using apt-get gives "E: Method gave invalid 200 URI Start message" for every repository

[Gijs Molenaar]

Since I updated to saucy I always get:

E: Method gave invalid 200 URI Start message

when using apt-get or aptitude. I've disabled all sources except for the main archive, but I still get this message. I also get it for all mirrors I tried (US, NL).

Full message:

$ sudo aptitude update
Ign http://archive.ubuntu.com saucy InRelease
Hit http://archive.ubuntu.com saucy Release.gpg
Hit http://archive.ubuntu.com saucy Release
Hit http://archive.ubuntu.com saucy/main amd64 Packages
Get: 1 http://archive.ubuntu.com saucy/main i386 Packages [1,256 kB]
Get: 2 http://archive.ubuntu.com saucy/main Translation-en [712 kB]
Fetched 2 B in 0s (13 B/s)
E: Method gave invalid 200 URI Start message

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 13.10
Package: apt 0.9.9.1~ubuntu3
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.11.0-11.17-generic 3.11.3
Uname: Linux 3.11.0-11-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.12.5-0ubuntu1
Architecture: amd64
Date: Mon Oct 7 11:51:30 2013
InstallationDate: Installed on 2012-09-27 (374 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 12.10 "Quantal Quetzal" - Alpha amd64 (20120612)
MarkForUpload: True
SourcePackage: apt
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to saucy on 2013-10-04 (2 days ago)

[Gijs Molenaar (gijzelaar)]

updating apt and libapt-pkg4.12 to 0.9.11.4 from debian didn't have any effect also.

[Gijs Molenaar (gijzelaar)]

downgrading apt and libapt-pkg4.12 to 0.9.7.7ubuntu4 doesn't have any effect also.

[Gijs Molenaar (gijzelaar)]

error message really comes from libapt-pkg5.12:

apt-pkg/acquire-worker.cc:270: _error->Error("Method gave invalid 200 URI Start message");

[David Kalnischkies (donkult)]

Please run:
sudo apt-get update -o Debug::pkgAcquire::Worker=1 2>&1 | tee /tmp/apt-1236258-update-with-debug.log
and attach the resulting /tmp/apt-1236258-update-with-debug.log to the bugreport.
Mentioning the exact sources.list line you are using to configure the mirror would help to.

Its a rather obscure error, I at least haven't seen it so far in my few years around apt, so mention any APT-configuration you have changed. Also, check that the packages 'apt', 'libapt-pkg4.12' and 'libapt-inst1.5' have the same version.

Oh, and don't install debian packages for key software like APT, in this very case its the same team and not that many ubuntu-specific patches applied (which aren't critical), but its not a good idea in general.

[Gijs Molenaar (gijzelaar)]

content of my sources.list:

deb http://nl.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ saucy main

versions:
apt 0.9.9.1~ubuntu3
libapt-pkg4.12:amd64 0.9.9.1~ubuntu3
libapt-pkg4.12:amd64 0.9.9.1~ubuntu3

I promise I will not install debian packages on ubuntu anymore ;) But I did not play with these packages before the problems occured, I installed the saucy ubuntu packages again. i did not modify my apt config, I had some external repos in /etc/apt/sources.lists.d but these are all disabled now.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[NoahY (noahy)]

This was an issue with locale for me; fixing locale and then rebooting fixed the problem here.

[Collin Richards (richardscollin)]

Had the same issue and it was indeed a locale issue for me as well. To fix this and other errors I changed my /etc/default/locale file to:
LANGUAGE=en_US.UTF-8
LANG=en_US.UTF-8
LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8

Then run:
sudo locale-gen
sudo dpkg-reconfigure locales