flashplugin-nonfree not successfully upgraded to adobe-flashplugin upon upgrade from 8.04 to 10.04

[Josh Follmann]

Binary package hint: flashplugin-nonfree

1) The problem occurred upon upgrading directly from 8.04 to 10.04
2) The prior installed flashplugin-nonfree version was 10.0.1.218+really9.0.262.0ubuntu1
    The version of adobe-flashplugin the upgrade tool attempted to install was 10.0.45.2-1lucid1
3) The old flashplugin-nonfree package should have been removed, and adobe-flashplugin installed in its place.
4) The upgrade tool stated there had been an error installing the new package, but that the upgrade could continue (i assume because flash is non-critical). Unfortunately I did not note the error at the time - this machine doesn't actually need flash so I planned to remove it after the upgrade completed. However, upon booting up after the upgrade, I discovered I am unable to remove the flashplugin-nonfree package through normal means.

ProblemType: Package
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.04
Package: flashplugin-nonfree 10.0.1.218+really9.0.262.0ubuntu1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.32-21.32-generic 2.6.32.11+drm33.2
Uname: Linux 2.6.32-21-generic i686
AptOrdering:
 flashplugin-nonfree: Remove
 flashplugin-installer: Install
 flashplugin-nonfree: Install
 flashplugin-installer: Configure
 flashplugin-nonfree: Configure
Architecture: i386
Date: Fri Apr 30 13:11:45 2010
ErrorMessage: Package is in a very bad inconsistent state - you should reinstall it before attempting a removal.
SourcePackage: flashplugin-nonfree
Title: package flashplugin-nonfree 10.0.1.218+really9.0.262.0ubuntu1 failed to install/upgrade: Package is in a very bad inconsistent state - you should reinstall it before attempting a removal.

[Darby (darby19d)]

This solution worked for me:

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/flashplugin-nonfree/+bug/518263

[Josh Follmann (jfollmann)]

It looks like this bug report should probably be merged with #518263

Also, thanks Darby! Editing /var/lib/dpkg/status does fix the problem (I also went through and removed all files associated with the flashplugin-nonfree package).