apt-get dist-upgrade failed with: dpkg: error: dpkg status database is locked by another process

[Andy Whitcroft]

Twice recently I have had apt-get dist-upgrade runs error out claiming locks were already taken. In the first case I was able to issue and apt-get update in parallel which worked unexpectedly and killed the dist-upgrade. The second case (this one) occured spontaneously (I suspect due to apt-daemon doing the same thing).

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.04
Package: apt 0.8.16~exp12ubuntu3
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.2.0-15.24-generic 3.2.5
Uname: Linux 3.2.0-15-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 1.91-0ubuntu1
Architecture: amd64
Date: Wed Feb 15 15:21:22 2012
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 12.04 LTS "Precise Pangolin" - Alpha amd64 (20111210)
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_GB:en
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 LANG=en_GB.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: apt
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[Andy Whitcroft (apw)]

Terminal output in the apt-get dist-upgrade window is attached.

[Brian Murray (brian-murray)]

Could you please add the log file /var/log/syslog from the relevant time frame and /var/log/apt/ahistory.log. Thanks in advance.

[Steve Langasek (vorlon)]

you don't happen to have landscape installed on this machine, do you?

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

[Expired for apt (Ubuntu) because there has been no activity for 60 days.]