Xfce Forum

steeblinski

Member

Registered: 2014-07-06

Posts: 1

software index is broken

so i'm not really experiencing any problems (that i'm aware of) but i've lost update manager and by that i mean it's stopped updating.

update manager came up one day and it looked like it was updating dropbox but nothing was happening, it seemed as tho it was hanging. i had to leave to go somewhere and i guess i should have just let it run but for some reason i wanted or thot i needed to shut the machine down. i do seem to remember it asking me or rather telling me this was a bad idea, that it would create an instability. all i can say is i did shut it down. maybe i wanted to see what would happen or what instability would look like, i don't remember.

situation now is i got an email from dropbox recently telling me i was running an outdated and soon to be retired version of dropbox. update manager still regularly reappears but what the dialog box that immediately pops up tells me is

not all updates can be installed.
run a partial upgrade, to install as many updates as possible.
this can be caused by:
a previous upgrade which didn't complete
problems with some of the installed software
unofficial software packages not provided by ubuntu
normal changes of a pre-release version of ubuntu

there are two buttons to choose from: if i choose the first button, partial upgrade, i am returned to the hanging dropbox update which will run for hours upon hours. it will say 100% but will not move further or return me to the command line. the other button, close, will take to another dialogue box which says:

software index is broken
it is impossible to install or remove any software. please use the package manager "synaptic" or run "sudo apt-get install -f" in a terminal to fix this problem at first.

i don't know if i have package manager "synaptic" as i don't see it listed in either settings or system so i run the sudo and i get:

E: dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run 'sudo dpkg --configure -a' to correct the problem.

i run that sudo and i get:

setting up nautilus-dropbox (0.7.1-2) ...
downloading dropbox... 100%[emptyverticalrectangle]o share and store your files online. want to learn more? head to http://www.dropbox.com/

and my hard-drive begins to whir and it runs at 50+% capacity indefinitely, hours upon hours, and no change or progress that i can see. again, it doesn't return me to the command line at any point, so i can't exit. i have to reboot or shut the machine down altogether.

i'm running linux lite 1.0.8, 32bit, xfce 4.8

anything else you need to know, just ask.

---

is as t'is till it ain't

ozjd

Member

From: Hawkesbury NSW Australia

Registered: 2012-02-05

Posts: 560

Website

Re: software index is broken

this is really a distro issue not an Xfce one, you might get a more useful response on their support