package be removed,
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Without sudo, you may not be able to gain administrative privileges.
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:you must set a root password with "sudo passwd".
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:Refusing to remove sudo.
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log:dpkg: error processing package sudo (--remove):
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log: installed sudo package pre-removal script subprocess returned error exit status 1
  dist-upgrade/apt-term.log: sudo

  Both systems are now:
  lsb_release -rd
  No LSB modules are available.
  Description:	Ubuntu 24.04.3 LTS
  Release:	24.04

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