Cache Open Failed

born4books · 09-24-2008, 08:41 AM

Morning Everyone! I just wiped everything clean and installed Ubuntu 8.04. So far everything seems to work great. My only problem thus far is this... I tried going to add/remove software to add a couple programs. When they went to install I received an error message telling me

E: dpkg was interrupted, you must manually run 'dpkg --configure -a' to correct the problem.
E: _cache->open() failed, please report.

So I opened the terminal and tried to run the command and it tells me I have to be an administrator. I'm the only user, aren't I the administrator?? I'm not on a network or anything. Just me. It also did this when I tried to open music files. It loads the Totem player and says I need codecs. When I try to install them, I receive the same message.

Someone please help dumb and confused here!

salasi · 09-24-2008, 03:13 PM

It is telling you that you need administrator privileges and, under Ubuntu, you can do this by using 'sudo'. So alter the line that you typed to

Code:

 sudo dpkg --configure -a

and it should ask you for your password (your password, not a root password under Ubuntu) and you should be away.

ffilc7373 · 11-28-2008, 09:57 AM

I hope you don't mind if I join in because i have a very similar problem.
I did as you say

Code:

sudo dpkg -- configure -a

and use my password.
I then get a few line on the screen for a fraction of a second and then

Code:

┤ Configuring virtualbox-2.0 ├───────────────────────┐
 │                                                                           │ 
 │ Compilation of the kernel module FAILED!                                  │ 
 │                                                                           │ 
 │ VirtualBox will not start until this problem is fixed. Please consult     │ 
 │ /var/log/vbox-install.log to find out why the kernel module does not      │ 
 │ compile. Most probably the kernel sources were not found. Install them    │ 
 │ (the package name is probably linux-headers-<version> whereby <version>   │ 
 │ can be determined by 'uname -r') and execute                              │ 
 │                                                                           │ 
 │   /etc/init.d/vboxdrv setup                                               │ 
 │                                                                           │ 
 │ as root.                                                                  │ 
 │                                                                           │ 
 │                                  <Ok>

If I run this nothing happens.

I suspect I have a failed installation lurking in the system, how do I clear this. Thanks for any help │
│

AlucardZero · 11-28-2008, 10:16 AM

Did you install the kernel headers?

ffilc7373 · 11-28-2008, 10:32 AM

I assume installed when I installed Ubuntu 8.10
How do I check?

AlucardZero · 11-28-2008, 11:38 PM

dpkg -l linux-headers-`uname -r`

ffilc7373 · 11-30-2008, 05:51 AM

Sorry for slow turn around, hope you are still with me.

Did as you suggest

Code:

dpkg -l linux-headers-'uname -r'

This gives me

PHP Code:


			
No packages found matching linux-headers-'uname -r'

So tried

Code:

uname -r

this gives me 2.6.24-19-386

So next

Code:

sudo apt-get install linux-headers-2.6.24-19-386

I confirm password

This gives a new error message

PHP Code:


			
E: dpkg was interrupted, you must run 'dpkg --configure -a' to correct the problem

It then appears to try to set up virtualbox, ending with the Error message with which I started my question. See Error message in message #3 of this thread.
Please give me a way out!!

AlucardZero · 11-30-2008, 09:19 AM

ummm.. can you apt-get remove virtualbox ?

ffilc7373 · 11-30-2008, 10:06 AM

This is what I get

cliff@HYACINTH:~$ sudo apt-get remove virtualbox
[sudo] password for cliff:
E: Could not get lock /var/lib/dpkg/lock - open (11 Resource temporarily unavailable)
E: Unable to lock the administration directory (/var/lib/dpkg/), is another process using it?