Locked Packages Database

[The Liquidator]

Yesterday adept seems to have exited abnormally (frozen basically) follwing which the package database is locked. Several reboots later, the situation persists.

Can anybody tell me, please, how to undo the lock?

Thanks

ian

[The Liquidator]

Re: Locked Packages Database

No-one any ideas how to unlock apt? 3 days now without being able to install anything. I thought it would have cleared itself, but it hasn't.

Ian

[sky]

Re: Locked Packages Database

You need to remove this file :
/var/lib/dpkg/lock

Cheers

[The Liquidator]

Re: Locked Packages Database

Hi

Thanks for that

Using sudo konqueror (which I know is wrong) I delete the file. I run apt updater and I'm told it's still locked as another application is using. I then try to run the clean function and get the following message:

ian@milly:~$ apt-get clean
E: Could not open lock file /var/cache/apt/archives/lock - open (13 Permission denied)
E: Unable to lock the download directory

That is even though I have deleted that lock file too.

I then navigate back to /var/lib/dpkg and find the lock file has reappeared. I have noted from leaving the konqueror window open that it appears whilst launching adept or apt-get. So I appear to be caught in a vicious circle.

Any further thoughts please?

Ian

[sky]

Re: Locked Packages Database

Hi,

So you should check this command :
sudo apt-get update

then with the error message, you should be able to remove the good file, and make the command again, for second time to see if it's solved or not.

Hope it helps.

[Fenyx]

Re: Locked Packages Database

sudo dpkg --configure -a

Run that in Konsole. It will continue where Adept left off before it froze and will unlock the database.

[The Liquidator]

Re: Locked Packages Database

Hi

Thanks to both of you for your help.

sudo dpkg --configure -a actually did the trick in the end, although adept has just frozen again doing an update so I think it's dodgy. At least I know how to fix it.

Any recommendations on the other package managers?

[sky]

Re: Locked Packages Database

Hi,

Usually if adept is failing in an update, it means there's errors, so I guess other would fail also, I'm using apt-get CLI to do it so I can see all messages

Cheers

[nejode]

Re: Locked Packages Database

Man, dump adept and install synaptic, it's a far better package manager. It even has an option to see your output in a terminal window, that way you can see things like the Flash licence ageement window that doesn't show up in adept ...if you don't agree with the licence, install stops, and you think the app froze, shut it down the hard way... and your problems begin again. It's happening right now with the "flashplugin-nonfree" update!.
I've been using it since Breezy with no problem whatsowever.

...hasta la vista...