On Thu, Aug 13, 2015 at 11:54:48PM +0200, Riccardo Boninsegna wrote:
> Il 13/ago/2015 10:21 PM, "Haines Brown" <haines@???> ha scritto:
> > I guess I'll just try to reinstall. I initially tried to install
> > testing/ascii, but couldn't complete install software. So I retreated to
> > jessie, and had the same problem, but after choosing not to install CUPS
> > (and no desktop manager), I finally succeeded but for the problem under
> > discussion. When I redo, I'll repartition and not use the default
> > partitioning scheme. I'll report on my success.
>
> Now I understand: you went through "Install the base system" (if not more, most
> likely given the issue is with Xfce), then went back to "choose a mirror" to
> switch releases, then back again to base system/package manager/install
> software without going back to partitioning to reformat root?
>
> That's where it went wrong, then: "install the base system" blindly overwrites
> dpkg's status file with one matching the debootstrap that happens for the most
> of that step (before it says to select a kernel package)!
>
> There is a warning if you "install the base system" on a non-empty partition
> but it's easy to miss if you went through partitioning again without
> reformatting, as it immediately follows "warnings" such as saving the partition
> table and complaining about not using a swap partition!

Yes, you spotted the problem. Perhaps only when I did chroot (cross)
installations, but it seems I used to partition and format a hard disk
before installing, and then skip the partitioning step in the
installation. But Devuan installation routine insisted that I partition
the drive because it seems to have removed mount points and
filesystem. I defined them and wrote to disk but I suspect without
re-formatting. That was my mistake.