Solved: Re: Update: Last Linux kernel did not install correctly (was: Re: Problems with Apper / automatic upgrading of my Debian 7.11 system)

[rhkramer@gmail.com]

Thanks to all who responded!  The problem is resolved.  The basic problem was 
lack of space on /var/tmp.  I think the biggest takeaway (for me) was the 
suggestion (by Steve) to run apt-get upgrade which gave me a much more 
informative error message (than apper).

Steve <dlist@bluewin.ch> wrote to me offlist and suggested that I run apt-get 
update and then apt-get upgrade.  I did that, and apt-get upgrade told me 
there was one package not installed and offered to install it--I said yes and 
got a much more informative message than the one(s) I got from apper.

The install failed do to a lack of space on /var/tmp.  I found that that the 
kde http cache was using a lot of space (over half of the 500 mb partition--I 
have it on a separate partition for, for me, historicial reasons) 
(/var/tmp/kdecache-rhk/http/).

I removed all the files from that directory (rm -rf /var/tmp/kdecache-
rhk/http/*), retried apt-get upgrade, and the linux-image was installed 
successfully.  (I still haven't rebooted, and don't plan to until there is 
some good reason to do so.)

So far I haven't noticed any problem that might be due to clearing the kde 
http cache, nor do I expect any, except perhaps some delay in re-viewing 
existing open tabs (which I haven't noticed so far).

(Clarification for Steve (note ot others: in responding to Steve I mentioned 
that I thought the problem was the growth of .xsession-errors, and somehow, I 
thought I had found an .xsession-errors on /var/tmp--I must have done 
something wrong (like typed in the wrong directory).  In any event, .xsession-
errors had grown to some outrageous size, and I've now put commands in my 
crontab to truncate that file once a minute.  Unfortunately, the space hasn't 
been freed up yet, but it is irrelevant to the problem of installing the linux 
image.  Of course, rebooting is one of the ways (iiuc) to free up that space, 
but I think, sometime in the past, I found another way to do that, and think 
(hope) I have notes about how I did that--I will look for those before 
resorting to rebooting.)

Thanks again to all who responded!  There were other useful suggestions in 
this (and a sister) thread that I intend to add to my notes for potential 
future use.

regards,
Randy Kramer

PS: Apologies--writing this with a headache and without careful proofreading.

PPS: Someone thought that one of my statements was unclear--iirc, it had to do 
with previous Linux images that I had installed without problems--iirc, I was 
trying to say that those Linux images had, according to apper, installed 
properly, but I had never rebooted.  (uname says my system is using version 
3.2.78-1of the Linux kernel, and this upgrade was for 3.2.81-1--so I'm 
guessing that versions .79 and .80 exist somewhere on my system (or may have 
existed), but were never actually activated because I haven't rebooted.


On Wednesday, June 29, 2016 05:36:28 PM Gene Heskett wrote: