dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run 'dpkg --configure -a' to correct the problem

[Adrian Macneil]

Binary package hint: synaptic

While installing some software, I had to kill off synaptic. When I restarted, I am pestered with:

E: dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run 'dpkg --configure -a' to correct the problem.
E: _cache->open() failed, please report.

Now obviously i ran this command in a terminal using sudo, and all is going smoothly now. But that is not a very helpful error message is it?

I therefore pronounce this a bug in synaptic, because it obviously doesn't know how to handle this error.

A better error would say: "synaptic was interrupted last time you were installing software, click ok to retry." or something like that.
Also the little update tray icon is complaining saying "Error: BrokenCount >0"

Clarification: I am not reporting the bug that synaptic crashed, just that it didn't know how to handle the situation. I can't find this reported anywhere else, perhaps i am blind ;) There are a few people who encountered this when installing packages, and didn't know what to do, but noone seems to be blaming synaptic for not knowing what to do in this situation.

uname -a: Linux my-laptop 2.6.24-16-generic #1 SMP Thu Apr 10 13:23:42 UTC 2008 i686 GNU/Linux
Ubuntu 8.04 hardy something

P.S. To anyone who has this message and doesn't have a clue what to do, go to Applications -> Accessories -> Terminal, and then type in "sudo dpkg --configure -a" without the quotes, press enter, type your password, enter again. all fixed :)