APT gives unclear error message: "something wicked happened" when hostname of archive cannot be found

[Jon Loldrup]

When something wicked happens when trying to download packages, this is the error message one gets:

"something wicked happened resolving 'dk.archive.ubuntu.com:http' (-5 - No address associated with hostname)"

This error message does not say anything about whether the error is local (ie. something the user has any chance to do anything about) or related to other things (is the host server down? Or is the DNS-server failing to do its deed?)

Generally, the text isn't very newbie friendly

[Sense Egbert Hofstede (sense)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this issue. I'm accepting this as a paper cut because this is a small issue affecting usability in an application that is present in the default installation of both Ubuntu and Kubuntu. This is an issue in a place that a lot of users will not see very often, so am I marking the priority as Low.

[Torsten Spindler (tspindler)]

I'm wondering what a better text might be. What about 'Please check your Internet connection. Something wicked ...'?

[matthew cooper (mczakk)]

i'm a total newbie, only using ubuntu10 1 cos i dont want to use microsoft anymore:)
i know nothing about using code, nor do i have the indepth knowledge needed to understand the answers on these forums.
i keep getting a warning triangle, and then the message
W:Failed to fetch http://<mirror>/bin/linux/ubuntu/hardy/Release.gpg Something wicked happened resolving '<mirror>:http' (-5 - No address associated with hostname)
when i follow the steps in update manager.

can anyone give me a fix in plain english?

cheers:)

[Julian Andres Klode (juliank)]

It seems logical to me that users know hostnames and addresses, or are capable of looking up the words in a dictionary. The message " No address associated with hostname" should be understandable to everyone. Yes, we could also replace it with "I do not know the address of the computer with the name BLAH", but is that really better?

[Matthew Paul Thomas (mpt)]

Most people don't know what a browser is, <http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hostname> says "The word you've entered isn't in the dictionary", and people generally spend about one or two seconds on an error message. So it's not logical to assume that people know, or will be interested and successful in looking up, what a "hostname" is.

If this message was confined to apt, maybe it would be okay. But the screenshot shows it bubbling up to gnome-codec-install. Maybe patching apt would fix this bug, but it wouldn't fix any of the other problems with the same alert. So I think this bug is actually in aptdaemon, which is what gnome-codec-install uses to install software.

[Jon Loldrup (loldrup)]

How about: "Download server cannot be found. Pleas check your internet
connection or try again later."
On Feb 26, 2011 5:16 PM, "Torsten Spindler" <email address hidden> wrote:
> I'm wondering what a better text might be. What about 'Please check your
> Internet connection. Something wicked ...'?
>
> ** Changed in: apt (Ubuntu)
> Status: New => Triaged
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are a direct subscriber
> of the bug.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/646834
>
> Title:
> APT gives unclear error message: "something wicked happened" when
> hostname of archive cannot be found
>
> Status in One Hundred Paper Cuts:
> Triaged
> Status in “apt” package in Ubuntu:
> Triaged
>
> Bug description:
> When something wicked happens when trying to download packages, this
> is the error message one gets:
>
> "something wicked happened resolving 'dk.archive.ubuntu.com:http' (-5
> - No address associated with hostname)"
>
> This error message does not say anything about whether the error is
> local (ie. something the user has any chance to do anything about) or
> related to other things (is the host server down? Or is the DNS-server
> failing to do its deed?)
>
> Generally, the text isn't very newbie friendly
>
> To unsubscribe from this bug, go to:
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/hundredpapercuts/+bug/646834/+subscribe

[Jon Loldrup (loldrup)]

On Apr 20, 2011 5:17 PM, "Matthew Paul Thomas" <email address hidden> wrote:
>
> Most people don't know what a browser is

But what IS a browser ?

(just kidding)
Jon

[David Kalnischkies (donkult)]

The question is not if its another application at fault - it a message from APT all front-ends see if the conditions are meet. The question is just if these conditions are likely to be hit: The answer to this is no as this message was already changed "recently" (2009) to include the errno and the string connected to this of the underlying method used. The message from APT is just "something wicked happened" which isn't the best, but somehow an old tradition for error messages in APT to be "wicked" than nobody could imagine a better message so far.

The message you really complain here is "No address associated with hostname" which doesn't come from APT (directly) but from the method getaddrinfo() from (e)(g)libc. The most common error conditions (EAI_NONAME, EAI_SERVICE and EAI_AGAIN) from it are captured and a "better" message is provided, but for all other (most notable the one here: EAI_NODATA) APT doesn't try to provide one as so far nobody knows how to describe it in a way that someone could understand it without deeper knowledge of networks who happens to don't understand the message from getaddrinfo…

But if someone has a good one: Feel free to suggest it! Maybe, we should even change it in (e)(g)libc then…

P.S.: That the message was changed in 2009 was a result of a bug in eglibc triggered by a missing /etc/hostname, before and since then i have never seen it in real life and the bug obviously only existed in debian unstable…

[Jon Loldrup (loldrup)]

Here's a error message taken from Google Chrome. It also occurs when there is problems with the internet connection. I find it highly relevant to our discussion of how to write error descriptions.

