kde apps broken after update

[dbaker]

During apt-get upgrade I got the 'unknown media' errors described here:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=2208433

After multiple restarts everything still seemed fine (this was yesterday afternoon). Late last night I went to take a screenshot using ksnapshot and this happened:


I then discovered that NONE of the KDE apps would open. Ksnapshot seems to be the only one that gives an error; the others just don't launch. I discovered that I can run all of them from the terminal, however (hence being able to take that screenshot).
Shortly before the problem started I'd been using KDE apps, such as Okular, without problems. It seems strange that the issue didn't kick in after multiple restarts, but started randomly of its own accord in the middle of me doing things.

Incidentally, ever since upgrading to 14.04 I've been getting 'security updates are available' notifications every day, often several times a day. Maybe there really are new updates available that often, but it's driving me crazy. I also can't figure out how to actually install them. I ran apt-get update followed by apt-get upgrade yesterday (the thing that appears to have broken everything), and immediately afterwards got the update notification again. It refused to go away until I used Muon Updater to update, and I'm not even sure what the difference is. Heeeelp

[GreyGeek]

I got that message a couple months ago and researched them. It turns out that the "unknown media type" errors are harmeless aand can be ignored. I also learned of an edit that eliminates the error but I forgot what it was. Anyway, the next update of media stuff re-triggered the error msgs, so I just ignore them.

As for your KDE installation it sounds to me like an update of plasma-desktop didn't complete. Open a Konsole and issue


sudo apt-get install --reinstall plasma-desktop


Then log out of the desktop and log back in. Or, reboot.

If that didn't fix it then perhaps another package is partially installed.
You can do a general repair using

sudo apt-get -f install

repeating until it comes back with nothing to do. Then try

sudo dpkg --configure -a

repeating until it comes back with nothing to do.

Then do:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade


to get any remaining updates.

[dbaker]

thankyou, that first step seemed to fix it! what's more, everything's much faster now than I ever remember it being.

[dbaker]

not sure if anyone's watching this thread, but I'm still getting notifications about updates way more often than seems natural...anyone else?

[GreyGeek]

Updates often come in spurts, especially following the release of the Gold version.
When you see an update notice just open a Konsole and do:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade


instead of running the muon updater.

In my experience that results in better updating, which leaves fewer packages behind.

[dbaker]

aha, thanks. I was wondering if I needed to run dist-upgrade.