How to fix a ruined package catalog?

Question

After installing mono-complete on my Ubuntu 11.10, something got corrupted in the package catalog. Whenever I try to install\remove anything I get an error and told to use apt-get -f install. I get the same thing from the GUI. When I try to do it, I get the following error:

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Correcting dependencies... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
  mono-devel mono-xbuild
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  mono-devel mono-xbuild
0 upgraded, 2 newly installed, 0 to remove and 83 not upgraded.
2 not fully installed or removed.
Need to get 0 B/2,256 kB of archives.
After this operation, 9,048 kB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? Y
(Reading database ... 269743 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking mono-xbuild (from .../mono-xbuild_2.10.5-1_all.deb) ...
dpkg: error processing /var/cache/apt/archives/mono-xbuild_2.10.5-1_all.deb (--unpack):
 unable to open '/usr/lib/mono/4.0/xbuild.exe.dpkg-new': No such file or directory
No apport report written because MaxReports is reached already
                                                              Unpacking mono-devel (from .../mono-devel_2.10.5-1_all.deb) ...
dpkg: error processing /var/cache/apt/archives/mono-devel_2.10.5-1_all.deb (--unpack):
 unable to open '/usr/lib/mono/2.0/al.exe.dpkg-new': No such file or directory
No apport report written because MaxReports is reached already
                                                              Processing triggers for man-db ...
Errors were encountered while processing:
 /var/cache/apt/archives/mono-xbuild_2.10.5-1_all.deb
 /var/cache/apt/archives/mono-devel_2.10.5-1_all.deb
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

I understand that I'm missing some mono files\directories, but I can't reinstall mono because apt-get just tells me to run apt-get -f install - which doesn't work.

How can I fix this?

UPDATE
Running apt-get update gives me the following errors:

W: Failed to fetch http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/edgy/universe/source/Sources  404  Not Found [IP: 91.189.88.46 80]

W: Failed to fetch http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/edgy/universe/binary-i386/Packages  404  Not Found [IP: 91.189.88.46 80]

W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/mozillateam/firefox-stable/ubuntu/dists/oneiric/main/source/Sources  404  Not Found

W: Failed to fetch http://ppa.launchpad.net/mozillateam/firefox-stable/ubuntu/dists/oneiric/main/binary-i386/Packages  404  Not Found

E: Some index files failed to download. They have been ignored, or old ones used instead

Solution 1

The two last lines of your /etc/apt/sources.list are wrong. Remove it from the file:

deb http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu edgy universe
deb-src http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu edgy universe

and then:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get -f install

That should fix the problems. Let me know if it's solved!

Regards

Solution 2

Try this:

sudo apt-get update

That will update your system software list.

And then,

sudo apt-get install -f

That should fix your packages.

If it doesn't, then you've got a broken package manager, and I'd recommend reinstalling - but only if you've tried everything else!!!

Comments

[kosaidpo]

hello ,have you tried sudo dpkg-reconfigure package_name if it doesnt work i would remove the config files and try over if not make sure that apt-get its workin correctly by installing sumtin else just to test , good luck

[Idan Arye]

dpkg-reconfigure doesn't work - it tells me the package is broken. Where are those config files that I need to remove?

[nilsonneto]

@Idan - why have you got "edgy" software-source? Comment those out. Also - the firefox PPA you have doesnt have an oneiric repo. Comment those out as well.

[Paulo Arruda]

Can you please pastebin your /etc/apt/sources.list ?

[jcollado]

I don't think you have exactly that same problem, but instead of repairing the package database, you might want to try to recover it from a backup as explained here.

[Idan Arye]

@PauloArruda: <pastebin.com/477x4PSD>

[Idan Arye]

The update command give me errors(I updated them at the question), and the install fix command gives me the same errors.

[Idan Arye]

That did not work - I still can't install mono-complete.

[Idan Arye]

I tried to install it(after fixing sources.list and recovering the apt status file from the backup) and than tried dpkg --configure -a. The package catalog still gets corrupted. Here are the results: pastebin.com/2rjqZUkM

[Paulo Arruda]

What happens if you try to purge (apt-get --purge remove mono-complete) and then autoremove unused packages (apt-get autoremove) and then try to install it again?

[Idan Arye]

I can't even remove it - pastebin.com/vV952WjA The only way to remove it is to recover the status file from a backup.

[Paulo Arruda]

Good, now remove monodoc-browser (sudo apt-get --purge remove monodoc-browser) and then clean (sudo apt-get clean) and try installing mono-complete again (without mono-browser)

[Paulo Arruda]

Sorry i think i wasnt clear. According to your last pastebin, you did remove the package mono-complete, but apt was still trying to install mono-browser. Just follow the steps i wrote in the comment above.

[Idan Arye]

When I try to remove monodoc-browser I get told I need to do apt-get -f install. The only way for me to remove monodoc-browser is to recover from a backup. When I try to install just monodoc-browser, I get the corruption errors. I don't suppose there is a way to install mono-complete without mono-browser? Is there another package that'll give me everything I need to develop in mono?

[Paulo Arruda]

First, we need to solve this problem, or else you wont be able to install new packages in the right way. Try to remove those packages with "dpkg --purge mono-browser" and "dpkg --purge mono-complete". After that, try "dpkg --configure -a" and let me now how it goes.

[Idan Arye]

I can't remove monodoc-browser - this is what I get - pastebin.com/4sLUdjPR . But that does not mean I can't recover from a backup. After I recover from a backup everything works as it should - as long as I don't try to install monodoc-browser or mono-complete. So, there is no point to keep trying to remove monodoc-browser with the package manager, since we already tried that and in doesn't work, and we can reach the same state by recovering from a backup. I just need to know what to do after I recover from a backup to get the full mono SDK.

[Paulo Arruda]

let us continue this discussion in chat