After completing a full scan under klamav last friday(I also have a windows partition) I followed some update prompts for mandriva spring 2009 got into some sort of loop in installing additional required packages, gave up trying to complete. Next morning on booting the init script failed at the Nvidia graphics 'unknown file' 'bad' 'exiting' (should have written the relevant parts) of the logfile down. Struggled all weekend thinking I could try and install new Nvidia drivers dowmloaded under windows. Learnt su and mount and telinit 3 but bash seems unstable under runlevel 3 as the init script trys to load the graphics drivers again.
At a loss, about to reinstall Mandriva totally again! any help appreciated.

Since you are dealing with a failed update, you need to get that done first. At the command line try to run the command
'urpmi --auto-update' as root user. If it completes, good stuff. If it fails, please post the error messages.

Once the correct updates are in place, you will have a chance to sort out the Nvidia stuff.

Hi Cliff

Many thanks, you stopped me fumbling around in the dark.
Here are my error messages:
Some on the way:

Failed to download locales-en-2.10.1-4mdv2010.0.i586.rpm

You may need to update your urpmi database

perl-Glib-1.222-1mdv2010.0.i586.rpm

perl-HTML-3.620.0-3mdv2010.0.i586.rpm

perl-Libconf-0.42.10-2mdv2010.0.i586.rpm

Last screen on program exit:

…retrieving failed: aria2 failed: exited with 1

Installation failed, some files are missing:
http://ftp.u-strsbg.fr/linux/distrib...010.0.i586.rpm
…harddrake-ui…
… Libconf-0.42.10-2mdv2010.0.i586.rpm
…urpmi-6.32-2. 1mdv2010.0.noarch.rpm
… drakxtools-curses-12.77.6-1.1mdv2010.0.i586.rpm
… perl-UPRM-3.33-1mdv2010.0.i586.rpm
… perl-Mail-SpamAssassin-3.2.5-11-1mdv2010.0.i586.rpm
…drakxtools-12.77.6-1.1mdv2010.0.i586.rpm
… harddrake-12.77.6-1.1mdv2010.0.i586.rpm
You may need to update your urpmi database.

Try to continue anyway? (y/N) y

Do I need to run a command to update the urpmi database and then try again?

Or is it just that the linux mirror in Strasbourg is down? How could I then change the mirror that urpmi calls?
Thanks again Nick

To question 1, yes.

I have no way of knowing if a particular mirror is down. You can always change mirrors.

Use Easy Urpmi to change mirrors, or add any you may want. The link -->http://mandrivausers.org/easyurpmi/
Follow the instructions on easy urpmi to add or change mirrors.

You can find much more information here -->http://wiki.mandriva.com/en/Tools#Packaging_Tools

for updating mirrors, and updating data bases for mirrors. This link may help also.

http://wiki.mandriva.com/en/Urpmi#urpmi.update

Hi Cliff,

Not sure if I'm retrieving anything
urpmi.update updates
gives /usr/bin/aria2c: /usr/lib/libxml2.so.2: no version information available (required by /usr/bin/aria2c)
...retrieving failed: aria2 failed: exited with 1

Is there anyway I can check that I am connecting to the net? Or is it even possible running under safe mode run level1 which is all that works at present?

thanks again
Nick

I just ran the command, this is what it looks like when it works.

You can tell you are up to date or are being updated by the long lines ending in '.hdlist.cz'. I did this as a regular user, I don't think there is any reason to be root. It should run as root ( I think ).

The files being reported as " No Version information available " are they installed on your system? I'm wondering if this partial update has replaced some, but not all of the files used in urpmi updates.

The easy way is to ping something you expect to be there. An example...

This shows DNS lookup worked, and I can ping the destination I chose.

Hi Cliff,

urpmi.update Main Updates

gives me

urpmi.update: /usr/lib/libxml2.so.2: no version information available (required by /usr/lib/libfontconfig.so.1)
urpmi.update: /usr/lib/libxml2.so.2: no version information available (required by /usr/lib/libfontconfig.so.1)

running
la /usr/lib | more
I can scroll down to find
libxml2.so.2@
What’s the significance of the @?

ping www.linuxquestions.org
gives
ping : unknown host www.linuxquestions.org

So I guess I’m not connected to the net under runlevel1. I can su and change runlevels with telinit 2 or 3 say but then the shell becomes totally unstable jumping from a login: prompt back to the shell prompt and then the current user prompt, making it impossible to run any command.

Hoping you don’t loose patience
Nick

The @ sign indicates this is a symlink to the real file. ie, the real file is elsewhere on the system and this entry should point to the location. It may also allow the sym link to point to a file with a slightly different file name. It is a common practise. To find out where the link points, try using the command 'file libxml2.so.2' without the quotes, and without the trailing @ symbol. That should list what and where it points.

This looks more like DNS did not work on the run level you were in. Try to ping the IP address 75.126.162.205 this is the address of linuxquestions. If that works, you are online, but without DNS lookup working.

Are you using DHCP to get an IP address, or have you got a static set up? You can always run the command 'ifconfig' to list the active interfaces.

