Upgrade Debian 11 (bullseye) to 12 (bookworm) without usrmerge errors
11. 9. 2023WSL1 -> WSL2 ↓
Following notes are for my ‘WSL1/Debian cloned to WSL2/Debian’ install.
Recommendation: 1st clone the 11 and then upgrade the clone. Make sure the clone is WSL version 2 (otherwise expect problems with usrmerge).
In 11:
cd
ls -l / > state1.txt
Install ‘usrmerge’ in 11. As soon as it is installed it will run and warn that this is one way only process (can’t be reversed automagically).
apt install usrmerge
# and say yes
ls -l / > state2.txt
cat state2.txt | grep -- "->"
should return bunch of symlinks now
bin -> usr/bin
lib -> usr/lib
lib32 -> usr/lib32
lib64 -> usr/lib64
libx32 -> usr/libx32
sbin -> usr/sbin
Now upgrayedd:
Probably delete anything in /etc/apt/sources.list
sudo vi /etc/apt/sources.list
For my WSL2 needs it may look like:
deb https://deb.debian.org/debian/ bookworm main
deb https://deb.debian.org/debian/ bookworm-updates main
deb https://deb.debian.org/debian/ bookworm-proposed-updates main
deb http://security.debian.org/debian-security bookworm-security main
deb https://deb.debian.org/debian bookworm-backports main
then
sudo apt update && sudo apt dist-upgrade -y
few months later, cleanup
sudo apt autoremove && sudo apt autoclean
optionally add something like
# info
cat /etc/*-release | grep PRETTY | cut --delimiter="\"" -f2 | lolcat
to .zshrc or .bashrc.
WSL1 -> WSL1 ? ↓
If WSL1 to WSL1 is needed, the workaround could be to block usrmerge before update
https://askubuntu.com/questions/1358789/is-it-possible-to-prevent-usrmerge-package-installation-on-systems-upgraded-from
https://github.com/microsoft/WSL/issues/8927
Two files in /etc/apt/preferences.d
pin-usrmerge holds
Package: usrmerge
Pin: version *
Pin-Priority: -1337
and the same for pin-usr-is-merged
Package: usr-is-merged
Pin: version *
Pin-Priority: -1337
