package man-db 2.5.7-2 failed to install/upgrade: subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 2

[Jason Kitching]

Binary package hint: man-db

Just completed a fresh install of 10.04 and booted up.
Selected Update Manager and tried to install the latest security updates.
Crash reported detected and then followed the on screen instructions to send you the file.

Have since gone back into Update Manager to try and run remaining updates but failed again and also locked out Update Manager
Am going to try a reboot and then UM again but wanted to send this bug report first.

ProblemType: Package
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 10.04
Package: man-db 2.5.7-2
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.32-21.32-generic 2.6.32.11+drm33.2
Uname: Linux 2.6.32-21-generic i686
Architecture: i386
Date: Thu Aug 12 20:42:23 2010
ErrorMessage: subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 2
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 10.04 LTS "Lucid Lynx" - Release i386 (20100429)
SourcePackage: man-db
Title: package man-db 2.5.7-2 failed to install/upgrade: subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 2

[Jason Kitching (jason-jadrallypix)]

Looks like it was my hard drive that was causing the issue.

Booted up again and fsck reported a problem in /
Clicked M as instructed to go into Manual mode and then ran fsck and all subsequent fixes.
Rebooted.

Then went into Update Manager and was prompted to do a partial upgrade. This completed successfully and after another reboot, UM now reports my system as up to date.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Colin Watson (cjwatson)]

Thanks for your report. The basic problem here is that man-db's trigger uses debconf to decide whether to update the manual page database, but debconf is not always reliably usable in triggers. I finally figured out a simple way to avoid this problem, which I'm tracking as bug 1372673. If you are still affected by this locally (which I realise is unlikely in the case of some of the older bugs of this type), then running "sudo dpkg --configure -a && sudo apt-get -f install" in a terminal should normally be enough to get the package management system back to a sensible state.