dpkg: "Package is in a very bad inconsistent state" how to fix it? [duplicate]

Question

When I run command

sudo apt-get -f 

I get this error

dpkg: error processing gcc-4.8-base:i386 (--configure):
Package is in a very bad inconsistent state - you should
reinstall it before attempting configuration.
Errors were encountered while processing:
gcc-4.8-base:i386
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

I'm using Ubuntu 13.10

Answer 1

Package is in a very bad inconsistent state - you should reinstall it before attempting configuration.

You have to reinstall the package:

sudo apt-get --reinstall install gcc-4.8-base:i386

Answer 2

I tried both of the answers given above at last after a lot of struggle i found this

sudo dpkg --remove --force-all gcc-4.8-base:i386

if somebody else is looking at this answer for another package then just replace gcc-4.8-base:i386 with the name of the package causing trouble

even after this if your problem is not solved then find all the files named with your package name as a prefix and use

sudo chmod 777 filename

with all of them and then create a copy of them (in case something goes wrong) and then use

sudo rm filename

to delete of them and then run this again

sudo dpkg --remove --force-all gcc-4.8-base:i386

Answer 3

Actually the problem is related to gcc 4.8 ,use the following to solve this issue -

Remove gcc-

sudo apt-get purge gcc-4.8

now check -

sudo apt-get -f

for correcting all broken downloads.

Add repository-

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:ubuntu-toolchain-r/test
sudo apt-get update

install again -

sudo apt-get install gcc-4.8

hope it will work.