Re: Broken perl

[Florian Kulzer <florian.kulzer+debian@icfo.es>]

On Thu, Oct 30, 2008 at 23:24:33 -0300, Victor Munoz wrote:
> Hello. I've got a very complex situation here with perl. I'm running
> sid, and last weekend's update left my system partially broken.
> Basically, perl was left in a "partially installed" status. This means
> that perl itself and several other packages cannot be upgraded because
> the system can't find some perl files. 
> 
> Currently, I've got several packages flaged for
> removal/install/update. So when I start aptitude I press "g", and then
> it proceeds to do its stuff, but I get things like this:
> 
> Reading package fields... Done
> Reading package status... Done
> Retrieving bug reports... Done
> Parsing Found/Fixed information... Done
> (Reading database ... 206704 files and directories currently installed.)
> Removing ttf-liberation ...
> Can't locate File/Copy.pm in @INC (@INC contains: /etc/perl
> /usr/local/lib/perl/5.8.8 /usr/local/share/perl/5.8.8 /usr/lib/perl5
> /usr/share/perl5 /usr/lib/perl/5.8 /usr/share/perl/5.8
> /usr/local/lib/site_perl .) at /usr/bin/defoma-font line 7.
> BEGIN failed--compilation aborted at /usr/bin/defoma-font line 7.
> dpkg: error processing ttf-liberation (--purge):
>  subprocess pre-removal script returned error exit status 2
>  Errors were encountered while processing:
>   ttf-liberation
>   E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
>   A package failed to install.  Trying to recover:

[...]

> And I guess most of it is due to the fact that perl failed to be
> upgraded correctly, for whatever reason I don't understand. 

If perl works again then all the rest should be fixable with a simple
"aptitude install -f".
 
> For reference, perl-base is flagged for update, from 5.8.8-12 to
> 5.10.0-16, but currently the perl package has a "B" flag and
> perl-modules has a "u" flag, and aptitude says I have version
> 5.10.0-16 installed, which is the latest. But they've not been
> configured completely, and several things do not work. 

I think your problem is similar to this one:

http://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2008/08/msg01904.html

You can try to follow the same procedure. I can walk you through it
step-by-step if necessary; in that case, start by posting the output of
the three commands that I mention in my first message in the August
thread.

-- 
Regards,            | http://users.icfo.es/Florian.Kulzer
          Florian   |