Within the last couple of days, I have tried to install network-manager on a Debian Jessie system as follows :-

apt-get update
apt-get install network-manger

but it failed as follows :-

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:
network-manager : Depends: libpam-systemd but it is not installable
Depends: policykit-1
Recommends: ppp (>= 2.4.6) but it is not going to be installed
Recommends: dnsmasq-base but it is not going to be installed
Recommends: crda
Recommends: iputils-arping but it is not going to be installed

E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

Can anyone please help me to understand why I cannot
install network-manager.

Thanks.

Do you have a bunch of packages that don't match? Have you held some packages back from updating.(I never use debain)

Can you install a previous version of network-manager?

Are you sure that you updated and not just updated the package list/database.
https://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/d...todate.en.html

That's what it looks like.

Thanks for your reply.

apt-get update
apt-get install <package-name>

is the standard way to install a package
contained in the Debian release currently used.

I now think my Debian package database may possibly be slightly screwed up.

I have used Debian myself for many years and also had to deal with broken packages regularly. I do not know what exactly caused it but it usually happened after I tried to install/remove a lot of packages at once via Synaptic.
You can try the solutions suggested in this thread. It is in the Ubuntu subforum but since Ubuntu is based on Debian it should also be applicable in your case. Hope this helps.

Thanks for your reply.

I have tried the following, if that helps :-

% cat /etc/apt/sources.list
deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ jessie main non-free contrib
deb-src http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ jessie main non-free contrib

deb http://security.debian.org/ jessie/updates main contrib non-free
deb-src http://security.debian.org/ jessie/updates main contrib non-free

# jessie-updates, previously known as 'volatile' #deb
http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ jessie-updates main contrib non-free
#deb-src http://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ jessie-updates main contrib
non-free #deb http://packages.linuxmint.com debian import

# Jessie backports #deb http://httpredir.debian.org/debian jessie-backports
main contrib non-free


% apt-cache policy network-manager
network-manager:
Installed: (none)
Candidate: 0.9.10.0-7
Version table:
0.9.10.0-7 0
500 http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ jessie/main amd64 Packages

did you run ?

No, I just ran :-

apt-get update
apt-get install network-manager

# apt-get update
# apt-get dist-upgrade

Then try to install it. Once NEW packages are available they tend to remove the availability of the OLD packages from the servers. When running testing or sid or experimental, there are times when updates can be out of sync, but generally get corrected in a timely manner. When running stable, that shouldn't be an issue. Baring extras like backports, or a really slow connection to where new updates are available before you complete downloading the old updates. Having been on dialup, probably a decade longer than I should have been, I tend to download only, then update and download again.

# apt-get update
# apt-get -d dist-upgrade
# apt-get update
# apt-get -d dist-upgrade
# apt-get dist-upgrade

Just to make sure I have all the current stuff before I apply the updates. OLD habits.

BTW, jessie is quite OLD at this point. Stretch was the previous "stable", with buster being the current "stable" as of this month. Which probably puts jessie near 5 years and out of support???

Jessie support ends next year.

Thanks for all the contributions.

The only version of network-manager available for Jessie is network-manager (0.9.10.0-7).

I realise that Debian Jessie is oldoldstable and support ends completely next year.

I intend to update to Stretch a bit later this year.