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I have done alot of searching and can't figure out how to fix my ubuntu installation.

I have a dual boot system with windows 7 (I can boot into windows fine). When I try to boot ubuntu from grub as per usual, it now goes into kernel panic complaining

error while loading shared libraries: libpcre.so.3: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

This happened a while back and I haven't got around to fixing it until now. I can't remember what caused this (I assume a failed update). I can't use recovery mode as it gives the same issue nor any of the older kernels still installed.

I have tried booting into text mode or single mode, but it always fails the same way with the above error.

I have tried booting via a live usb stick and have managed to mount the root directories and chroot into them. However I can't do a

sudo apt-get update ; sudo apt-get upgrade

due to the same issue. Even trying to do ls in a directory fails with the above error.

I would really appreciate any advice on how to get the ubuntu up and running again.

I have tried copying the libpcre.so.3.13.1 from the live cd to the /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/ on the harddisk, and then linked it in the same folder to libpcre.so.3. Unfortuately that didn't work either. I can't find any useful log of the failed boot to share to help with the debugging.

Please let me know if there is any additional information I can provide to help debug the issue.

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6
  • Does sudo ldconfig help?
    – Kalle Richter
    Oct 14, 2015 at 10:57
  • Thanks for the suggestion, but unfortunately it gives the same shared library error
    – Swifty
    Oct 14, 2015 at 11:19
  • fisrt thing to do is to verify if the .so exist, the file should be in /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/ directory or you can use find utils to find the file. Follow this guide to restore and check your ld path. GUIDE
    – Aizuddin Zali
    Oct 14, 2015 at 11:33
  • I have found the library in /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpcre.so.3 I made a link of it back to /lib/ I then tried sudo ldconfig, but it still doesn't work. I however get a different error message root@ubuntu:/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu# sudo ldconfig sudo: error while loading shared libraries: libpcre.so.3: wrong ELF class: ELFCLASS32 I'm guessing I have the 32bit version installed and that is screwing up the 64bit operating system
    – Swifty
    Oct 14, 2015 at 12:13
  • Remove the link of /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpcre.so.3 in /lib. After that boot into your live system, download mirrors.kernel.org/ubuntu/pool/main/p/pcre3/… and extract the file via dpkg -x libpcre3_8.31-2ubuntu2.1_amd64.deb foo and copy the content of foo into your / of your system.
    – A.B.
    Oct 14, 2015 at 18:26

1 Answer 1

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You said

Thank you A.B. That has fixed it!

Therefore I have converted my comment into an answer:

  1. Remove the link of /lib/i386-linux-gnu/libpcre.so.3 in /lib

  2. Boot into your live system

  3. Download and extract

    wget http://mirrors.kernel.org/ubuntu/pool/main/p/pcre3/libpcre3_8.31-2ubuntu2.1_amd64.deb
dpkg -x libpcre3_8.31-2ubuntu2.1_amd64.deb foo

  4. Mount your root partition of your real system

  5. Copy the content of foo into / of your real system

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