update-manager crashed with OSError in _get_application_for_package(): [Errno 5] Input/output error

[Mike Kupfer]

I started update-manager with "gksu update-manager" from an i3 environment. The update manager downloaded the updates okay, but it seemed to hang while installing one of the kernel packages. I did a little poking around with strace. update-manager was waiting for a Perl child process to finish. The Perl process seemed to be stuck doing a read (fd 3, if I remember correctly).

I got tired of waiting, so I killed the update manager window (alt-q) and rebooted.

After the system rebooted I logged in to the Xubuntu session. I started the update manager from the apps menu. I got an error pop-up from update manager window:

    Package operation failed

    The installation or removal of a software package failed.
    [Settings...] [Try again][OK]

This was followed by a notice of a crash.

ProblemType: Crash
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 13.04
Package: update-manager 1:0.185
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.8.0-14.24-generic 3.8.4
Uname: Linux 3.8.0-14-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.9.2-0ubuntu5
Architecture: amd64
Date: Wed Mar 27 19:42:08 2013
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'1364516446'
 b'com.ubuntu.update-manager' b'show-details' b'true'
 b'com.ubuntu.update-manager' b'window-height' b'1038'
 b'com.ubuntu.update-manager' b'window-width' b'706'
InstallationDate: Installed on 2013-03-17 (12 days ago)
InstallationMedia: Xubuntu 13.04 "Raring Ringtail" - Alpha amd64 (20130311.1)
InterpreterPath: /usr/bin/python3.3
MarkForUpload: True
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcCmdline: /usr/bin/python3 /usr/bin/update-manager
PythonArgs: ['/usr/bin/update-manager']
SourcePackage: update-manager
Title: update-manager crashed with OSError in _get_application_for_package(): [Errno 5] Input/output error
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)
UserGroups:

[Mike Kupfer (mkupfer37)]

After this bug was filed, I noticed another automatic bug report window, which was about the failure to install the kernel package mentioned in my original description. If I understood the report (and IIRC), the problem happened during the preinstall phase.

Unfortunately, apport-gtk crashed when I asked to submit this 2nd bug.

[Mike Kupfer (mkupfer37)]

Sorry, a correction to my earlier text. It was dpkg, not update-manager, that was waiting for the perl script.