ValueError: Unable to parse section data on SourceGear package diffmerge

[David]

Description: Ubuntu 12.04.1 LTS
Release: 12.04

apt-xapian-index:
  Installed: 0.44ubuntu5
  Candidate: 0.44ubuntu5
  Version table:
 *** 0.44ubuntu5 0
        500 http://za.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise/main i386 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

...

This error occurs whenever I check for software updates (through the Update Manager), but I think the command line output is more useful (below). It appears to be caused by the description of a non-Ubuntu package "diffmerge", which is not installed (the description is included in the traceback below). The package comes from the stable SourceGear deb repository "deb http://debian.sourcegear.com/ubuntu precise main" (see http://www.veracity-scm.com/help/ubuntu_install.html for details).

Is there a formatting issue in the package description? If not, update-apt-xapian-index should not be failing.

Please let me know if I can provide any further details.

...

user@computer$ sudo update-apt-xapian-index
Reading .desktop files from /usr/share/app-install/desktop/: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/security.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-security_main_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise_universe_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-backports_main_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/security.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-security_restricted_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise_main_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise_restricted_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-backports_multiverse_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/security.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-security_universe_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-updates_main_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-updates_restricted_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-updates_multiverse_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-backports_universe_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise_multiverse_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-backports_restricted_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/za.archive.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-updates_universe_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Reading en translations from /var/lib/apt/lists/security.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_precise-security_multiverse_i18n_Translation-en: done.
Rebuilding Xapian index... 8%Package: diffmerge
Version: 3.3.2.1139-1
Maintainer: Jeff Hostetler <email address hidden>
Architecture: i386
Depends: libc6 (>= 2.3.6-6~), libc6 (>= 2.11), libgcc1 (>= 1:4.1.1), libglib2.0-0 (>= 2.16.0), libgtk2.0-0 (>= 2.18.0), libpango1.0-0 (>= 1.14.0), libpng12-0 (>= 1.2.13-4), libsm6, libstdc++6 (>= 4.4.0), libx11-6 (>= 0), libxinerama1
Installed-Size: 10240
Priority: optional
Section: devel
Filename: pool/main/d/diffmerge/diffmerge_3.3.2.1139-1_i386.deb
Size: 4415930
SHA256: 862c71caecaa76b9f233c26241d0c3ea9786f5405e3349ded8f3238db0b195db
SHA1: 23dea6d9612e977c50be2ccffd13cbf0a28c5dcc
MD5sum: 8956c77b69ca244d177926c5ef88c45d
Description: SourceGear DiffMerge
 Revision 3.3.2.1139
 Copyright (C) 2003-2011 SourceGear LLC. All Rights Reserved.
 .
 http://www.sourcegear.com/diffmerge/index.html
 .
 A file/folder difference viewer/editor with support for 3-way
 file merges.

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/sbin/update-apt-xapian-index", line 108, in <module>
    indexer.rebuild(opts.pkgfile)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/axi/indexer.py", line 735, in rebuild
    self.buildIndex(dbdir, generator)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/axi/indexer.py", line 710, in buildIndex
    for doc in documents:
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/axi/indexer.py", line 568, in gen_documents_apt
    yield self.get_document_from_apt(pkg)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/axi/indexer.py", line 531, in get_document_from_apt
    addon.obj.index(document, pkg)
  File "/usr/share/apt-xapian-index/plugins/apttags.py", line 125, in index
    rec = ver.record
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/apt/package.py", line 429, in record
    return Record(self._records.record)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/apt/package.py", line 186, in __init__
    self._rec = apt_pkg.TagSection(record_str)
ValueError: Unable to parse section data

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Andrei Dziahel (develop7)]

Hey, david,

can you please check https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/software-properties/+bug/1090925 which looks closely related to this one.

Thanks.

[David (lofidevops)]

@Andrei yup, it looks like the same thing, yours in on a more recent version of Ubuntu so I'll mark mine as a duplicate of yours