having a small issue starting Ubuntu Software Center

[TheFu]

format c:

[tcll5850]

@TheFu:

before this gets mentioned, I don't want to reinstall, I'm asking what to do so I can avoid that.

I have a zorin 6 (Ubuntu 12.04) installation, which means it will take me 3 days to set everything up after upgrading to Ubuntu14.04,
and another 2-3 days to customize everything on XFCE. (not calculating rest time or sleep)

my people can't wait for that.
I'm going to avoid formatting, and just fix the issues I have. (as they ARE fixable (Linux is far from the limited interface Windows offers))
I'd only reinstall if my kernel corrupted.

[Temüjin]

There's your problem: the base-files package is from zorin. You need to switch to the ubuntu version. I have no idea if you're using anything from zorin sources, but synaptic makes it easy to figure that out. If you're not using zorinf packages, then get rid of the zorin sources and switch to ubuntu packages for any local/obsolete packages installed.

[tcll5850]

O.o
I thought I did that...

ok...
what do I have to do there??

I've uninstalled everything used by the zorin PPAs except for what might render my compy unusable
(as stated earlier)

so, just...
how do I switch?? :/

EDIT:
oh wait, I wasn't connecting "base-files" as the actual thing from the ppa...
yea, how do I switch that??

[raptir]

You should be able force it to install the version from the Ubuntu repository.

sudo apt-get reinstall -t trusty base-files

I've only tried that with the install command for a non-installed package though, so I'm not sure how it will work with the reinstall command.

[TheFu]

When it comes to stuff like this, you can use aptitude (not apt-get) and often it will find issues and solutions to the dependencies better than any of the other programs. Be certain to remove any zorin packages before removing them from the APT sources.

OTOH, if this machine is important, spend the 45 min to backup everything important, then perform a fresh install (15 min) and restore the data, settings and packages without any zorin dependencies. 1st time, takes about an hour, and every other time it gets shorter and shorter ... I'm down to 30 min for a system restore now with a fresh OS, but all my programs, data and settings from any backup in the last 60days. http://blog.jdpfu.com/2013/12/11/how...-data-overview

[tcll5850]

still fails...

lemme use a little of my debug skills...

module = __import__(distro_module_name, globals(), locals(), [], -1)

where:
>>> print distro_module_name
'zorin'

where does the 'zorin' string come from, and how can I change the source to 'ubuntu'??
because it should be either 'ubuntu' (as this was an upgrade from [Zorin OS 6 (Ubuntu 12.04)] to [Ubuntu 14.04]) or 'xubuntu' (as I've installed xubuntu-desktop)

[TheFu]

I've never heard of anyone mixing distros like this, hence why the recommendation to fresh-install, then migrate the data and settings. Sorry that you don't like it. You are in completely new land going backwards Zorin-->Ubuntu.

If you solve it, please post a how-to for the other people who may be interested.

The way that I would attack this (assuming I wanted to know about the differences), is by performing 2 installations which I believe to be identical, just using Zorin and the equivalent Ubuntu. Then perform a complete comparison between these two installations to see which files are different. I would completely ignore /home and primarily worry about /etc, /var, and /usr .... binary file differences will likely happen just because there are newer versions of programs between the release dates for each. Of course, if your specific installation had lots and lots of extra tools loaded, then the differences will be much greater.

If you don't want to be in this to do it 100 times, seriously, I'd just perform a fresh Ubuntu install and restore the settings, data and previously installed programs - about an hour of effort. Be certain to NOT use the zorin sources in /etc/apt/ at all.

Good luck!

[tcll5850]

I think I may have found the problem:
sudo add-apt-repository ppa:zorin-os/packages

this might be what's giving me zorin 9

last I tried that it failed...
though apparently not O.o

what I was trying to achieve there was a DE that would span both of my monitors...
that's when I found XFCE as the final

so I'm running 'apt-purge ppa:zorin-os/packages' as we speak

and plan to re-run 'sudo aptitude reinstall -t trusty base-files', which should fix everything

EDIT:

tcll@tcll-AY589AAR-ABA-a4317c:~$ sudo aptitude reinstall -t trusty base-files
[sudo] password for tcll: 
The following packages will be REINSTALLED:
  base-files 
0 packages upgraded, 0 newly installed, 1 reinstalled, 0 to remove and 5 not upgraded.
Need to get 0 B/70.2 kB of archives. After unpacking 0 B will be used.
(Reading database ... 423503 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to unpack .../base-files_7.2ubuntu5.1_amd64.deb ...
Unpacking base-files (7.2ubuntu5.1) over (7.2ubuntu5.1) ...
Processing triggers for man-db (2.6.7.1-1ubuntu1) ...
Processing triggers for install-info (5.2.0.dfsg.1-2) ...
Processing triggers for cracklib-runtime (2.9.1-1build1) ...
Processing triggers for plymouth-theme-ubuntu-text (0.8.8-0ubuntu17.1) ...
update-initramfs: deferring update (trigger activated)
Processing triggers for initramfs-tools (0.103ubuntu4.2) ...
update-initramfs: Generating /boot/initrd.img-3.13.0-43-generic
Setting up base-files (7.2ubuntu5.1) ...

YAY!
last time I ran that, (7.2ubuntu5.1) was a zorin package.

let's see if software center works now =D

EDIT2: YES!
thanks for your help from earlier or I'd've never have figured it out! =3