Running the "apt-get install php" command on Ubuntu 20.04LTS automatically installed the php8.3* package

Virtualmin
1
SYSTEM INFORMATION
OS type and version Ubuntu Linux 20.04.4
Webmin version 2.111 (after update)
Virtualmin version 7.10.0 (after update)
Related packages php, libapache2-mod-php8.3

I updated packages on the Software Package Updates page, so php8.3, php8.3-*, libapache2-mod-php8.3 were automatically installed and worked in mod_php mode. Until then php7.4 was enabled in fcgid mode.

Here is the log:

apt-get -y install apparmor apport apt apt-utils base-files bolt distro-info dns-root-data fwupd fwupd-signed grub-common grub-pc grub-pc-bin grub2-common happo-agent hb-nagiosplugin-check-lsync-delay iptables iputils-ping iputils-tracepath isc-dhcp-client isc-dhcp-common kpartx landscape-common libapparmor1 libapt-pkg6.0 libargon2-1 libfwupd2 libfwupdplugin5 libgpgme11 libidn2-0 libip4tc2 libip6tc2 libmemcached11 libmemcachedutil2 libnetplan0 libnl-3-200 libnl-genl-3-200 libnss-systemd libpam-systemd libpcre2-16-0 libpcre2-32-0 libpcre2-8-0 libpcre2-dev libpcre2-posix3 libpcre3 libpython2.7-minimal libpython2.7-stdlib libsnmp-base libsnmp35 libsystemd0 libtss2-esys0 libudev1 libunwind8 libxml2 libxtables12 libzip-dev libzstd1 linux-firmware ltrace mackerel-agent mackerel-agent-plugins motd-news-config multipath-tools netplan.io nfs-common php php-bz2 php-cgi php-cli php-common php-curl php-dev php-fpm php-gd php-mbstring php-mysql php-pear php-pgsql php-sqlite3 php-xml php-zip php7.4 php7.4-bz2 php7.4-cgi php7.4-cli php7.4-common php7.4-curl php7.4-dev php7.4-fpm php7.4-gd php7.4-json php7.4-mbstring php7.4-mysql php7.4-opcache php7.4-pgsql php7.4-readline php7.4-sqlite3 php7.4-xml php7.4-zip php8.2-bz2 php8.2-cgi php8.2-cli php8.2-common php8.2-curl php8.2-dev php8.2-fpm php8.2-gd php8.2-mbstring php8.2-mysql php8.2-opcache php8.2-pgsql php8.2-readline php8.2-sqlite3 php8.2-xml php8.2-zip python-apt-common python2.7 python2.7-minimal python3-acme python3-apport python3-apt python3-debian python3-distro-info python3-distupgrade python3-gpg python3-problem-report python3-software-properties python3-tz python3-update-manager rsync sa-compile snapd snmp software-properties-common sosreport spamassassin spamc systemd systemd-sysv systemd-timesyncd tcpdump ubuntu-advantage-tools ubuntu-release-upgrader-core udev ufw unzip update-manager-core update-notifier-common usermin webmin webmin-jailkit webmin-virtual-server webmin-virtualmin-awstats webmin-virtualmin-htpasswd webmin-virtualmin-registrar

The output was as follows:

Reading package lists...
Building dependency tree...
Reading state information...
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
  libpcre2-posix2 libxmlb1 libzip5
Use 'apt autoremove' to remove them.
The following additional packages will be installed:
  libapache2-mod-php8.3 libclass-inspector-perl libclass-singleton-perl
  libdatetime-locale-perl libdatetime-perl libdatetime-timezone-perl
  libencode-detect-perl libfile-sharedir-perl libhashkit2 libqrencode4
  libxmlb2 lynx lynx-common **php8.3 php8.3-bz2 php8.3-cgi php8.3-cli
  php8.3-common php8.3-curl php8.3-dev php8.3-fpm php8.3-gd php8.3-mbstring
  php8.3-mysql php8.3-opcache php8.3-pgsql php8.3-readline php8.3-sqlite3
  php8.3-xml php8.3-zip qrencode ubuntu-pro-client ubuntu-pro-client-l10n
Suggested packages:
  apparmor-profiles-extra apparmor-utils apport-gtk | apport-kde apt-doc
  aptitude | synaptic | wajig shunit2 gir1.2-fwupd-2.0 multiboot-doc grub-emu
  xorriso desktop-base nftables traceroute resolvconf avahi-autoipd
  isc-dhcp-client-ddns snmp-mibs-downloader multipath-tools-boot
  network-manager | wpasupplicant openvswitch-switch watchdog dh-php
  python2.7-doc binfmt-support python-acme-doc python3-apt-dbg python-apt-doc
  zenity | kdialog razor pyzor libgeoip2-perl libnet-patricia-perl
  libbsd-resource-perl systemd-container
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  libapache2-mod-php8.3 libclass-inspector-perl libclass-singleton-perl
  libdatetime-locale-perl libdatetime-perl libdatetime-timezone-perl
  libencode-detect-perl libfile-sharedir-perl libhashkit2 libqrencode4
  libxmlb2 lynx lynx-common php8.3 php8.3-bz2 php8.3-cgi php8.3-cli
  php8.3-common php8.3-curl php8.3-dev php8.3-fpm php8.3-gd php8.3-mbstring
  php8.3-mysql php8.3-opcache php8.3-pgsql php8.3-readline php8.3-sqlite3
  php8.3-xml php8.3-zip qrencode ubuntu-pro-client ubuntu-pro-client-l10n
......

The dependencies showed php->php8.3->libapache2-mod-php8.3, and it seemed mod_php was enabled by libapache2-mod-php8.3.
I deleted the symbolic links to php8.3.conf and php8.3.load in /etc/apache2/mods-enabled/ and restarting apache2.

I suppose this happened because I updated the php package, but is it normal for a new version of php to be automatically installed?
Any information about this would be appreciated.
Thank you.

2

Hello,

You should revert any previous manual changes made and follow our tutorial for installing additional PHP versions.

3

Don’t do that! Nobody here ever told you to apt install php. (In fact, I tell people every couple of days to not do that. It’s in the guidelines, even.)

4

things like nextcloud might require more modules though. I never had problems installing them, but that was within php-fpm I guess.

I setup remi repo to replace outdated base with 8.3. Surely ubuntu has something similar. Unsure why it would now suggest 8.3 on its own.

5

That has nothing to do with installing php. That’s not a module, it’s a metapackage that pulls in at least one server API (we call this execution mode in Virtualmin), and libapache2-mod-php is the first one in the list of possibilities. You should never install it. Literally never.

6

Hello Joe and everyone else,
Thank you for the replies.
I get to know that apt install php should never be executed. By running this, I found that a series of packages for libapache2-mod-php and php8.3-* were newly installed.

But it doesn’t make sense.

I installed php8.2-* in August 2023 as written in the guidelines.

LC_ALL=C.UTF-8 add-apt-repository -y ppa:ondrej/php && apt-get update
apt-get install php8.2-{bz2,cgi,cli,common,curl,dev,fpm,gd,mbstring,mysqlnd,opcache,pgsql,readline,sqlite3,xml,zip}

And I didn’t install php package manually, but it showed on “Software Package Updates” page as a package that needs updating. – It might be my fault that I didn’t pay enough attention and just left checked for update though.

I would just like to know why the php module was targeted for update, and what I should do.
The php8.2- and php8.3-related packages are not currently used so I can delete them if it does not affect existing packages.

Thank you.

7

You can purge using sudo apt purge php8.1* if you want to delete or have you done that?

8

Thank you for replying.
I’ll consider deleting them.

9

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