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An unresolvable problem occurred while initializing the package information.

Please report this bug against the 'update-manager' package and include the following error message:

'E:Type 'e' is not known on line 18 in source list /etc/apt/sources.list,
 E:The list of sources could not be read.,
 E:The package lists or status file could not be parsed or opened.'

How do I fix it?

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  • Whats the output of sed -n '18p' /etc/apt/sources.list ?
    – heemayl
    Jun 21, 2015 at 21:02
  • Try to rm /var/lib/apt/lists/* and then run sudo apt-get update again
    – Sergiy Kolodyazhnyy
    Jun 21, 2015 at 21:10

1 Answer 1

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First, make a backup of your sources.list file: sudo cp /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list.backup

Then, go to this site: http://repogen.simplylinux.ch/ and check the boxes for all the software repositories you want. (I would use main, restricted, universe, multiverse, security, and updates).

Then, either copy and paste that file into your /etc/apt/sources.list file, overwriting it, or follow the cURL directions on that site (something like curl http://repogen.simplylinux.ch/txt/sources_<some-giant-string>.txt | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list

It sounds like your sources.list file has a typo somewhere, and this should fix it.

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  • :( iam so confused iam also new so :(
    – UbuntuNinja101
    Jun 21, 2015 at 22:16
  • Ah, OK, so a quick explanation; sources.list is a list that your package manager (in this case apt-get) uses to keep track of all of the places from which you obtain software. Usually, this file should be typo-free, but if you ever get third-party software from ppa repositories and you (or a program) are editing it it can be corrupted. In general, the best way to fix it is just to start over with a clean version of the file generated using an online generator like the one at repogen. Could you post the contents of your current /etc/apt/sources.list file? That may be helpful.
    – 3_humped_CAML
    Jun 22, 2015 at 0:13
  • So are you saying the things i downloaded could have messed it up and caused a typo? Can i delete the stuff i downloaded and that will fix it?
    – UbuntuNinja101
    Jun 23, 2015 at 18:12

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