Comment 58 for bug 430224

I've come across this problem while setting up a headless 12.04 server via debootstrap and chroot. To be able to upgrade or install services (like mdadm, which requires postfix) I had to use Ericks workaround and divert initctl.

It worked fine, however, there seems to be something missing in Ericks proposed command to delete the divert. Maybe this is the cause for his problems with gdm afterwards.

Here's what worked for me:

Set the divert:

# dpkg-divert --local --rename --add /sbin/initctl
# ln -s /bin/true /sbin/initctl

Remove the divert:

# rm /sbin/initctl
# dpkg-divert --local --rename --remove /sbin/initctl

Note the added '--rename' option that was missing in Ericks post. Without this, dpkg-divert says it removed the divert, however, /sbin/initctl.distrib is not renamed back to the original initctl command. Which in consequence breaks all services.

Took me a while to find out why my headless remote system got stuck at boot ;-)
Hope this is of help to someone, since the underlying problem seems to persist.

Cheerz, Martin.