seg fault of apt-get on a linkstation (was: Re: Problem: update hell: apt-get gives segmentation fault consistently)
Hi, Mungo.
On Feb 23 2009, Mungo Henning wrote:
> I'm attempting to upgrade the kernel on my linkstation box and I'm getting
> a dreaded crash in apt-get.
Which linkstation do you have?
I have a kurobox here and the kernel for that isn't included in
Debian. I have been working with the upstream kernel devs to get it
working right with the vanilla kernel.org kernels. I'm currently
running a uImage kernel (booted with uBoot):
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
rbrito@lutz:~$ uname -a
Linux lutz 2.6.30-rc3 #2 Thu Apr 23 23:06:06 BRT 2009 ppc GNU/Linux
rbrito@lutz:~$
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Quite fresh, as you can see.
> When I run the webinstaller shell script it bombs out as copied-and-pasted
> below:
Is this André's webinstaller/kernel? I never used them myself. I use my
own compiled kernels, so that everything stays under the control of the
package manager.
Oh, BTW, you may want to install my package avr-evtd (I'm upstream of
it, together with Bob Perry a.k.a. lbworm). Please, install avr-evtd if
you have not done so and install popularity-contest, so that it is
counted.
(...)
> URL:http://downloads.buffalo.nas-central.org/Installers/Webinstaller/md5sums
> /latest-modules.tar.gz.md5 [56/56] -> "latest-modules.tar.gz.md5" [1]
> --> modules retrieved.
OK so far.
> Buffalo400Gb:/tmp# apt-get -y install module-init-tools
Can you install other packages? Do you really need a newer m-i-t? (Not
that this solves the problem with apt-get segfaulting).
> Segmentation faultsts... 9%
> Buffalo400Gb:/tmp# ls -lt /var/cache/apt
> total 19800
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 1000000001 Feb 22 15:41 pkgcache.bin
> drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 14336 Feb 22 09:39 archives
> -rw-r--r-- 1 root root 19169764 Aug 17 2007 available
> Buffalo400Gb:/tmp#
What about "dpkg -i /var/cache/apt/archives/apt*.deb" and then trying to
use apt-get again?
> It looks as if I'm in update-hell: the updater is crashing out even
> after pushing the cache limit up to something ridiculous such as
> 1000000000 (== 1,000,000,000 ).
I'm not so sure that this regards the problem that you've been seeing.
> For the last two or three days I have revisited this problem
> sporadically. I usually end up with half a dozen firefox windows open
> on this laptop, each with a dozen tab pages following any threads
> relating to this problem.
This is strange, as I keep my kurobox perfectly updated with sid (which
is debian's unstable version of the distribution; I even run some
packages from debian's experimental branch).
> I've optimistically tried several variants in order to fix the
> problem, hence I could have taken the machine into a worse state.
If you can still use wget, then it might be a reasonable thing to
install either an older apt package or a newer one, if reinstalling the
current one doesn't fix your problem.
Also, can you use other tools from the apt suite? Like, say:
"apt-cache policy apt"?
> I'm even starting to doubt myself regarding the configuration: when I
> view the debian_version it shows "5.0" but I installed the box
> originally a couple of years ago and only recently attempted the
> update.
You might want to remove some cruft from your box with programs like
cruft, debfoster, aptitude, deborphan etc. All those are very useful in
removing unwanted stuff, especially if you have "alien" libraries in
/usr/local and not everything installed from Debian.
If there is any program that you need that is not yet available in
Debian, post an RFP (Request For Packaging) bugreport to the
pseudo-package "wnpp" and, if it interesting, other people might do it
the Debian way.
If it is interesting for a linkstation/kurobox, even I could package it.
> So how do I extricate myself out of this mire: I'd love to obtain a
> working "apt-get" that doesn't hit a segmentation violation, but the
> only mechanism I know of to get a new version is to use the existing
> (broken) apt-get, hence I am in "catch 22" situation!
See the wget/dpkg solution cited above.
> Any replies to the effect of "just restore the previous version" might
> prove futile: some of the advice I read was to clear out the cache
> hence I'm guessing that the backups have gone.
See the wget solution cited above.
> Pragmatically, I use this little linkstation box as a third-level
> backup disk: the main files are on my PCs, I have a terabyte external
> hard disk as my backup media and I backup the terabyte to the
> linkstation. So the files on it are not *absolutely* important but
> I'd want to preserve them if possible: no disk-formats entertained at
> the moment.
I use my kurobox as my second-level backup and an external USB HD as a
third level.
I would not even contemplate suggesting a "install from scratch". It is
way more enlightening to know how things work with the system up and
running.
> Have got to the "totally p*ssed off" stage, I throw myself upon the
> mercy of the newsgroup and humbly request any help that is offered. If
> you need further data information then please let me know.
Actually, if I were you, I would subscribe to this list and follow it.
It's (sadly) low traffic nowadays and it is possible to keep discussions
in a more convenient format than those in the web forums.
Hope this helps slightly, Rogério Brito.
--
Rogério Brito : rbrito@{mackenzie,ime.usp}.br : GPG key 1024D/7C2CAEB8
http://www.ime.usp.br/~rbrito : http://meusite.mackenzie.com.br/rbrito
Projects: algorithms.berlios.de : lame.sf.net : vrms.alioth.debian.org
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