3

A Note: This question may be the exact same question as given in How to cancel an installation in the Software Center? but the solutions listed there haven't worked for me.

Question:

I am trying to terminate a software installation from Ubuntu Software Center. I tried installing matlab-support 0.0.17 from the software center:

This package does not provide MATLAB. Instead, it configures an existing MATLAB installation to integrate more comfortably in Debian installation.

However, I didn't have MATLAB installed on my system and accidentally attempted to download matlab-support 0.0.17. As a result, I'm facing the following problem:

Whenever I open Ubuntu Software Center, I notice that there is a process always running. It shows matlab-support 0.0.17 installing...

enter image description here

I look for a way to terminate the installation from the Progress tab to get this:

enter image description here

Once there, I see no way to deselect or terminate the process.

Edit: Output for sudo apt-get install -f

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 12 not upgraded.

Edit: Output for sudo apt-get upgrade

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
The following packages have been kept back:
  dpkg-dev libatlas3gf-base libblas-dev libblas3gf libdpkg-perl liblapack-dev liblapack3gf linux-headers-generic-lts-quantal
  linux-image-generic-lts-quantal r-base-dev r8168-dkms texinfo
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 12 not upgraded.

Edit: Output for dpkg -l | grep matlab No output message:

anirudh@anirudh-Vostro-3445:~$ dpkg -l | grep matlab
anirudh@anirudh-Vostro-3445:~$ 

Edit: Output for sudo apt-get install matlab-support

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  matlab-support
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 12 not upgraded.
Need to get 0 B/27.9 kB of archives.
After this operation, 165 kB of additional disk space will be used.
debconf: DbDriver "config": /var/cache/debconf/config.dat is locked by another process: Resource temporarily unavailable
Selecting previously unselected package matlab-support.
(Reading database ... 187961 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking matlab-support (from .../matlab-support_0.0.17_all.deb) ...
Processing triggers for bamfdaemon ...
Rebuilding /usr/share/applications/bamf.index...
Processing triggers for desktop-file-utils ...
Processing triggers for gnome-menus ...
Processing triggers for hicolor-icon-theme ...
Processing triggers for man-db ...
Setting up matlab-support (0.0.17) ...
debconf: DbDriver "config": /var/cache/debconf/config.dat is locked by another process: Resource temporarily unavailable
dpkg: error processing matlab-support (--configure):
 subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 1
Errors were encountered while processing:
 matlab-support
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

Edit: Output for sudo fuser -v /var/cache/debconf/config.dat

                     USER        PID ACCESS COMMAND
/var/cache/debconf/config.dat:
                     root      11060 F.... dpkg-preconfigu

Edit: Another set of commands with output sudo kill -9 11060 and sudo apt-get install matlab-support :

anirudh@anirudh-Vostro-3445:~$ sudo kill -9 11060
anirudh@anirudh-Vostro-3445:~$ sudo apt-get install matlab-support
E: Could not get lock /var/lib/dpkg/lock - open (11: Resource temporarily unavailable)
E: Unable to lock the administration directory (/var/lib/dpkg/), is another process using it?

Edit: Output for sudo fuser /var/lib/dpkg/lock (No output message)

anirudh@anirudh-Vostro-3445:~$ sudo fuser /var/lib/dpkg/lock
[sudo] password for anirudh: 
anirudh@anirudh-Vostro-3445:~$
7
  • @A.B. - posted output.
    – Anirudh
    Oct 20, 2015 at 8:39
  • added output to dpkg -l | grep matlab
    – Anirudh
    Oct 20, 2015 at 8:49
  • I have a silly question... I read your post and it's not in there and I kind of assume you've tried this but have you tried sudo apt-get remove matlab-support perhaps? I figure you have but you didn't mention it so I might as well check to see if you tried that.
    – KGIII
    Oct 20, 2015 at 8:54
  • @A.B. - added output. @KGlll I have tried sudo apt-get purge matlab-support to no avail.
    – Anirudh
    Oct 20, 2015 at 9:02
  • @A.B. added output to sudo fuser -v /var/cache/debconf/config.dat
    – Anirudh
    Oct 20, 2015 at 9:22

2 Answers 2

1

First we have to find the blocking processes:

sudo fuser -v /var/cache/debconf/config.dat

Sample output

USER        PID ACCESS COMMAND
/var/cache/debconf/config.dat:
root      11060 F.... dpkg-preconfig

and

ps xa | grep apt

Sample output

24743 ? S 0:00 /usr/bin/python /usr/share/apt-xapian-index/update-apt-xapian-index-dbus

Kill both processes

sudo kill -9 11060
sudo kill -9 24743

and your problem is solved.

The matlab-support is not installed, as you have identified with this command

dpkg -l | grep matlab
0

I had the excact same problem with gparted. But, I saw back on the How to cancel an installation in the Software Center? question this:

pkill -15 dpkg

It worked for me, and I hope it works for you, if you have not already solved the problem.

:D

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