After a hdd install from knoppix 3.2 I tried to dist-upgrade to Debian unstable. It all seems to work fine but my debian_version is still reported as testing/unstable. I've tracked this down to the fact that a number of packages from the hdd install are not at the latest versions available in unstable but are unoffical versions with different dependencies. The most significant being sysvinit.

If I try apt-get install sysvinit, I'm told I have the latest version installed. Not true. The knoppix version is 2.84 something or other, whereas 2.85 is available in unstable.

If I try apt-get --reinstall install sysvinit, I'm told the packages is not available for download.

This is a common problem when trying to replace a package from an unofficial source with an official one. My usual trick is just to remove the offending package, then reinstall from an official source.

HOWEVER, sysvinit is a rather crucial package and I'm a little concerned that removing it - even if only to replace it with a different version shortly afterwards - may be dangerous.

Any suggestions as to whether or not this may be a safe thing to do or what alternative approach I could take would be much appreciated...

Thanks!