(Comments below apply to the "unstable/sid" version of Debian.) The subject program has a rather sizable memory leak on Alpha. Stuff starts breaking due to the OOM condition (USB device driver loads fail with paging errors), and "top" confirms "packagekitd" consuming a disproportionate share of system RAM. Restarting with "systemctl" clears the condition. For now, I simply have the service disabled.
Is that something I really don't want to do for some reason? --Bob