I want a (debian lenny) system with KDE and without any games.

In order to remove all games (including, but not limited to kde-games) from the system, I have to break the kde package.

After that apt-get tells me that there are some 400 packages that "were automatically installed and are no longer required" every time I install or remove any package.
I once played along and apt-get autoremove(d) the allegedly unnecessary packages. It went on and on until my system had even been disburdened of its kernel...
So I really want to keep these packages.
I can't use aptitude install or remove at all any more because it would remove those some 400 packages right away, just like apt-get autoremove would.

I tried aptitude unmarkauto to make the apt* family believe the packages had been installed by hand, but to no avail.

Any clue?

A fresh, clean install without a desktop environment included.

Then go in and install KDE packages one by one and not with the Kde-All package.

A lot of work to remove a few unused games.

I've found you can usually simply run "apt-get install" again on any "autoremove" packages you want to keep to remove them from the list. You can even just highlight and paste the list to do them all at once.

I usually try to avoid installing the bigger metapackages now for just this reason. It's usually better in the long run to target what you want installed more selectively.

You can unmark them as being automatically installed:

Edit: Sorry, I see now in your post that you say you did this. Can you please post the output from a terminal session demonstrating that this does not work?

Evo2.

apt-get install kde-minimal then install the kde packages that you need.

Removing the kdegames meta should remove most of the kde games without removing anything else.

@ Evo2: Here we go:

FamilyPC:~# aptitude safe-upgrade
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Reading extended state information
Initializing package states... Done
Reading task descriptions... Done
The following packages will be REMOVED:
akregator{u} ark{u} ...

FamilyPC:~# aptitude unmarkauto akregator
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Reading extended state information
Initializing package states... Done
Reading task descriptions... Done
The following packages will be REMOVED:
akregator{u} ark{u} ...

It's like telling my 8 yr old son to not touch the PC alone while he's alone. ;-)

Cheers, THvier

@ craigevil:

> Removing the kdegames meta should remove most of the kde games without removing anything else.

Yeah, "should" is the right word.

@ David the H.:

That helped, many thanks!

FamilyPC:~# apt-get install akregator
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
akregator is already the newest version.
akregator set to manually installed.
...

srv01:~# aptitude show akregator
Package: akregator
State: installed
Automatically installed: no
Version: 4:3.5.9-5
Priority: optional
Section: web
Maintainer: Debian Qt/KDE Maintainers <debian-qt-kde@lists.debian.org>
Uncompressed Size: 3621k
Depends: kdelibs4c2a (>= 4:3.5.9), libc6 (>= 2.7-1), libgcc1 (>= 1:4.1.1),
libkdepim1a (>= 4:3.5.9), libqt3-mt (>= 3:3.3.8b), libstdc++6 (>= 4.1.1)
...

apt-get remove libkdegames5
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following packages will be REMOVED:
bomber bovo kapman katomic kbattleship kbreakout kdiamond kfourinline kjumpingcube kmahjongg kolf kollision kpat kreversi ksame kshisen ksirk ksquares libkdegames5
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 19 to remove and 1 not upgraded.

Nothing but games being removed here. But I do not use the big kde metapackage to install kde.

I installed debian lenny from debian-50x-amd64-kde-CD-1.iso and was quite astonished that the system self-destructed only because I wanted to get rid of the games.

try installing the KDE stuff without recommends maybe

thats how get over installing gnome stuff when trying to install just Brasero