Ubuntu

Hold packages

Manually

To prevent the update of a package, although a newer version is available, the package must be set to hold.

$ sudo apt-mark hold linux-firmware linux-generic
linux-firmware set on hold.
linux-generic set on hold.

$ sudo apt-mark showhold
linux-firmware
linux-generic

Packages on hold will not be updated anymore.

$ sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
[...]
The following packages have been kept back:
  linux-firmware linux-generic linux-headers-generic linux-image-generic
[...]

To check the changelog of packages on hold, the following call can be used

https://wiki.debianforum.de/Pakete_auf_hold_setzen

$ dpkg -l | awk '$1=="hi" {printf "%s %s %s\n", $2, $3, $4}' | while read pkg ver arch; do apt-get -qq changelog $pkg | sed "/$pkg ($ver)/q" | pager; done

With unhold the lock can be removed again.

$ apt-mark unhold linux-firmware linux-generic
Canceled hold on linux-firmware.
Canceled hold on linux-generic.

Automatically

Create a playbook with the name playbook-hold.yml in the environment generic. Packages can be defined via the parameter packages_hold.

---
- name: Hold packages
  hosts: all
  gather_facts: no

  vars:
    packages_hold:
      - linux-firmware
      - linux-generic

  tasks:
  - name: Hold package
    command: "apt-mark hold {{ item }}"
    register: result
    changed_when: "'was already set on hold' not in result.stdout"
    become: true
    with_items: "{{ packages_hold }}"

The playbook can now be executed with osism-run.

$ osism-run generic hold -l 10-11.betacloud.xyz
PLAY [Hold packages] *********************************************

TASK [Hold package] ***********************************************
ok: [10-11.betacloud.xyz] => (item=linux-firmware)
ok: [10-11.betacloud.xyz] => (item=linux-generic)

PLAY RECAP *********************************************************
10-11.betacloud.xyz : ok=1    changed=0    unreachable=0    failed=0

To unlock packages again, create an additional playbook playbook-unhold.yml and use unhold instead of hold.