Update manager not working

[David Steele]

I'll settle for any fix on this. re-install. Format hard drive. Anything. I just want my lovely computer to work again!

I am having severe problems with update manager-

I get the message:

Could not initialise the package information

An unresolvable problem occurred while initialising the package information.

Please report this bug for the 'update-manager' package and try to include the following error message:

'E:Encountered a section with no Package: header, E:Problem with MergeList /var/lib/apt/lists/gb.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_jaunty-updates_restricted_binary-i386_Packages, E:The package lists or status file could not be parsed or opened.'


Also, Synaptic gives the following message:

E: Encountered a section with no Package: header
E: Problem with MergeList /var/lib/apt/lists/gb.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_jaunty-updates_restricted_binary-i386_Packages
E: The package lists or status file could not be parsed or opened.
E: _cache->open() failed, please report.

Report? Who to? I love Ubuntu being free, but I wish there was a customer service department I could call for things like this!

[mac9416]

Howdy, David,

A package list file must be corrupted. Try running these commands...


$ sudo rm -R /var/lib/apt/lists/* # Clear out the APT lists cache
$ sudo apt-get update # Fill it agai

Good luck!

[David Steele]

Thanks so much for helping.

I've managed the following so far:

(user name)@(computer name):~$ sudo rm -R /var/lib/apt/lists/*
[sudo] password for (username):
(user name)@(computer name):~$ sudo apt-get update
E: Lists directory /var/lib/apt/lists/partial is missing.


I feel like I'm getting somewhere.... Just not sure where, yet !

[Soul-Sing]

hmm the list should be automat. (re)create by apt...

and this? :
sudo mkdir -p /var/lib/apt/lists/partial

[mac9416]

Sorry, that was my bad, David. The command should have been 'sudo rm /var/lib/apt/lists/*'. I've never learned BASH like I know I should. leoquant's command will get you back on track though. Good luck!

[David Steele]

Wow. That seems to have covered it. All kinds of things are happening and the update manager has kicked in.

Magic. Can I have next week's lottery numbers now please?

Thanks very much to both of you.