Problems installing libgl1-mesa-dri:i386 because of many unmet dependencies and hidden broken packages

Question

I have been trying to install Steam on my Ubuntu 16.04 LTS. When I run:

sudo apt install steam

I get the following:

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
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:
steam:i386 : Depends: libgl1-mesa-dri:i386 but it is not going to be 
installed
          Depends: libgl1-mesa-glx:i386 but it is not going to be 
installed
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.

No big deal, I tried installing the individual packages (I have already run sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386 before running these commands):

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:
 appmenu-qt5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                        libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libcontent-hub0 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                            libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 liboxideqtcore0 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.4.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                            libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.4.0) but it is not going to be installed
 liboxideqtquick0 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                             libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
                    Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                             libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libqmenumodel0 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                           libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libqt5multimedia5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                              libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libqt5multimediaquick-p5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                     libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
                            Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.4.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                                     libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.4.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libqt5printsupport5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                                libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libqt5waylandclient5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                                 libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libqt5widgets5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                           libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed
 libqt5x11extras5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                             libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libthumbnailer-qt1.0 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                 libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libubuntugestures5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                               libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
                      Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                               libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 libubuntutoolkit5 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                              libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 qml-module-io-thp-pyotherside : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                          libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
                                 Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                          libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 qml-module-qtquick-layouts : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                                       libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed
                              Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                                       libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.2.0) but it is not going to be installed
 qml-module-ubuntu-layouts : Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                      libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
 qml-module-ubuntu-thumbnailer0.1 : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed or
                                             libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.0.2) but it is not going to be installed
                                    Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                                             libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.5.0) but it is not going to be installed
 qmlscene : Depends: libqt5gui5 (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                     libqt5gui5-gles (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed
            Depends: libqt5quick5 (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed or
                     libqt5quick5-gles (>= 5.3.0) but it is not going to be installed
 va-driver-all : Depends: vdpau-va-driver but it is not going to be installed
E: Error, pkgProblemResolver::Resolve generated breaks, this may be caused by held packages.

I tried doing sudo apt-get update and -f install but that did not help either. I realised that these packages (appmenu-qt5, libcontent-hub0 etc.) are already installed in their latest versions. I have no broken packages as I have verified using Synaptic.

I am not sure how to fix this error.

Solution

It's similar to my problem.

The following packages have unmet dependencies:
steam:i386 : Depends: libgl1-mesa-dri:i386 but it is not going to be 

Trying to install libgl1-mesa-dri, I got this error

the following packages have unmet dependencies:
 libgl1-mesa-dri:i386 : Depends: libgcrypt20:i386 (>= 1.7.0) but it is not going to be installed

Then I tried to install libgcrypt20:i386 but again I got unmet dependency errors.

To solve this, I manually downloaded and installws libgcrypt20 (1.7.8-2) (latest version) from this Debian package archive.

Then I was able to install the libgcrypt20:i386 package

sudo apt-get install -f
sudo apt-get install libgcrypt20:i386

Then I was able to run the installed steam that I manually download from steam official website, on my Debian Stretch.

sudo apt-get install steam

Comments

[David Foerster]

I'm not sure what you did here. Were you able to install libgl1-mesa-dri:i386, libgl1-mesa-glx:i386 and steam:i386? Which precise command led to the second output listing?

[Wish Tak]

I ran: sudo apt-get install libgl1-mesa-dri:i386 I get very similar output when I try installing libgl1-mesa-glx:i386. From my knowledge, the non i386 versions exist and so do these unmet dependencies shown above (verified using Synaptic). I have also tried running apt-get autoremove and apt-get clean in the meantime and tried updating but not effect.

[David Foerster]

I'm still as confused as before before because just like in your question post you insinuate multiple things but don't state clearly what you did and what happened. How exactly did you try to install libgl1-mesa-dri:i386 and libgl1-mesa-glx:i386 and what was the result? Were the packages installed? Were there any warning or error messages? Which exact command led to the second output listing in your question?