installed package "is not installable" on Xenial i386

(Originally asked on [ask ubuntu](https://askubuntu.com/questions/1467968/installed-package-is-not-installable-on-xenial-i386) but it's off-topic there since Ubuntu 16.04 LTS has reached the end of it's standard support life; and is also off-topic on [SO](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/76252952/installed-package-is-not-installable-on-xenial-i386) . Third's the charm?) Part of installing a package i'm maintaining is a dist-upgrade. I noticed that there have been recent changes in the repos, such as upgrading libmysqlclient18 to libmysqlclient20, so i had to change my dependencies accordingly. However, now i can't install my app because it depends on an installed package that is apparently not installable. $ uname -a Linux myvm 4.4.0-210-generic #242-Ubuntu SMP Fri Apr 16 09:57:00 UTC 2021 i686 i686 i686 GNU/Linux $ lsb_release -a No LSB modules are available. Distributor ID: Ubuntu Description: Ubuntu 16.04.7 LTS Release: 16.04 Codename: xenial $ sudo apt install ./myapp-dep1.deb ./myapp-dep2.deb ./myapp-bin.deb Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done Note, selecting 'myapp-dep1' instead of './myapp-dep1.deb' Note, selecting 'myapp-dep2' instead of './myapp-dep2.deb' Note, selecting 'myapp-bin' instead of './myapp-bin.deb' Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable distribution that some required packages have not yet been created or been moved out of Incoming. The following information may help to resolve the situation: The following packages have unmet dependencies: myapp-bin : Depends: libhpdf (>= 2.2.1) but it is not installable E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages. $ apt search libhpdf Sorting... Done Full Text Search... Done libhpdf-2.2.1/xenial,now 2.2.1-1.1 i386 [installed] C library for generating pdf files libhpdf-dev/xenial,now 2.2.1-1.1 i386 [installed] C library for generating pdf files (development files) $ find /usr/lib/ -name "libhpdf*" /usr/lib/libhpdf.so /usr/lib/libhpdf-2.2.1.so The Depends line in my DEBIAN/control includes, among others, Depends: .., libhpdf (>=2.2.1), .. so what am i doing wrong? At first i assumed they dropped i386 altogether, but it's still listed, at least in [some repos](http://de.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/universe/libh/libharu/) . The [Xenial page](https://ubuntu.com/16-04) states that Xenial's now in ESM, and the [ESM page](https://ubuntu.com/security/esm) lists x86 as a supported architecture for Xenial. I do doubt my company has ESM support though, but can't get an official source on whether or not they dropped x86 for non-ESM. I thought Xenial was the last version to support x86, following versions only supporting x86_64, but comments on the askubuntu thread say otherwise. I tried to install using aptitude as suggested on the SO thread but cannot get it to install a local .deb file. Also tried with dpkg with similar results: $ sudo dpkg -i ./myapp-dep1.deb ./myapp-dep2.deb ./myapp-bin.deb Selecting previously unselected package myapp-dep1. (Reading database ... 112300 files and directories currently installed.) Preparing to unpack ./myapp-dep1.deb ... Unpacking myapp-dep1 (2023.02.01.214-1) ... Selecting previously unselected package myapp-dep2. Preparing to unpack ./myapp-dep2.deb ... Unpacking myapp-dep2 (1.0-1) ... Selecting previously unselected package myapp-bin. Preparing to unpack ./myapp-bin.deb ... Unpacking myapp-bin (1.0-420) ... Setting up myapp-dep2 (1.0-1) ... dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of myapp-bin: myapp-bin depends on libhpdf (>= 2.2.1); however: Package libhpdf is not installed. dpkg: error processing package myapp-bin (--install): dependency problems - leaving unconfigured Setting up myapp-dep1 (2023.02.01.214-1) ... Processing triggers for mime-support (3.59ubuntu1) ... Errors were encountered while processing: myapp-bin ...only it is still installed.