Errors after running an update.

**false_chicken** · August 29th, 2010

I ran an update recently. It was about a 300Mb download and with it was the current kernel and others. I restarted to find an error. Compiz is no longer starting and there is this red minus icon on my bar saying there is a package error. It said to run "sudo dpkg --configure -a" but when I ran that I got: dpkg: failed to open package info file `/var/lib/dpkg/status' for reading: No such file or directory" Any Ideas? Thanks.

Running Lucid i386 Desktop.

**dabl** · August 30th, 2010

Close synaptic, and open a terminal.

Code:

sudo apt-get clean

Code:

sudo apt-get autoclean

Code:

sudo apt-get autoremove

now try

Code:

sudo dpkg --configure -a

post back if you have errors.

**false_chicken** · August 30th, 2010

Same error on all but the first command: "dpkg: failed to open package info file `/var/lib/dpkg/status' for reading: No such file or directory" I checked and the file status indeed does not exist.

**false_chicken** · August 30th, 2010

So do I reinstall? Because I would hate to have to do that.

**JBAlaska** · August 30th, 2010

Don't re-install, this can be fixed.

Try:

Code:

sudo dpkg-reconfigure -phigh apt

**false_chicken** · August 30th, 2010

This is what I got:

"Use of uninitialized value $value in substitution (s///) at /usr/share/perl5/Debconf/Format/822.pm line 65, <$__ANONIO__> line 1.
Use of uninitialized value $value in substitution (s///) at /usr/share/perl5/Debconf/Format/822.pm line 65, <$__ANONIO__> line 2.
Use of uninitialized value $item in hash element at /usr/share/perl5/Debconf/DbDriver/File.pm line 70, <$__ANONIO__> chunk 2.
dpkg-query: failed to open package info file `/var/lib/dpkg/status' for reading: No such file or directory
/usr/sbin/dpkg-reconfigure: apt is not installed"

**JBAlaska** · August 30th, 2010

Ok,
1- gunzip dpkg.status.0.gz located in /var/backups and save it as "status" in /var/lib/dpkg/

2- you also might need to create the "available" file in /var/lib/dpkg/ this can be done by typing:

Code:

sudo touch available

Then:

Code:

sudo dpkg --configure -a

**false_chicken** · August 30th, 2010

Thanks! that problem is fixed. But now it says I have about 14 broken packages. And I dont know what to do about them. If I choose reinstall it seems to want to pretty much reinstall my whole system.