Automatic apt updates break with python2.7 and update-binfmts

[Penelope Fudd]

I have apt set to auto-update with cron (/etc/cron.daily/apt), and I was dismayed to find out that it hasn't been running for some time; there were 70 packages that needed updating (apt-get dist-upgrade).

Upon further investigation, it seemed that python2.7-minimal required update-binfmts (part of binfmt-utils) to be present for installation to succeed, but binfmt-utils wasn't installed. And trying to install binfmt-utils required python2.7 to be installed.

I broke this deadlock by creating a file named '~/bin/update-binfmts' and making it executable, then installing python2.7-minimal, then removing ~/bin/update-binfmts. At that point, apt-get dist-upgrade worked, although my fix probably means that python2.7 isn't registered as a bin-fmt yet.

If there's any way to prevent things like this from breaking automatic apt updates would be appreciated. Thanks!

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.04
Package: python2.7-minimal 2.7.3-0ubuntu3.2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.2.0-41.66-generic 3.2.42
Uname: Linux 3.2.0-41-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.0.1-0ubuntu17.2
Architecture: amd64
Date: Mon May 6 09:04:01 2013
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 12.04 LTS "Precise Pangolin" - Release amd64 (20120425)
MarkForUpload: True
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_CA:en
 TERM=xterm
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 LANG=en_CA.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: python2.7
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)