Kubuntu upgrade 9.10 -> 10.4 fails: rarian-compat conflicts with scrollkeeper / scrollkeeper (version 0.8.1-4ubuntu1) is present and unpacked but not configured.

[Aaron Novstrup]

Binary package hint: update-manager

Distribution upgrade failed during the "Installing the upgrades" phase with the message "Could not install the upgrade The upgrade is now aborted. Your system could be in an unusable state. A recover will run now (dpkg --configure -a). Please report this bug against the 'update-manager' package and include the files in /var/log/dist-upgrade/ in the bug report. E:Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg return an error code (1), E:Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg return an error code (1)"

[Jean-Baptiste Lallement (jibel)]

Thanks for your report.

The relevant error is
---
Preparing to replace scrollkeeper 0.3.14-16ubuntu1 (using .../scrollkeeper_0.8.1-4ubuntu1_all.deb) ...
Unpacking replacement scrollkeeper ...
dpkg: warning: unable to delete old directory '/var/lib/scrollkeeper': Directory not empty
Preparing to replace librarian0 0.8.1-2ubuntu3 (using .../librarian0_0.8.1-4ubuntu1_amd64.deb) ...
Unpacking replacement librarian0 ...
Selecting previously deselected package rarian-compat.
dpkg: regarding .../rarian-compat_0.8.1-4ubuntu1_amd64.deb containing rarian-compat:
 rarian-compat conflicts with scrollkeeper
  scrollkeeper (version 0.8.1-4ubuntu1) is present and unpacked but not configured.
dpkg: error processing /var/cache/apt/archives/rarian-compat_0.8.1-4ubuntu1_amd64.deb (--unpack):
 conflicting packages - not installing rarian-compat

[ilia Lobsanov (ilia-lobsanov)]

is there a workaround?

[Bert Esser (bert-esser)]

Having same problem and so I'm unable to update anything on my system.

[ilia Lobsanov (ilia-lobsanov)]

A workaround that works for me is:
sudo dpkg -r --force-depends scrollkeeper

Then you can:
sudo apt-get -f install
sudo apt-get upgrade

[Bert Esser (bert-esser)]

@ilia thanks a lot!!!
It works!