Knowledge Base

Installing Neo4j Database on Debian or Ubuntu fails with "The following packages have unmet dependencies"

Installing Neo4j Database on Debian or Ubuntu fails with the error:

The following packages have unmet dependencies:
 neo4j-enterprise : Depends: cypher-shell (< 1.2.0) but it is not going to be installed
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

Why is this happening?

The apt package manager is not handling multiple versions of a package, in this case Cypher Shell 1.1.12 and 4.0.

How to circumvent this issue?

Until we find a solution to this issue we suggest the following workaround:

Add cypher-shell=1.1.12 to the end of your apt install command, eg:

sudo apt install neo4j cypher-shell=1.1.12

This way you ensure the lastest supported Cypher Shell version will be installed for the Neo4j Database version 3.x.