Calibre crashes on startup after upgrade from 11.10 to 12.04

[Alex Thompson]

Calibre doesn't start after upgrading to 12.04, with the crash log

python2.7: /build/buildd/sip4-4.13.2/siplib/siplib.c:10938: sipEnumType_alloc: Assertion `(((currentType)->td_flags & 0x0007) == 0x0003)' failed.
Aborted (core dumped)

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.04
Package: calibre 0.8.38+dfsg-1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.2.0-24.37-generic 3.2.14
Uname: Linux 3.2.0-24-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.0.1-0ubuntu7
Architecture: amd64
Date: Thu May 3 10:21:40 2012
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04 LTS "Lucid Lynx" - Release amd64 (20100429)
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 TERM=xterm
 SHELL=/bin/bash
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_AU.UTF-8
SourcePackage: calibre
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to precise on 2012-04-30 (2 days ago)

[Fabrice Coutadeur (fabricesp)]

Hi,

That's strange because it's working fine here, with the same version.

Could you please post the result of the following commands:
apt-cache policy python-sip
apt-cache policy calibre
apt-cache policy calibre-bin

as well as running calibre from the command line and paste here the output.

Thanks,
Fabrice

[Alex Thompson (alexofdoom)]

Since making the report, I've also upgraded another machine to 11.10 to 12.04 and calibre still works fine on that one, so it must be something specific to the packages on this machine.. Below is the further detail you requested.

alex@clacks:~$ calibre
python2.7: /build/buildd/sip4-4.13.2/siplib/siplib.c:10938: sipEnumType_alloc: Assertion `(((currentType)->td_flags & 0x0007) == 0x0003)' failed.
Aborted (core dumped)

python-sip:
  Installed: 4.13.2-1
  Candidate: 4.13.2-1
  Version table:
 *** 4.13.2-1 0
        500 http://au.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
calibre:
  Installed: 0.8.38+dfsg-1
  Candidate: 0.8.38+dfsg-1
  Version table:
 *** 0.8.38+dfsg-1 0
        500 http://au.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise/universe amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
calibre-bin:
  Installed: 0.8.38+dfsg-1
  Candidate: 0.8.38+dfsg-1
  Version table:
 *** 0.8.38+dfsg-1 0
        500 http://au.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise/universe amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

[Fabrice Coutadeur (fabricesp)]

Hi,

Thanks for the info, but everything looks fine there. I found reports in Suse and Debian about this error and they all points out to a non standard KDE installation.

Could you please post the result of the following command:
apt-cache policy python-qt4

and the content of your /etc/apt/sources.list file?

Thanks,
Fabrice

[Alex Thompson (alexofdoom)]

alex@clacks:~$ apt-cache policy python-qt4
python-qt4:
  Installed: 4.9.1-2really4.9-2u3~ppa1
  Candidate: 4.9.1-2really4.9-2u3~ppa1
  Version table:
 *** 4.9.1-2really4.9-2u3~ppa1 0
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     4.9.1-2ubuntu1 0
        500 http://au.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise/main amd64 Packages

Looks like a version from the n-muench ppa which I thought I had purged properly (with ppa-purge), after forcing the release version calibre works fine.

Is there any way that ppa/ppa author can be tagged in this bug, so the problem can be fixed at the source?

Thanks very much for your help :)

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Raven (doom-raven)]

The problem is in python-qt4. Open Synaptic and look at its origin, in my case it was installed locally. I purged n-muench ppa and python-qt4. After that in my source list appeared official ubuntu package:
python-qt4:
  Installed: 4.9.1-2ubuntu1
  Candidate: 4.9.1-2ubuntu1
  Version table:
 *** 4.9.1-2ubuntu1 0
        500 http://ua.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ precise/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status

[Sergio (sergio-otero)]

I've forced python-qt4 to the official Ubuntu version with synaptic and now it works.
Should i force something else?

Thanks

[Sergio (sergio-otero)]

It opens but fails to convert from EPUB to MOBI with several books (also one i know it worked a time ago).

Raven: does it work for you?

