VSCode 1.94 Debian package can not be installed on Debian 11 anymore (uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up)

[olifre]

Does this issue occur when all extensions are disabled?: Yes

• VS Code Version: 1.94
• OS Version: Debian 11 (bullseye)

Steps to Reproduce:

1. Try to install the Debian package.
2. Observe:

dpkg-deb: error: archive '/var/cache/apt/archives/code_1.94.0-1727878498_amd64.deb' uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up
dpkg: error processing archive /var/cache/apt/archives/code_1.94.0-1727878498_amd64.deb (--unpack):
 dpkg-deb --control subprocess returned error exit status 2
Errors were encountered while processing:
 /var/cache/apt/archives/code_1.94.0-1727878498_amd64.deb
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

Last working package was version 1.93.1.

[olifre]

I was able to install it without problems in debian

Was that by any chance Debian 12 or another release?
Debian 11 does not support zstd for deb packages unless you patched dpkg itself.

[tuukkapa]

I can reproduce this issue and I'm running Debian 11.

[Whobeu]

I am seeing the same thing. Trying to upgrade on a Raspberry Pi running the equivalent of Debian 11 and it fails with the following:

dpkg-deb: error: archive '/var/cache/apt/archives/code_1.94.0-1727877189_arm64.deb' uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up

[IncandescentChrysalis]

dpkg < 1.28 does not support ZSTD compression, hence Debian 11 Bullseye and older are impacted.
Cf. Debian bug #892664

Since M$ code repository does not match a specific distribution, I see no way of segmenting different releases of a distribution, packages-wise.
Maybe would it be time to set that up?

[olifre]

Since M$ code repository does not match a specific distribution, I see no way of segmenting different releases of a distribution, packages-wise.
Maybe would it be time to set that up?

Either that, or reverting the change, as it does not appear to save any noticeable space anyways (of course zstd is faster to decompress):

• code_1.93.1-1726079302_amd64.deb 12-Sep-2024 18:02 102.7 MB
• code_1.94.0-1727878498_amd64.deb 03-Oct-2024 17:02 108.3 MB

[deepak1556]

Sorry for this unintended change, this seems to have been impacted by our CI changes last milestone ab30106 that bumped the version of dpkg-deb, not sure if the default compression changed with newer versions. I will check and prepare a candidate fix.

[deepak1556]

Yeah seems to be the case, in the ubuntu version of the deb tools zstd seems to be default compressor for dpkg-deb. Whereas in the upstream repo it is still xz.

We can use -Zxz to revert the compression, which I will make as a candidate fix.

[olifre]

We can use -Zxz to revert the compression, which I will make as a candidate fix.

Thanks for hunting this down!

In the long term, it might also be interesting to add a "try to install deb package" step into the CI, which tries to install the deb for common distros (e.g. Debian, Ubuntu in supported versions) so incompatibilities can be captured by the CI?

[deepak1556]

Fair point, our team does sanity testing of build bits before releasing but the issue is that we haven't covered a good array of distros to ensure these types of issues are catched. I will work on improving our sanity testing process.

[deepak1556]

Issue will be fixed in tomorrow's insider and will also be fixed in stable 1.94.2 release early next week.

[RossBoylan]

https://unix.stackexchange.com/a/723014/580693 offers a work-around that looks plausible, and pretty simple, though I haven't tried it myself. Or, if you're feeling ambitious, upgrade to current Debian.

Personally, I'll just wait for the fix so thoughtfully provided by @deepak1556.

[RossBoylan]

Fair point, our team does sanity testing of build bits before releasing but the issue is that we haven't covered a good array of distros to ensure these types of issues are catched. I will work on improving our sanity testing process.

This problem would only be caught by testing against old versions of Debian. Debian 11 is currently oldstable . While it's still under LTS, it is technically EOL as of a couple of months ago. See this guide.

Since I, and apparently others, are still using the old version, I'm all for such testing, but I just wanted to point out it's a little more ambitious than just testing against the current releases.

[Whobeu]

Fair point, our team does sanity testing of build bits before releasing but the issue is that we haven't covered a good array of distros to ensure these types of issues are catched. I will work on improving our sanity testing process.

This problem would only be caught by testing against old versions of Debian. Debian 11 is currently oldstable . While it's still under LTS, it is technically EOL as of a couple of months ago. See this guide.

Yes Debian 11 is still supported as "oldstable" and will be supported with security patches until August 31st, 2026. Debian 10 was "oldoldstable" and just went off support effective July 1, 2024.

[versionbayjc]

Since the VS Code system requirements still state Debian 10 is supported, I was not expecting to see any issues with Debian 11 myself 😇

[pedroobando]

I have the same problem, I have Debian 11 installed on my personal computer.

dpkg-deb: error: el archivo /var/cache/apt/archives/code_1.94.0-1727878498_amd64.deb' contiene un miembro de datos contro
l.tar.zst' ininteligible, abandono
dpkg: error al procesar el archivo /var/cache/apt/archives/code_1.94.0-1727878498_amd64.deb (--unpack):
el subproceso dpkg-deb --control devolvió el código de salida de error 2
Se encontraron errores al procesar:
/var/cache/apt/archives/code_1.94.0-1727878498_amd64.deb
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

[almi05]

https://unix.stackexchange.com/a/723014/580693 offers a work-around that looks plausible, and pretty simple, though I haven't tried it myself. Or, if you're feeling ambitious, upgrade to current Debian.