"This webpage is not available
The server at mail.google.com can't be found, because the DNS lookup failed. DNS is the web service that translates a website's name to its internet address. This error is most often caused by having no connection to the internet or a misconfigured network. It can also be caused by an unresponsive DNS server or a firewall preventing Google Chrome from accessing the network.
Here are some suggestions:
Reload this web page later.
Check your internet connection. Reboot any routers, modems, or other network devices you may be using.
Check your DNS settings. Contact your network administrator if you're not sure what this means.
Try disabling DNS prefetching by following these steps: Go to Wrench menu > Preferences > Under the Hood and deselect "Use DNS pre-fetching to improve page load performance."
Try adding Google Chrome as a permitted program in your firewall or antivirus software's settings. If it is already a permitted program, try deleting it from the list of permitted programs and adding it again.
If you use a proxy server, check your proxy settings or check with your network administrator to make sure the proxy server is working.
If you don't believe you should be using a proxy server, try the following steps: Go to Wrench menu > Preferences > Under the Hood > Change proxy settings and make sure your configuration is set to "no proxy" or "direct."
"

[Marcus Haslam (marcus-haslam)]

I'm out of the office until 1st August.

On 20 Apr 2011, at 16:57, David Kalnischkies
<email address hidden> wrote:

> The question is not if its another application at fault - it a message
> from APT all front-ends see if the conditions are meet. The question
> is
> just if these conditions are likely to be hit: The answer to this is
> no
> as this message was already changed "recently" (2009) to include the
> errno and the string connected to this of the underlying method used.
> The message from APT is just "something wicked happened" which isn't
> the
> best, but somehow an old tradition for error messages in APT to be
> "wicked" than nobody could imagine a better message so far.
>
> The message you really complain here is "No address associated with
> hostname" which doesn't come from APT (directly) but from the method
> getaddrinfo() from (e)(g)libc. The most common error conditions
> (EAI_NONAME, EAI_SERVICE and EAI_AGAIN) from it are captured and a
> "better" message is provided, but for all other (most notable the one
> here: EAI_NODATA) APT doesn't try to provide one as so far nobody
> knows
> how to describe it in a way that someone could understand it without
> deeper knowledge of networks who happens to don't understand the
> message
> from getaddrinfo…
>
> But if someone has a good one: Feel free to suggest it! Maybe, we
> should
> even change it in (e)(g)libc then…
>
>
> P.S.: That the message was changed in 2009 was a result of a bug in
> eglibc triggered by a missing /etc/hostname, before and since then i
> have never seen it in real life and the bug obviously only existed
> in debian unstable…
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are a member of
> Papercutters, which is subscribed to One Hundred Paper Cuts.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/646834
>
> Title:
>  APT gives unclear error message: "something wicked happened" when
>  hostname of archive cannot be found
>
> Status in One Hundred Paper Cuts:
>  Triaged
> Status in “aptdaemon” package in Ubuntu:
>  Triaged
>
> Bug description:
>  When something wicked happens when trying to download packages, this
>  is the error message one gets:
>
>  "something wicked happened resolving 'dk.archive.ubuntu.com:http' (-5
>  - No address associated with hostname)"
>
>  This error message does not say anything about whether the error is
>  local (ie. something the user has any chance to do anything about) or
>  related to other things (is the host server down? Or is the DNS-
> server
>  failing to do its deed?)
>
>  Generally, the text isn't very newbie friendly

[Marcus Haslam (marcus-haslam)]

I'm out of the office until 1st August.

On 14 Apr 2011, at 19:09, Vish <email address hidden> wrote:

> ** Changed in: hundredpapercuts
>       Status: Confirmed => Triaged
>
> ** Changed in: apt (Ubuntu)
>   Importance: Undecided => Low
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are a member of
> Papercutters, which is subscribed to One Hundred Paper Cuts.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/646834
>
> Title:
>  APT gives unclear error message: "something wicked happened" when
>  hostname of archive cannot be found
>
> Status in One Hundred Paper Cuts:
>  Triaged
> Status in “apt” package in Ubuntu:
>  Triaged
>
> Bug description:
>  When something wicked happens when trying to download packages, this
>  is the error message one gets:
>
>  "something wicked happened resolving 'dk.archive.ubuntu.com:http' (-5
>  - No address associated with hostname)"
>
>  This error message does not say anything about whether the error is
>  local (ie. something the user has any chance to do anything about) or
>  related to other things (is the host server down? Or is the DNS-
> server
>  failing to do its deed?)
>
>  Generally, the text isn't very newbie friendly