Figured I'd get rid of some cruft - evolution for example.
What about this thing evolution-data-server ?Nah, maybe not.Just leave well enough alone.

Taking myself off zero-reply.

evolution-data-server is The Devil!

In debian I do a few things to cleanup.

$ sudo dpkg -l | grep -v ^ii

Which should list any partially removed packages.

$ sudo dpkg --purge --force-all package1 package2 package3

Until the non ii entrys from dpkg -l is just header information. Then deborphan to remove things not used by other things. Beware of false positives like grub2 which are actually used.

$ sudo deborphan

$ sudo dpkg --purge --force-all package1 package2 package3

Beyond that when I get too much kruft, I tend to just start over. I boot another distro install, and rsync the existing install, kruft and all, to directory on a large drive. And start over on an otherwise clean storage device. But I tend to be a minimalist. I launch things from the command line. I figure that if I can't recall the program enough to launch it from the command line, then I probably don't need it, or need to install it. As long as I have an internet connection I don't need most of the kruft. It's when the internet goes away that I DO need the kruft. Like povray or avconv to make content while I'm away from the internet matrix. In a crunch I can always chroot into the previous kruft or rsync it back to a bootable device.