Hi Cliff

file libxml2.so.2

gives

libxml2.so.2: cannot open ‘libxml2.so.2’ (No such file or directory)

so I guess I only have the pointer

ping 75.126.162.205

gives

connect : Network is unreachable

so I don’t suppose I’m connected

ifconfig

gives

-bash: ifconfig: command not found

but

man ifconfig

works so it seems things are missing even within bash.
I have the Mandriva Powerpack DVD that I used to load the 2009 system, should I change tacks, I think I’ve learnt how to mount to the cdrom drive? It might be possible to reinstall without formatting and save my files?

continuing thanks
Nick

There was an update to the package libxml2_2, and this is the package the file libxmls.so.2 belongs to. Since you had a failure during update, it looks like the old version got deleted, and the new one not installed. I checked on my system, and I do have the package libxml2_2 installed. So, the trick is to reinstall this package to fix this issue.

In order to do that, I think we'll have to get your network working.
The file ifconfig is in /sbin directory. You should be able to run that as a non root user if you give the path, try the command '/sbin/ifconfig' That should work, unless the file is not there.

The ping not working may because the interface is not up in run level 1. You could always try to activate it.

For that you could try ( as root ) 'ifconfig eth0 up' assuming your interface is called eth0.

Hi Cliff,
I could only try out your suggestions late last night and didn’t have this second machine with me to document things as I went.

Trying to reconstruct:

running '/sbin/ifconfig' as a non root user returned me straight to the prompt.

so I listed the contents of the sbin folder and sbin was there in dark green with a * at the end which I think means it’s a script.
I also noticed ifcfg* so I ‘man’ed this and I think I tried ‘source /sbin/ifcfg’ at some stage and was taken right back to the shell prompt. Logging in again ‘ifconfig’ worked as root user and listed my Ethernet connection as eth0.
So joy at last, however all attempts to run urpmi commands ended with “mirror list” not found or similar.
So I decided to call it a night and being basically a “windows man” disconnected from the net by powering down, hoping I can reconnect today.

Thanks again

Nick

Strange behaviour to say the least. If ifconfig ran, then the binary is there.

ifcfg is used to configure, or change the configuration of your ethernet adapters. If you want to look at your current configuration, you should have files at /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts . The first ethernet card should have a file called ifcfg-eth0 the next will end in a 1. Have a look to see what is there. Here is what it may look like, this is my adapter. Note, I changed the IP addresses ( security reasons ).

Hi Cliff

Tried running urpmi commands when connected

At one stage

Installation failed:
libdecore4 = 30000000:3.5.10-4.4mdv2009.0 is needed by kdelibs-common-30000000:3.5.10-4.4mdv2009.0.586

cat /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0

returns

DEVICE=eth0
BOOTPROTO=dhcp
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
ONBOOT=yes
METRIC=10

ifup eth0

returns

Determining IP information for eth0… done.
./network-functions: line 82: .: ifcfg-eth0: file not found
./network-functions: line 82: .: ifcfg-eth0: file not found
Missing config file ifcg- ifcfg-eth0.
run-parts: missing operand
Try run-parts –help for more information

Now ifconfig runs and gives me info on
Link encap
HWaddr
inet addr
Bcast
Mask
inet6 addr
Scope: … UP…RUNNING…
MTU
Metric
RX bytes
TX bytes
Interrupt

After further attempts to run urpmi commands I have (4.3 MiB) under RX bytes

At one stage I had 62 kernels to choose from but none good for an i586 laptop

Thanks Nick

What command are you running with urpmi ? Could you post it as exactly as you entered it?

This is a laptop. Are you using a wired or a wireless connection? eth0 is the first wired card. The ifcfg-eth0 command looks O.K. for a wired card, using DHCP. You must have a router. Can you confirm that?

When you ran ifconfig, did the output look like this?

Hi Cliff,
Yes I have a router.
If I run ifconfig the output looks just like that without the ‘Base address:0xc000 ‘ address entry at the end. Yesterday I had an additional ‘inet6 addr’ entry after ‘Mask’, but its not there today

I tried running
urpmi.update Main Updates

output:
/usr/bin/aria2c: /usr/lib/libxml2.so.2: no version information available (required by /usr/bin/aria2c)
medium "Main" is up-to-date
/usr/bin/aria2c: /usr/lib/libxml2.so.2: no version information available (required by /usr/bin/aria2c)
medium "Main Updates" is up-to-date
/usr/bin/aria2c: /usr/lib/libxml2.so.2: no version information available (required by /usr/bin/aria2c)
medium "Main Updates debug" is up-to-date
/usr/bin/aria2c: /usr/lib/libxml2.so.2: no version information available (required by /usr/bin/aria2c)
medium "Contrib Updates" is up-to-date
/usr/bin/aria2c: /usr/lib/libxml2.so.2: no version information available (required by /usr/bin/aria2c)
medium "Contrib Updates debug" is up-to-date
/usr/bin/aria2c: /usr/lib/libxml2.so.2: no version information available (required by /usr/bin/aria2c)
medium "Non-free Updates" is up-to-date
…retrieving failed: curl failed: exited with 22

no metadata found for medium “Restricted Updates i586 70355”

Running ‘ifconfig’ again the ‘inet6 addr: ab01::23c:45de:fgh6:7i89/01’ (representative values) is there again.
I notice in addition that both times the ‘UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST’ line is preceded by ‘Scope: Link’

Running 'file libxml2.so.2'
returns
libxml2.so.2 : cannot open 'libxml2.so.2' (No such file or directory)

Thanks Nick