dpkg error on apt-get upgrade

[Lennart Sorensen]

On Thu, Oct 21, 2010 at 11:17:53AM -0400, Christopher Browne wrote:
> It is somewhat self-explanatory...
> 
> That particular file is in two packages, which conflicts.
> 
> You might resolve this by de-installing the offending packages, and
> installing "fresh" the stuff you want.
> 
> Perhaps a bug needs to be reported.  You could use reportbug to do so.
> 
> You can cause the new .deb to overwrite the file from the other package via:
> dpkg -i whatever.deb --force-overwrite
> 
> See the force options:
> root at cbbrowne:~# dpkg --force-help
> dpkg forcing options - control behaviour when problems found:
>   warn but continue:  --force-<thing>,<thing>,...
>   stop with error:    --refuse-<thing>,<thing>,... | --no-force-<thing>,...
>  Forcing things:
>   all [!]                Set all force options
>   downgrade [*]          Replace a package with a lower version
>   configure-any          Configure any package which may help this one
>   hold                   Process incidental packages even when on hold
>   bad-path               PATH is missing important programs, problems likely
>   not-root               Try to (de)install things even when not root
>   overwrite              Overwrite a file from one package with another
>   overwrite-diverted     Overwrite a diverted file with an undiverted version
>   bad-verify             Install a package even if it fails authenticity check
>   depends-version [!]    Turn dependency version problems into warnings
>   depends [!]            Turn all dependency problems into warnings
>   confnew [!]            Always use the new config files, don't prompt
>   confold [!]            Always use the old config files, don't prompt
>   confdef [!]            Use the default option for new config files if one
>                          is available, don't prompt. If no default can be found,
>                          you will be prompted unless one of the confold or
>                          confnew options is also given
>   confmiss [!]           Always install missing config files
>   confask [!]            Offer to replace config files with no new versions
>   breaks [!]             Install even if it would break another package
>   conflicts [!]          Allow installation of conflicting packages
>   architecture [!]       Process even packages with wrong architecture
>   overwrite-dir [!]      Overwrite one package's directory with another's file
>   remove-reinstreq [!]   Remove packages which require installation
>   remove-essential [!]   Remove an essential package
> 
> WARNING - use of options marked [!] can seriously damage your installation.
> Forcing options marked [*] are enabled by default.

Force should really never be used and is certainly unnecesary in this
case.  Simply removing one package before installing the update and the
package again will work.

But it is a package bug and should be reported of course.

-- 
Len Sorensen
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