apt-get remove default should not be Y.

[Scott Kitterman]

Binary package hint: apt

In Feisty when removing unwanted packages, apt-get asks for confirmation (Y/n) and then proceeds to remove even if the response is not Y. In this case I just hit carriage return. The confirmation should fail unless Y is provided. This is currently as designed, but it makes it easy to accidentally approve the removal. Default should be N so it takes typing a key to remove stuff from your system. Someone who can do so should set this to importance wishlist.

$ sudo apt-get remove bind9
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
  linux-headers-2.6.20-13-generic linux-headers-2.6.20-13
Use 'apt-get autoremove' to remove them.
The following packages will be REMOVED:
  bind9
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 1 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 0B of archives.
After unpacking 807kB disk space will be freed.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]?
(Reading database ... 132838 files and directories currently installed.)
Removing bind9 ...
 * Stopping domain name service... bind

[Jens (jens.timmerman)]

the Y is typed in Capital, this means this is the default option when you hit carriage return

when you use a translated version of Ubuntu it shows 'J/n' for example
and will continue on a y/Y/j/J or just carriage return

I believe this is a feature

[Scott Kitterman (kitterman)]

Makes sense. I re-wrote the description.

[Micah Cowan (micahcowan)]

In general, it has long been considered a bad idea to make destructive actions the default. I'm considering filing a similar bug in the GUI upgrade-to-beta-feisty program that update-manager downloads and runs, since it makes "Replace" the default action for modified configs.

The usual addition of a "--yes" option or somesuch would be usual.

Of course, this probably isn't really a decision we should make, independently of Debian...

[Scott Kitterman (kitterman)]

apt-get is currently operating as designed, so wishlist.