apt-get install always fails with dpkg error

[bingasedu]

I'm having trouble getting any apt-get install command to work. They all fail with some dpkg warnings and an error concerning root's PATH. I have no idea why root's PATH might have changed, and I don't know the correct way to fix root's PATH, or root's PATH as seen by sudo. Here an example:


$ sudo apt-get install gnome-core
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
libswscale0 libavutil49 libdb5.1-java appmenu-gtk ttf-sil-gentium
libkadm5clnt-mit7 libglpng g++-4.4 linux-headers-3.2.0-56 libdb5.1-java-gcj
libpostproc51 libstdc++6-4.4-dev libdirectfb-extra libsysfs-dev
libpod-coverage-perl libavformat52 libdirectfb-dev appmenu-qt
libdb4.7-java-gcj libx264-85 libdevel-symdump-perl
linux-headers-3.2.0-56-generic-pae libxcb-render-util0-dev libjpeg62-dev
liblzo2-2 python2.6-dev libkadm5srv-mit7 libdb4.7-java libavcodec52
libid3tag0 libkdb5-4 libreadline5 libmpcdec3 libtest-pod-perl appmenu-gtk3
libllvm3.0
Use 'apt-get autoremove' to remove them.
The following extra packages will be installed:
dconf-tools epiphany-browser epiphany-browser-data fonts-cantarell
gir1.2-accountsservice-1.0 gir1.2-caribou-1.0 gir1.2-clutter-1.0
gir1.2-cogl-1.0 gir1.2-coglpango-1.0 gir1.2-folks-0.6
gir1.2-gdesktopenums-3.0 gir1.2-gee-1.0 gir1.2-gjsdbus-1.0 gir1.2-gkbd-3.0
gir1.2-json-1.0 gir1.2-mutter-3.0 gir1.2-networkmanager-1.0
gir1.2-polkit-1.0 gir1.2-telepathyglib-0.12 gir1.2-telepathylogger-0.2
gir1.2-upowerglib-1.0 gir1.2-xkl-1.0 gjs gnome-applets gnome-backgrounds
gnome-contacts gnome-icon-theme-extras gnome-js-common gnome-panel
gnome-session-fallback gnome-shell gnome-shell-common gnome-themes-standard
libcaribou-common libcaribou0 libgjs0c libmutter0 libseed-gtk3-0
mutter-common notification-daemon
Suggested packages:
epiphany-extensions gnome-netstatus-applet deskbar-applet cpufrequtils gnome
desktop-base
The following packages will be REMOVED:
libgail-gnome-module libgnomepanel2.24-cil libpanel-applet2-0 tsclient
The following NEW packages will be installed:
dconf-tools epiphany-browser epiphany-browser-data fonts-cantarell
gir1.2-accountsservice-1.0 gir1.2-caribou-1.0 gir1.2-clutter-1.0
gir1.2-cogl-1.0 gir1.2-coglpango-1.0 gir1.2-folks-0.6
gir1.2-gdesktopenums-3.0 gir1.2-gee-1.0 gir1.2-gjsdbus-1.0 gir1.2-gkbd-3.0
gir1.2-json-1.0 gir1.2-mutter-3.0 gir1.2-networkmanager-1.0
gir1.2-polkit-1.0 gir1.2-telepathyglib-0.12 gir1.2-telepathylogger-0.2
gir1.2-upowerglib-1.0 gir1.2-xkl-1.0 gjs gnome-applets gnome-backgrounds
gnome-contacts gnome-core gnome-icon-theme-extras gnome-js-common
gnome-panel gnome-session-fallback gnome-shell gnome-shell-common
gnome-themes-standard libcaribou-common libcaribou0 libgjs0c libmutter0
libseed-gtk3-0 mutter-common notification-daemon
0 upgraded, 41 newly installed, 4 to remove and 9 not upgraded.
Need to get 0 B/20.7 MB of archives.
After this operation, 46.7 MB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? Y
Extracting templates from packages: 100%
dpkg: warning: 'ldconfig' not found in PATH or not executable.
dpkg: warning: 'start-stop-daemon' not found in PATH or not executable.
dpkg: error: 2 expected programs not found in PATH or not executable.
Note: root's PATH should usually contain /usr/local/sbin, /usr/sbin and /sbin.
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (2)
$
Thank you for any help with this.

[steeldriver]

Hmm... what does



sudo grep ^Defaults /etc/sudoers


say?

[bingasedu]

This:
$ sudo grep ^Defaults /etc/sudoers
Defaults env_reset
$

[steeldriver]

What version of Ubuntu do you have? afaik the standard version of the sudoers file on Ubuntu should have a secure_path definition


Defaults env_reset
Defaults secure_path="/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin"

however I'm leery about suggesting you should modify yours without understanding why it's been configured that way. If you do decide to modify it, be sure to use visudo i.e.



sudo visudo

[bingasedu]

Appologies for not including that orignially. I'm using 12.04 LTS, and it's acting strange in many ways. I'm hoping that getting apt-get install to work will allow me to get things "back to normal". Oh my - I just tried sudo visudo and got this result:

$ sudo visudo
[sudo] password for leighton:
sudo: visudo: command not found
$

This system is not acting normally at all...

[bingasedu]

I was able to login as root, locate visudo, and add this line to /etc/sudoers:


Defaults secure_path="/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin"

That appears to have resolved the apt-get install problems. I wish I knew how this problem arose, but at least it's solved. Thanks very much for your help!