debconf error on upgrade install [feisty]

[Witold Krakowski]

Binary package hint: debconf

I installed correctly Feisty Herd 4 on my Sony Vaio Celeron M based laptop (model VGN-FS315E).
I launched the adept-updater to install upgrades and got the following error message during install:

"incorrect nice value
Please enter an integer between -20 and 19"

The updates installation seemed to proceed ok, if clicked cancel, but at the end shown the following message: "There was an error committing changes. Possibly there was an error downloading some packages or the commit would break packages."
Clicking "ok" closes adept, and no changes are made to the system. Adept-updater still prompts for updates.

UPDATE: the update operation proceeds correctly from konsole with a "sudo apt-get update" and "udo apt-get upgrade".

[shadowwulf (shadowwulf)]

i would like to add .. it seems to have something to do with the X11

i saw it briefly and now cant access the updater as it is locked out

[shadowwulf (shadowwulf)]

At least on my machine it is confirmed ... that when trying to upgrade x11-common the error occurs ... but when unchecked .. removed from the upgrade ... the rest of the upgrades will download .......i am running on a compaq evo

if you upgrade everything but the x11-common ... the adept updater will update

[Joe Dougherty (joe-attaboy)]

I can confirm the x11-common issue on my HP Pavilion dv6000t. I pulled a bunch of updated debs using adept, but the update would break as described above in the bug report. I deleted the x11-common deb from the cache (/var/cache/apt), ran the update from a command-line with apt-get, and the remaining packages updated properly.

[sveri (sssssrichter)]

Same problem here on my machine (msi p965 neo, core 2 duo), adept upgrader reports the same problem and an sudo apt-get upgrade doesnt work too.

Not upgrading x11-common reports the same error, i had to take out xorg and
xserver-xorg too, then it works.

[Joe Dougherty (joe-attaboy)]

Re: my comment above...
I thought the problem might have been with multiple packages, as I had the same issues as sveri. The problem with other debs only seemed to occur when I used an interface application to do the updates (i.e., adept or adept updater). Both seemed to want to update xorg-common, even after I deselected them from the updates list manually. I believe it was due to the fact that the deb had already been downloaded on a previous update attempt and adept was going to install it no matter what.

One I deleted the xorg-common deb file and ran apt-get from the command line, the updates succeeded. Oddly, I noticed that xorg-common was in the list of packages apt-get said it would update just before it does the update. Since the file wasn't there, the update worked. I'll assume that that list is pulled from some log file prior to the update.

As I typed this, I noticed a pending upgrade notice from adept for mc. I ran the update manager and it installed fine. So, barring anything else, could we conclude that xorg-common is the culprit?

[sveri (sssssrichter)]

i found a workaround here:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=285176&highlight=debconf+nice+edgy

Running sudo dpkg-reconfigure debconf and choosing "dialog" as frontend solved the issue.

This worked for me.

[Marco Maini (maini10)]

The original report of this bug is very similar to bug 87641, which contains extra debug information. In my opinion, this bug could be marked as duplicate of bug 87641.

[Witold Krakowski (wkrakowski-gmail)]

I agree. I'll mark this bug and its duplicates as duplicates of 87641.
Thanks for pointing this out.