This week, in our Linux Page (in Spanish) we posted some tips about repairing a bad Linux upgrade. In fact, it is rare but sometimes, unfortunately, it happens. I mean one or more error during an upgrade installation on Ubuntu. In my case the problem was caused by a blackout and a battery which did not worked properly. When I restarted the PC it worked only in text mode and it asked me the login and the password to enter into the Ubuntu root mode. Obviously, as usual, I typed the requested data and then, after reading how to solve similar problems on internet, I decided to go forward with sudo apt-get update. At this point Ubuntu advised me that something had been wrong during the last update and suggested to try with sudo dpkg –configure -a. I followed the suggestions and I concluded the “repair session” with sudo apt-get upgrade –fix-broken. Fifteen minutes later and after rebooting all the “bad upgrade” problems were solved. Recommended!


its worked man thanksssssssssssss
You are a genius…my eyes are so red..thanks man…it works!!
it works…great!
what version you are working on. cause I have 9.10 and none on the commands you said worked.
Try :
dpkg –configure -a
apt-get upgrade –fix-broken
I’m about to look for online pc services to help me out….
MAN U ROCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thankz!!!
thanks man..!!!!
will this work with 11.04
unless you don’t have networking =/
<– got no networking after fail on upgrade to 11.10
i have the latest ubuntu available as of 2/14/12;
it tells me;
“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?”
OK, so after going through forums and trying many codes I just rebooted to end all my processes and everything went fine. until sudo apt-get upgrade –fix-broken
I get;
error: cannot read from ‘/dev/sda’.
it hangs and just keeps repeating the error.
This is the problem i was having when i initially tried installing ubuntu (right now i am just trying to get my wireless driver, ubuntu runs just fine). The harddrive was bad on this laptop so i had to get an external and install it on that. i think it is, for whatever reason, trying to read my bad internal hd. Any help would be great. So far, everything else on ubuntu seems to be fine. But then again, I have barely been using it because I don’t have the wireless driver. right now i am crammed in a corner next to my router lol. Please help if you can.
If I try “sudo apt-get upgrade -fix-broken” I get the following error:
“E: Command line option ‘i’ [from -fix-broken] is not known.”
I get a similar error with trying the other line you provided…I think this upgrade really screwed something up.
The line should be “sudo apt-get upgrade –fix-broken”
Note the second ‘-’ before the last argument.
Wow, the comment system strips away one of the dashes. No wonder this has been hard to get correct.
Anyway, there are supposed to be two dashes before the ‘fix-broken’ argument.
Thx. Damn why is this not the first hit on google
Good information. Lucky me I recently found your blog by accident (stumbleupon).
I have saved as a favorite for later!
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