Amusingly, whenever I try to remove a package using apt-get on Ubuntu 11.04, apt-get attempts to install an alternative package in addition to removing the requested package(s). Here are a couple examples:

ubuntu@ip-10-40-64-142:/$ sudo apt-get remove w3m

Reading package lists... Done

Building dependency tree       

Reading state information... Done

The following extra packages will be installed:

  lynx lynx-cur

Suggested packages:

  lynx-cur-wrapper

The following packages will be REMOVED:

  w3m

The following NEW packages will be installed:

  lynx lynx-cur

0 upgraded, 2 newly installed, 1 to remove and 105 not upgraded.

Need to get 1,069 kB of archives.

After this operation, 406 kB of additional disk space will be used.

Do you want to continue [Y/n]? n

Abort.



ubuntu@ip-10-40-64-142:/$ sudo apt-get remove firefox

Reading package lists... Done

Building dependency tree       

Reading state information... Done

The following extra packages will be installed:

  epiphany-browser epiphany-browser-data epiphany-gecko evince evince-common gir1.2-clutter-1.0 gir1.2-gstreamer-0.10

  gir1.2-json-glib-1.0 gnome-doc-utils gnome-js-common gnome-user-guide gvfs gvfs-backends indicator-application libappindicator1

  libavahi-glib1 libavahi-gobject0 libbluetooth3 libcdio-cdda0 libcdio-paranoia0 libcdio10 libclutter-1.0-0 libclutter-1.0-common

  libdjvulibre-text libdjvulibre21 libevdocument3 libevview3 libgdu0 libgphoto2-2 libgphoto2-port0 libgvfscommon0 libindicator3

  libjson-glib-1.0-0 libnautilus-extension1 libopenobex1 libpoppler-glib6 libseed0 libspectre1 libt1-5 libwebkitgtk-1.0-0

  libwebkitgtk-1.0-common obex-data-server policykit-1-gnome python-libxml2 yelp yelp-xsl

Suggested packages:

  epiphany-extensions unrar poppler-data nautilus gphoto2 gtkam libspectre1-dbg ttf-dejavu

The following packages will be REMOVED:

  firefox firefox-globalmenu

The following NEW packages will be installed:

  epiphany-browser epiphany-browser-data epiphany-gecko evince evince-common gir1.2-clutter-1.0 gir1.2-gstreamer-0.10

  gir1.2-json-glib-1.0 gnome-doc-utils gnome-js-common gnome-user-guide gvfs gvfs-backends indicator-application libappindicator1

  libavahi-glib1 libavahi-gobject0 libbluetooth3 libcdio-cdda0 libcdio-paranoia0 libcdio10 libclutter-1.0-0 libclutter-1.0-common

  libdjvulibre-text libdjvulibre21 libevdocument3 libevview3 libgdu0 libgphoto2-2 libgphoto2-port0 libgvfscommon0 libindicator3

  libjson-glib-1.0-0 libnautilus-extension1 libopenobex1 libpoppler-glib6 libseed0 libspectre1 libt1-5 libwebkitgtk-1.0-0

  libwebkitgtk-1.0-common obex-data-server policykit-1-gnome python-libxml2 yelp yelp-xsl

0 upgraded, 46 newly installed, 2 to remove and 104 not upgraded.

Need to get 21.9 MB of archives.

After this operation, 90.8 MB of additional disk space will be used.

Do you want to continue [Y/n]? 

Here is output of --version

ubuntu@ip-10-40-64-142:/$ apt-get --version

apt 0.8.13.2ubuntu4.6 for amd64 compiled on Jun 15 2012 14:55:09

Supported modules:

*Ver: Standard .deb

*Pkg:  Debian dpkg interface (Priority 30)

 S.L: 'deb' Standard Debian binary tree

 S.L: 'deb-src' Standard Debian source tree

 Idx: Debian Source Index

 Idx: Debian Package Index

 Idx: Debian Translation Index

 Idx: Debian dpkg status file

Is there some obscure config or known bug that causes this?

(I know that 11.04 is disgustingly old, but I do not have the luxury of upgrading dist in this case.)