Rollback an apt-get upgrade if something goes wrong on Debian / Ubuntu Linux

Rolling back to the previous version may solve the problem or free the disk space. Both CentOS/RHEL support rollback feature, but I learned hard way both Debian and Ubuntu does not support rollback feature yet.



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Know the problem before choosing the solution

I remotely administer a Ubuntu 14.04.3 LTS server in one of those dirt cheap clouds, and I will periodically use apt-get command to install packages or do upgrades. I wanted to set up “Planet Venus” ( a flexible feed aggregator ) software on my system. For some weird reason, I ran:

$ sudo apt-get -y --install-suggests install planet-venus

I should have stopped the installation. But, I was too tired and overworked that day. The result was a disaster. I ran out of disk space, and it installed 1764 packages on the system. My planet-venus installation broke down too. It was one of those days where I made mistakes and forgot to take snapshot/backups. Long story short:



Related: This is not the first time I f*cked up. See my 10 Unix command line mistakes.

Solution

I tried Google and found this wiki page not so helpful. A couple of mailing list and forum posts did not help at all. Finally, a hint come from Twitter:



Does anyone know a simple way to rollback packages on @Ubuntu Linux 14.04 LTS server?messed up.. I need to rollback over 1k+ packages :( — nixCraft (@nixcraft) January 17, 2016

How to rollback an apt-get upgrade from command line?

I quickly ran:

# grep -A 2 'Start-Date: 2016-01-17 07:56:42' /var/log/apt/history.log

Sample output (full dump here):



Rollback / undo an apt-get install command

Rest was easy.

Create the list:

grep -A 2 'Start-Date: 2016-01-17 07:56:42' / var / log / apt / history.log | tail -1 >/ tmp / packages.txt grep -A 2 'Start-Date: 2016-01-17 07:56:42' /var/log/apt/history.log | tail -1 >/tmp/packages.txt

Edit the /tmp/packages.txt file and delete Install: word:

vi / tmp / packages.txt vi /tmp/packages.txt

OR

sed -i 's/Install://' / tmp / packages.txt sed -i 's/Install://' /tmp/packages.txt

Finally, I need to clean up a few things:

tr ',' '

' < / tmp / packages.txt | sed '/automatic)/d' | awk '{ print $1}' > / tmp / final.packages.txt wc -l / tmp / final.packages.txt tr ',' '

' < /tmp/packages.txt | sed '/automatic)/d' | awk '{ print $1}' > /tmp/final.packages.txt wc -l /tmp/final.packages.txt

Sample outputs:

1764 /tmp/final.packages.txt

Delete the packages

Now, I have an entire list of all packages installed on that unfaithful day

# less /tmp/final.packages.txt libmaa3:amd64 ant:amd64 libmimic0:amd64 dc:amd64 libparse-yapp-perl:amd64 gir1.2-clutter-1.0:amd64 libjna-java:amd64 python-egenix-mxbeebase:amd64 libxkbcommon-x11-0:amd64 libmpeg2-4:amd64 libopencv-core2.4:amd64 libdvdread4:amd64 libhunspell-1.3-0:amd64 fonts-lobster:amd64 libtotem-plparser18:amd64 libodbcinstq4-1:amd64 jed-common:amd64 .... .. ... xfonts-cyrillic:amd64 postgresql:amd64 db5.3-util:amd64 libopencore-amrnb0:amd64 firebird2.5-examples:amd64 libboost-random1.54-dev:amd64 libtbb2:amd64 libwxgtk2.8-0:amd64 libc6-x32:amd64 magicfilter:amd64

Just uninstall it:

# Run as root # Store packages name in $p p = " $(</tmp/final.packages.txt) " # Nuke it apt-get --purge remove $p #clears out the local repository of retrieved package files apt-get clean # Just in case ... apt-get autoremove # Verify disk space df -H # Run as root # Store packages name in $p p="$(</tmp/final.packages.txt)" # Nuke it apt-get --purge remove $p #clears out the local repository of retrieved package files apt-get clean # Just in case ... apt-get autoremove # Verify disk space df -H

Conclusion

To help yourself, you must be yourself. Be the best that you can be. When you make a mistake, learn from it, pick yourself up and move on. –Dave Pelzer

I learned that:

The best time to backup is before you do major stuff on the server. Think twice. Hit enter once. Never trust blindly the apt-get or any command that has -y option. Always make the snapshot. Unfortunately, this box still uses ext4. There is no option to set my filesystem to BTRFS/ZFS (Linux on ZFS) with this cloud server provider. So I’m stuck with ext4 for now.

Category List of Unix and Linux commands File Management cat Network Utilities dig • host • ip • nmap Package Manager apk • apt Processes Management bg • chroot • disown • fg • jobs • killall • kill • pidof • pstree • pwdx • time Searching grep • whereis • which User Information groups • id • lastcomm • last • lid/libuser-lid • logname • members • users • whoami • who • w