Score:2

Ubuntu

Lot of dpkg package missing, but I can't reinstall them

Marco Sulla

2/19/24, 12:15 PM

I had a problem with python-debian package with Lubuntu 18.04 and I reinstalled it. After that I get a lot of:

dpkg: warning: files list file for package 'PACKAGE' missing; assuming package has no files currently installed

I reinstalled a lot of them with apt-get install --reinstall PACKAGE1 PACKAGE2 etc, but a bunch of them I can't reinstall:

Reinstallation of PACKAGE is not possible, it cannot be downloaded.

I think it's because these packages are old or manually installed from source (as llvm-10). These packages are anyway installed and working.

How can I get rid of these annoying warnings?

EDIT

Currently, GChuf's answer worked, but I still have the warnings for these packages:

libarchive13:amd64
libnm0:amd64
python3-zope.interface
network-manager

and they depends from packages I don't have the bravery to pass to dpkg -r

321

2 + 6

package-management

apt

dpkg

lubuntu

software-installation

guiverc

2/19/24, 12:18 PM

FYI: Lubuntu 18.04 LTS is no longer supported; refer https://lubuntu.me/bionic-eol/ or https://fridge.ubuntu.com/2020/08/14/ubuntu-18-04-5-lts-released/ where you'll note only Ubuntu Server, Ubuntu Desktop & Ubuntu Cloud come with 5 years of support; *flavors* had shorter lives. I'd suggest using `ubuntu-support-status` to assess the security status of your actual install. Your question is still on-topic here, but consider how much security matters to you and the results of prior command. You're now using Ubuntu 18.04 LTS with LXDE (*not Lubuntu*).

Marco Sulla

2/20/24, 7:00 PM

@guiverc *"Lubuntu 18.04 LTS is no longer supported"* I quite know :)

GChuf

2/27/24, 1:27 PM

How did you reinstall the packages?

Marco Sulla

2/27/24, 6:58 PM

@GChuf I reinstalled the packages with `apt-get install --reinstall PACKAGE1 PACKAGE2 etc`. This did not work with the packages I'm asking help

GChuf

2/28/24, 9:00 AM

Just to be clear, what is the actual thing you want to solve? Successfully reinstall all missing packages, or get rid of dpkg warnings?

Marco Sulla

2/28/24, 10:44 AM

@GChuf Get rid of the warnings.

Score:2

Ubuntu

GChuf

2/28/24, 11:14 AM

TL;DR

dpkg -r PACKAGE1 PACKAGE2 PACKAGE3 ...

Short explaination:

dpkg -r removes an installed package without removing the config files.

In this case, dpkg -r did not perform a real "uninstall", since the packages were not installed through dpkg or apt.

It simply removed some leftover files or entries on Marco's PC - I wasn't able to find the information on where these entries could be stored other than under "/var/lib/dpkg/info".

There may be other explainations possible, and I don't know how exactly this situation would happen in the first place.

Not sure if any of these will help you, but it's worth a try.

Check if dpkg sees the packages:

dpkg -l '*python3.5*'

mark to remove:

dpkg-remove PACKAGE_NAME
apt-update

remove or purge through dpkg:

dpkg -r python3.5
dpkg -P python3.5

Double check if there are any files in /var/lib/dpkg/info

ls -al /var/lib/dpkg/info/ | grep python3

Clean packages thorugh apt-get:

sudo apt-get autoclean

sudo apt-get autoremove

sudo apt-get clean

I've also come across this bash script: https://github.com/epinna/Unusedpkg

If anything happened, reboot the PC afterwards.

EDIT

I can find all of these 4 packages through apt on ubuntu 20:

libarchive13:amd64
libnm0:amd64
python3-zope.interface
network-manager

I suggest you simply try to reinstall these 4.

+ 8

Marco Sulla

2/28/24, 1:06 PM

`dpkg -r` worked. It left only some packages, I'll remove the warnings for them with relax :)

GChuf

2/28/24, 1:39 PM

I'm glad! I accepted your edit as well.

GChuf

2/28/24, 1:40 PM

P.S. if the bounty is still available, I'd gladly accept it, thank you!

Someone

2/28/24, 1:44 PM

Great! Could you please explain why or how the `dpkg -r` removed the warnings; and would be appreciated if you include why the error message generate in the first place... It would attract votes and add content to your answer making it more trustable.

Marco Sulla

2/28/24, 6:38 PM

I'll second @AlwaysAvailable . What I found surprising is that it seemed to remove only the warning, without uninstalling any package (I tested it first with python3.5, to be safe)

GChuf

2/28/24, 8:42 PM

Added a short explaination which might be lacking a little bit - if anyone knows more than I do about this, feel free to make an edit. I've also checked the 4 packages that still output a warning for you and updated the answer.

Someone

3/1/24, 11:59 AM

Worth noticing, that the post installation scripts and the pre installation scripts along with the lists files of the packages are stored in `var/lib/dpkg/info`; since those files were missing, dpkg threw warnings related to the same (surprisingly, someone or some packages had manually removed those files); `dpkg -r` or even better `dpkg -P` just completely remove the package, so no installation candidate is sustained, so dpkg just assumes that those packages were never installed and stopped the warnings. Also, the packages are crucial and I suggest @MarcoSulla to reinstall them.

Marco Sulla

3/18/24, 3:47 PM

@AlwaysAvailable thank you for the explaining. About reinstalling them, I suppose they are already installed. For example, python3.5 is available, even after `dpkg -r python3.5`. I suppose they were simply not listed as installed after the reinstalling of `python-debian`, since these packages are no more available in the Ubuntu repo.

Score:-1

Ubuntu

Efi Jeremiah

2/25/24, 1:40 AM

Try clean the dpkg package list cache using commands:

    sudo dpkg --clear-avail
    sudo apt-get update

If the warning messages persist, try remove the package's files list manually like this:

    sudo rm /var/lib/dpkg/info/<PACKAGE>.list

+ 3

Marco Sulla

2/25/24, 7:43 PM

`--clear-avail` did not worked, and there's no file for problematic packages in `/var/lib/dpkg/info/`

Efi Jeremiah

2/26/24, 4:34 PM

what do you get when try reinstall? upgrade the package?

Marco Sulla

2/26/24, 8:51 PM

I can't reinstall because they are no more present in the repository (there's python3.5 for example). I could remove them, but they are not listed by autoremove and I do not want to mess up things (more than that...)

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EN: Lot of dpkg package missing, but I can't reinstall them

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