The plugin is broken. Python said: cannot import name QtWebKit

[Hadmut Danisch]

when trying to load the OpenLayersPlugin in qgis there's an error message:

 The plugin is broken. Python said:cannot import name QtWebKit

Reason revealed by strace:

qgis uses /usr/bin/python, which is a link to python 2.7 under ubuntu, and then does not find a particular python lib:

17171 stat("/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/PyQt4/QtWebKit", 0x7ffc1443c810) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
17171 openat(AT_FDCWD, "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/PyQt4/QtWebKit.x86_64-linux-gnu.so", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
17171 openat(AT_FDCWD, "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/PyQt4/QtWebKit.so", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
17171 openat(AT_FDCWD, "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/PyQt4/QtWebKitmodule.so", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
17171 openat(AT_FDCWD, "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/PyQt4/QtWebKit.py", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)
17171 openat(AT_FDCWD, "/usr/lib/python2.7/dist-packages/PyQt4/QtWebKit.pyc", O_RDONLY) = -1 ENOENT (No such file or directory)

apt-file says there are no such files in bionic. Bionic offers files for PyQt5, but not PyQt4.

I'm not sure whether this is a problem of that particular plugin or a general standard for qgis, to still use PyQt4.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 18.04
Package: qgis 2.18.17+dfsg-1
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.15.0-22.24-generic 4.15.17
Uname: Linux 4.15.0-22-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: zfs zunicode zavl icp zcommon znvpair
ApportVersion: 2.20.9-0ubuntu7
Architecture: amd64
CurrentDesktop: LXDE
Date: Thu May 24 17:02:59 2018
InstallationDate: Installed on 2018-04-30 (24 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Lubuntu 18.04 LTS "Bionic Beaver" - Release amd64 (20180426)
SourcePackage: qgis
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[Jürgen E. Fischer (jef-norbit)]

Hi Hadmut,

On Thu, 24. May 2018 at 15:15:01 -0000, Hadmut Danisch wrote:
> I'm not sure whether this is a problem of that particular plugin or a general
> standard for qgis, to still use PyQt4.

PyQt4 is not the problem - without it QGIS 2.x wouldn't run at all.

But QtWebKit is not available for PyQt4 anymore in Debian/Ubuntu. IIRC because
the webkit C++ libraries were about to be removed and PyQt4.QtWebKit was
removed upfront. QGIS itself doesn't use it, but a bunch of plugins do -
openlayers being one of them.

So this is not an actual qgis packaging problem, nor an upstream problem, nor a
problem of the plugin.

The removal of the C++ libraries never happened and the QGIS packages from
qgis.org include the PyQt4.QtWebKit bindings based on the still available
libraries.

Jürgen

--
Jürgen E. Fischer norBIT GmbH Tel. [phone]
Dipl.-Inf. (FH) Rheinstraße 13 Fax. [phone]
Software Engineer D-26506 Norden http://www.norbit.de

[Stefano Maffulli (smaffulli)]

Any idea of a workaround? QGis is of limited use in its current state on Ubuntu/Debian and I don't understand why :(

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Jürgen E. Fischer (jef-norbit)]

Hi,
On Mon, 25. Jun 2018 at 00:45:02 -0000, Stefano Maffulli wrote:
> Any idea of a workaround? QGis is of limited use in its current state on
> Ubuntu/Debian and I don't understand why :(

See https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=828031

The packages from qgis.org have a workaround...

Jürgen

--
Jürgen E. Fischer norBIT GmbH Tel. [phone]
Dipl.-Inf. (FH) Rheinstraße 13 Fax. [phone]
Software Engineer D-26506 Norden http://www.norbit.de