I got this after doing a sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade from breezy to dapper today:

Preconfiguring packages ...
/tmp/xserver-xorg.config.120461: line 957: syntax error near unexpected token `esac'
xserver-xorg failed to preconfigure, with exit status 2
(Reading database ... 90645 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to replace xserver-xorg 6.8.2-77 (using .../xserver-xorg_7.0.0-0ubuntu24_all.deb) ...
/var/lib/dpkg/tmp.ci/config: line 957: syntax error near unexpected token `esac'
dpkg: error processing /var/cache/apt/archives/xserver-xorg_7.0.0-0ubuntu24_all.deb (--unpack):
subprocess pre-installation script returned error exit status 2
xserver-xorg postinst warning: not updating /etc/X11/xorg.conf; file has
been customized
Errors were encountered while processing:
/var/cache/apt/archives/xserver-xorg_7.0.0-0ubuntu24_all.deb
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)


I'm now afraid to restart my machine. That sounds like it might hurt.

Has anyone seen this problem? Is there a fix? Or is it safe to restart?

Thanks.

You can restart your box without worry the issue is that you will need to reconfigure X for the GUI to launch. Of course I forget the command.

This was a bug in the xserver-xorg package for Ubuntu Dapper. You can try your dist-upgrade again and it will work fine


For future reference, since you're using a testing version you can expect things to break periodically. This error has been fixed and doing apt-get update and dist-upgrade again will set things straight