Here is the error:

calibre, version 0.8.50
ERROR: Conversion Error: <b>Failed</b>: Convert book 1 of 1

Convert book 1 of 1
Resolved conversion options
calibre version: 0.8.50
{'asciiize': False,
 'author_sort': None,
 'authors': None,
 'base_font_size': 0.0,
 'book_producer': None,
 'change_justification': u'original',
 'chapter': u"//*[((name()='h1' or name()='h2') and re:test(., '\\s*((chapter|book|section|part)\\s+)|((prolog|prologue|epilogue)(\\s+|$))', 'i')) or @class = 'chapter']",
 'chapter_mark': u'pagebreak',
 'comments': None,
 'cover': u'/tmp/calibre_0.8.50_tmp_b4NMRJ/ldHmE2.jpeg',
 'debug_pipeline': None,
 'dehyphenate': True,
 'delete_blank_paragraphs': True,
 'disable_font_rescaling': False,
 'dont_compress': False,
 'duplicate_links_in_toc': False,
 'enable_heuristics': False,
 'extra_css': None,
 'extract_to': None,
 'filter_css': u'',
 'fix_indents': True,
 'font_size_mapping': None,
 'format_scene_breaks': True,
 'html_unwrap_factor': 0.4,
 'input_encoding': None,
 'input_profile': <calibre.customize.profiles.InputProfile object at 0x2556210>,
 'insert_blank_line': False,
 'insert_blank_line_size': 0.5,
 'insert_metadata': False,
 'isbn': None,
 'italicize_common_cases': True,
 'keep_ligatures': False,
 'language': None,
 'level1_toc': None,
 'level2_toc': None,
 'level3_toc': None,
 'line_height': 0.0,
 'linearize_tables': False,
 'margin_bottom': 5.0,
 'margin_left': 5.0,
 'margin_right': 5.0,
 'margin_top': 5.0,
 'markup_chapter_headings': True,
 'max_toc_links': 50,
 'minimum_line_height': 120.0,
 'mobi_ignore_margins': False,
 'mobi_keep_original_images': False,
 'mobi_toc_at_start': False,
 'no_chapters_in_toc': False,
 'no_inline_navbars': True,
 'no_inline_toc': False,
 'output_profile': <calibre.customize.profiles.KindleOutput object at 0x2556890>,
 'page_breaks_before': u'/',
 'personal_doc': u'[PDOC]',
 'prefer_author_sort': False,
 'prefer_metadata_cover': False,
 'pretty_print': False,
 'pubdate': None,
 'publisher': None,
 'rating': None,
 'read_metadata_from_opf': u'/tmp/calibre_0.8.50_tmp_b4NMRJ/R8MrBl.opf',
 'remove_fake_margins': True,
 'remove_first_image': False,
 'remove_paragraph_spacing': False,
 'remove_paragraph_spacing_indent_size': 1.5,
 'renumber_headings': True,
 'replace_scene_breaks': u'',
 'search_replace': '[]',
 'series': None,
 'series_index': None,
 'share_not_sync': False,
 'smarten_punctuation': False,
 'sr1_replace': None,
 'sr1_search': None,
 'sr2_replace': None,
 'sr2_search': None,
 'sr3_replace': None,
 'sr3_search': None,
 'tags': None,
 'timestamp': None,
 'title': None,
 'title_sort': None,
 'toc_filter': None,
 'toc_threshold': 6,
 'toc_title': None,
 'unsmarten_punctuation': False,
 'unwrap_lines': True,
 'use_auto_toc': False,
 'verbose': 2}
InputFormatPlugin: EPUB Input running
on /tmp/calibre_0.8.50_tmp_b4NMRJ/CcVaAW.epub
Found HTML cover OEBPS/Text/cubierta.xhtml
Parsing all content...
Parsing OEBPS/Text/Section0146.xhtml ...
....................
Reading TOC from NCX...
Merging user specified metadata...
Detecting structure...
Flatten...

[Raven (doom-raven)]

Sergio, I tried multiple convert (3 books) from EPUB to MOBI and it was successfully and books opened fine. But I used the latest version of calibre 0.8.51 from this PPA: https://launchpad.net/~bodiltv/+archive/ppa

[Sergio (sergio-otero)]

I 've changed the PPA i was using to that and now it works perfectly. Thanks !!

[Danjones (goodevilgenius)]

I have this problem as well. How do I force python-qt4 to use the official version, rather than the one from the ppa? Do I have to remove the ppa first? (I'd prefer to use the ppa version of calibre, as it's up-to-date.)

[Danjones (goodevilgenius)]

This still affects me. I haven't been able to launch the calibre gui for a while now.

[Rolf Leggewie (r0lf)]

This was a problem with a 3rd party PPA repo. Closing as invalid. Please contact the author of the PPA directly.