during an update there was some error with creating an archive -- sorry -- did not copy the message down!

[K2JJT]

I had some 41 updates pending. Started the process, and walked away. (Presently it now reports 3 updates available).

We will pay more attention next time, and see if this error repeats.

This is version 8.04 of Ubuntu -- and normally kept up-to-date. Per lsb_release -rd:
Description: Ubuntu 8.04.1
Release: 8.04

I am assuming some data about the problem was collected automatically, and will be attached to this report.

...Bob

ProblemType: Package
Architecture: i386
Date: Wed Sep 10 01:02:15 2008
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 8.04
ErrorMessage: unable to make backup link of `./boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24-21-generic' before installing new version
Package: linux-image-2.6.24-21-generic 2.6.24-21.40 [modified: lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.pcimap lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.dep lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.ieee1394map lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.usbmap lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.isapnpmap lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.inputmap lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.seriomap lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.alias lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.symbols]
PackageArchitecture: i386
SourcePackage: linux
Title: package linux-image-2.6.24-21-generic 2.6.24-21.40 [modified: lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.pcimap lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.dep lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.ieee1394map lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.usbmap lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.isapnpmap lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.inputmap lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.seriomap lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.alias lib/modules/2.6.24-21-generic/modules.symbols] failed to install/upgrade: unable to make backup link of `./boot/vmlinuz-2.6.24-21-generic' before installing new version
Uname: Linux 2.6.24-21-generic i686

[Jean-Baptiste Lallement (jibel)]

Thanks for your report.

Please have a look at Bug #252900, does this apply to you, too?

[K2JJT (ubuntu-kesters)]

Yes -- that was it! (Thanks very much for the information.)

In this installation the wubi resides in a FAT32 partition. Taking one suggestion in the Bug #252900 thread, I copied the /boot directory off to an ext3 partition (using rsync) and then mounted that over the original /boot directory.

The update went without error.

I unmounted the updated ext3 directory, and copied it back to the original /boot.

The only thing I noticed was the permissions of the new files did not match -- it was simple to use chmod 755 * to correct that.

[Jean-Baptiste Lallement (jibel)]

Thanks for following up. I'm marking it as duplicate.