diff --git a/docker/packaging/install.bash b/docker/packaging/install.bash
index 01eddad..6d47b02 100755
--- a/docker/packaging/install.bash
+++ b/docker/packaging/install.bash
@@ -2,6 +2,9 @@
 
 set -euxo pipefail
 
+# See install.bash for the runtime image for much of the same, but
+# with more comments.
+
 mkdir /tmp/riju-work
 pushd /tmp/riju-work
 
@@ -37,6 +40,12 @@ deb [arch=amd64] https://deb.nodesource.com/${node_repo} ${ubuntu_name} main
 deb [arch=amd64] https://dl.yarnpkg.com/debian/ stable main
 EOF
 
+tee -a /etc/apt/preferences.d/riju >/dev/null <<EOF
+Package: *
+Pin: origin packages.microsoft.com
+Pin-Priority: 1
+EOF
+
 packages="
 
 # compilation tools
diff --git a/docker/runtime/install.bash b/docker/runtime/install.bash
index fac1dc1..191f6d3 100755
--- a/docker/runtime/install.bash
+++ b/docker/runtime/install.bash
@@ -86,6 +86,24 @@ deb [arch=amd64] https://cloud.r-project.org/bin/linux/ubuntu ${ubuntu_name}-${c
 deb [arch=amd64] https://dl.yarnpkg.com/debian/ stable main
 EOF
 
+# Work around brutal packaging error courtesy of Microsoft.
+# Unfortunately, the Microsoft repo includes a duplicate version of
+# the libodbc1 package whose version is not in sync with the one
+# shipped by the corresponding release of Ubuntu. If this one happens
+# to be newer, then it'll cause a horrifyingly difficult to diagnose
+# error later on while building the composite image because there's a
+# conflict between the default-available versions of libodbc1 and
+# libodbc1:i386, which surfaces as an inability to install
+# dependencies for Erlang. Thanks Microsoft. Please don't. Anyway,
+# solution is to pin this repository at a lower priority than the
+# Ubuntu standard packages, so the correct version of libodbc1 gets
+# installed by default.
+tee -a /etc/apt/preferences.d/riju >/dev/null <<EOF
+Package: *
+Pin: origin packages.microsoft.com
+Pin-Priority: 1
+EOF
+
 apt-get update
 apt-get install -y dctrl-tools