update-manager crashed with RuntimeError in /usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/gi/overrides/Gtk.py: Gtk couldn't be initialized

[Josh Holland]

Not sure what happened, Apport window popped up.

ProblemType: Crash
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.10
Package: update-manager 1:0.173
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.5.0-15.20-generic 3.5.4
Uname: Linux 3.5.0-15-generic x86_64
NonfreeKernelModules: nvidia
ApportVersion: 2.5.2-0ubuntu1
Aptdaemon:

Architecture: amd64
Date: Wed Sep 19 16:36:04 2012
ExecutablePath: /usr/bin/update-manager
GsettingsChanges:
 b'com.ubuntu.update-manager' b'first-run' b'false'
 b'com.ubuntu.update-manager' b'launch-time' b'1347958265'
 b'com.ubuntu.update-manager' b'show-details' b'true'
 b'com.ubuntu.update-manager' b'window-height' b'621'
 b'com.ubuntu.update-manager' b'window-width' b'600'
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 12.04 LTS "Precise Pangolin" - Beta amd64 (20120328)
InterpreterPath: /usr/bin/python3.2mu
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcCmdline: /usr/bin/python3 /usr/bin/update-manager
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_GB:en
 PATH=(custom, user)
 LANG=en_GB.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
PythonArgs: ['/usr/bin/update-manager']
SourcePackage: update-manager
Title: update-manager crashed with RuntimeError in /usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/gi/overrides/Gtk.py: Gtk couldn't be initialized
UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to quantal on 2012-09-17 (2 days ago)
UserGroups: adm audio cdrom dip fuse libvirtd lpadmin plugdev sambashare sudo www-data

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

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

[Anne (anne-schmidt)]

This bug affects me but I'm having other troubles with the update-manager. Once it has installed updates, it should relaunch itself and check that the system is up-to-date but it doesn't. Most of the time the result is that I can't boot the day after. Today, I had a complete black screen, I could only use the tty. I suspected that the problem came from update manager so I uninstalled it with the option --purge. After that I made an apt-get update, re-installed update-manager and re-run apt-get update. It appeared that some packages, all of them concerning gnome, were not up-to-date. I ran an apt-get upgrade and rebooted. It was the thing to do because it solved the problem.

I'm good! :)

[jbcolvin (jbcolvin)]

I concur with Anne, or at least with the solution.

I had recently run software-updater under quantal (beta), and foolishly clicked on the partial upgrade option. The system no longer booted properly. tty7 was left with boot messages, but no logon prompt. I logged in under tty1 and ran

> startx&

and this gave me my desktop icons, but no unity plugin stuff (launcher & status bar). I also ran

> unity&

but this complained about no display being set (default = 0 ???), and maybe something about looking for a "core" library.

Anyways, I also had been using apt-get to update upgrade dist-upgrade no no avail. So when I ran...

> sudo apt-get purge update-manager
> sudo apt-get install update-manager

and rebooted, I was pleasantly surprised that everything was working again.

[Tobiasz Jarczyk (dotnokato-q)]

Hi,
I've crashed update-manager and when trying to report using ubuntu-bug my crash was marked as duplicate of this bug.
And, indeed, traceback is the same.

This is how i got it:
1. Logged to unity as user1.
2. In terminal I relogged to user2 using: su user2
3. As user2 I run update-manager from terminal and got crash:

$ update-manager
No protocol specified

** (update-manager:4253): WARNING **: Could not open X display
No protocol specified,
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/bin/update-manager", line 28, in <module>
    from gi.repository import Gtk
  File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/gi/importer.py", line 76, in load_module
    dynamic_module._load()
  File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/gi/module.py", line 244, in _load
    overrides_modules = __import__('gi.overrides', fromlist=[self._namespace])
  File "/usr/lib/python3/dist-packages/gi/overrides/Gtk.py", line 1624, in <module>
    raise RuntimeError("Gtk couldn't be initialized")
RuntimeError: Gtk couldn't be initialized

Now, I understand it is not exactly the same path as people above, but maybe this gives some kind of hint.
Also, maybe some friendlier message for this case?

[Robert Roth (evfool)]

Thank you for taking the time to report this bug and helping to make Ubuntu better. This particular bug has already been reported and is a duplicate of bug #985969, so it is being marked as such. Please look at the other bug report to see if there is any missing information that you can provide, or to see if there is a workaround for the bug. Additionally, any further discussion regarding the bug should occur in the other report. Feel free to continue to report any other bugs you may find.