Update issues?

[GregM]

I keep getting update alerts from Discover but when I try to update I get this message.

Cannot obtain lock: E: dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run dpkg --configure -a to correct the problem.

This has never happened before.
What's the issue?

[claydoh]

The error message is accurate -- something interrupted the previous (successful) update process, and tells you what to do.

The reasons can vary - apt crashed somehow, the system lost power during an update, the system was powered down while installing updates, the Gremlins were fed after midnight, etc.

So:
sudo dpkg --configure -a which will finish installing/configuring where it last left off.

it is also a good idea to run this afterward to install any packages that didn't actually get to the point of being installed

sudo apt -f install

Then to triple check, run sudo apt update and sudo apt full-upgrade to see if there are any errors or anything.

[GregM]

Ran

sudo dpkg --configure -a

┌───────────────────────────────────────────────── ──┤ Configuring shim-signed ├───────────────────────────────────────────────── ──┐
│ The GRUB boot loader was previously installed to a disk that is no longer present, or whose unique identifier has changed for │
│ some reason. It is important to make sure that the installed GRUB core image stays in sync with GRUB modules and grub.cfg. │
│ Please check again to make sure that GRUB is written to the appropriate boot devices. │
│ │
│ GRUB install devices: │
│ │
│[*] /dev/sda2 (537 MB; /boot/efi) on 256060 MB SPCC_Solid_State_Disk │
│ │
│ │
│ <Ok>

[claydoh]

Is /dev/sda2 your EFI partition? if it is, then click OK - this is reinstalling grub, from a secure boot shim update ?, probably whatever caused that to happen also stopped upgrades.

If unsure, use Partition Manager to view, or:

mount | grep /boot/efi

Once that completes, I'd redo the previous two commands again, to make sure any more stray things are finished up.

I gave no clue what caused this, but it is not totally rare, from googling things.

[GregM]

Ran that command and got....

greg@OptiPlex-9020:~$ mount | grep /boot/efi
/dev/sda2 on /boot/efi type vfat (rw,relatime,fmask=0077,dmask=0077,codepage=437,io charset=iso8859-1,shortname=mixed,errors=remount-ro
)
greg@OptiPlex-9020:~$

[claydoh]

Then you can click or tab to OK and proceed.from the shim-signed prompt

[GregM]

Clicked OK and got
greg@OptiPlex-9020:~$ sudo dpkg --configure -a
Setting up shim-signed (1.51.4+15.8-0ubuntu1) ...
Installing grub to /boot/efi.
Installing for x86_64-efi platform.
grub-install: warning: EFI variables cannot be set on this system.
grub-install: warning: You will have to complete the GRUB setup manually.
Installation finished. No error reported.
greg@OptiPlex-9020:~$

[GregM]

Went back to Discover and this time the updates succeeded.
Would it be safe to now to do a clone of this SSD now?

[claydoh]

I don't see why not, assuming it boots and runs as expected

[GregM]

Once again you have saved my bacon and I thank you.

Oddly my wife's computer started doing that too. I applied your fixes and it seems to be fine now also.
Thanks again.