Personally, I'll just wait for the fix so thoughtfully provided by @deepak1556.

Tried this workaround on my Raspberry Pi running Debian 11 aarch64, VSCode 1.94 was installed without any issues, thanks!
If you need the deb file ready for arm64, I temporarily uploaded it here.

[petit-vps]

got the same issue
dpkg-deb: erreur: l'archive « /var/cache/apt/archives/code_1.94.0-1727878498_amd64.deb » utilise un procédé de compression inconnu pour le membre « control.tar.zst ». Abandon.
on bullseye

[IncandescentChrysalis]

I kindly suggest to people tempted to comment in here to start by reading previous comments, in order to avoid comments with no additional value.

dpkg < 1.28 does not support ZSTD compression, hence Debian 11 Bullseye and older are impacted.
Cf. Debian bug #892664

[theofficialgman]

Same issue. Hope this can be released ASAP

[williamyizhu]

Same issue for code_1.94.1-1728111316_amd64.deb

[deepak1556]

Closing for verification.

Steps:

1. Run the following docker run -e COMMIT="7b878f5a39c027a8c4368125ba2165679705d60f" -it --rm --platform linux/amd64 debian:11 /bin/sh -c 'apt update && apt install -y wget libasound2 libatk-bridge2.0-0 libatk1.0-0 libatspi2.0-0 libcairo2 libcurl3-gnutls libdbus-1-3 libdrm2 libexpat1 libgbm1 libglib2.0-0 libgtk-3-0 libnspr4 libnss3 libpango-1.0-0 libx11-6 libxcb1 libxcomposite1 libxdamage1 libxext6 libxfixes3 libxkbcommon0 libxkbfile1 libxrandr2 xdg-utils gpg && wget "https://update.code.visualstudio.com/commit:$COMMIT/linux-deb-x64/stable" -O code_1.94.2_amd64.deb && dpkg -i code_1.94.2_amd64.deb'
2. Follow the prompts and confirm the installation exits without the failure in VSCode 1.94 Debian package can not be installed on Debian 11 anymore (uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up) #230418 (comment)

[wavesailor]

I don't have docker on my Raspberry Pi ... besides it does not have enough space or horsepower to install and run it.
Is there not another solution?

[IncandescentChrysalis]

Closing for verification.

Wouldn't it be better to close an issue after positive verification of the problem at hand being solved where it first appeared, ie in production?

---

Steps:

1. Run the following `docker run -e COMMIT="7b878f5a39c027a8c4368125ba2165679705d60f" -it --rm --platform linux/amd64 debian:11 /bin/sh -c 'apt update && apt install -y wget libasound2 libatk-bridge2.0-0 libatk1.0-0 libatspi2.0-0 libcairo2 libcurl3-gnutls libdbus-1-3 libdrm2 libexpat1 libgbm1 libglib2.0-0 libgtk-3-0 libnspr4 libnss3 libpango-1.0-0 libx11-6 libxcb1 libxcomposite1 libxdamage1 libxext6 libxfixes3 libxkbcommon0 libxkbfile1 libxrandr2 xdg-utils gpg && wget "https://update.code.visualstudio.com/commit:$COMMIT/linux-deb-x64/stable" -O code_1.94.2_amd64.deb && dpkg -i code_1.94.2_amd64.deb'`

2. Follow the prompts and confirm the installation exits without the failure in [VSCode 1.94 Debian package can not be installed on Debian 11 anymore (uses unknown compression for member 'control.tar.zst', giving up) #230418 (comment)](https://github.com/microsoft/vscode/issues/230418#issue-2564672671)

A simpler verification mechanism would be (on GNU/Linux, amd64 architecture):

1. Download the https://update.code.visualstudio.com/commit:7b878f5a39c027a8c4368125ba2165679705d60f/linux-deb-x64/stable package
2. file <package>
3. If zst compression is mentioned, run away screaming

Just tested on this URL, got redirected to a code_1.94.1-1728111316_amd64.deb package, and xz compression is mentioned, which means it seems you are on the right track.

I would however have waited that package to land in the public repository before closing the current issue, as it is technically not resolved in production yet…
Said otherwise: As things stands, I stille cannot update code through M$ repositories.

[RossBoylan]

Closing for verification.

What does that mean?
It sounds like "closing in order to verify the fix", which doesn't make much sense. I'm guessing the intended meaning is "closing after having verified the fix".

[rzhao271]

"Closing for verification" means "closing to signal to team members that the issue is ready to verify and will show up in the next stable release once verified".
This procedure occurs as part of our endgame.
If pre-release verification fails, the issue gets re-opened again.

[IncandescentChrysalis]

Problem solved with 1.94.2-1728494015 from the public repository.
Now would have been a good time to solve the issue.

If you wish so, try to address odd processes at M$ 😉

[versionbayjc]

I'm also "just a user" of VS Code, while I understand the reasoning of some other users here, I think it's also good to think about the perspective of the developers/maintainers of VS Code. GitHub issues is the issue tracking system that the developers use to track what issues need to be worked on. If this issue with the compression with the .deb (for Debian 11) is fixed in the main branch, it is fixed (from a dev perspective); even if it is not yet available as a general release. Maybe there should be a clearer separation between whether issues are resolved for a user perspective vs a developer perspective, but just being aware of this difference is I think useful.
But specifically for this one, it was explained that this should be resolved as part of 1.94.2