mjhjmtu

I have been trying to update Ubuntu 12.04 on the command line by using the two commands

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

which ends with the following error:

(Reading database ... 70%dpkg: ../../src/filesdb.c:683: findnamenode: Assertion `(*pointerp)->name[0] == '/'' failed.
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg exited unexpectedly

How to fix this on the command line?

The solution to this messed up installation is as follows.

1. 
   

   Remove some installation files

   
   
   

   /var/cache/apt/pkgcache.bin /var/cache/apt/srcpkgcache.bin

   
   



2. Run sudo apt-get dist-upgrade again.



3. 
   

   Now the output is even more garbled up:

   
   
   

   Preparing to replace jenkins 1.548 (using .../archives/jenkins_1.549_all.deb) ...
    * Stopping Jenkins Continuous Integration Server jenkins [ OK ] 
   Unpacking replacement jenkins ...
   dpkg-deb (subprocess): data: internal gzip read error: '<fd:4>: invalid distance code'
   dpkg-deb: error: subprocess <decompress> returned error exit status 2
   dpkg: error processing /var/cache/apt/archives/jenkins_1.549_all.deb (--unpack):
    short read on buffer copy for backend dpkg-deb during `./usr/share/jenkins/jenkins.war'
   No apport report written because MaxReports is reached already
    * Starting Jenkins Continuous Integration Server jenkins [ OK ] 
   Errors were encountered while processing:
    /var/cache/apt/archives/jenkins_1.549_all.deb
   E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
   

   
   
   

   but provides a hint of what was incorrectly installed: jenkins.

   
   



4. Now remove this incomplete installation with sudo apt-get purge jenkins.



5. Install it again (if you still need it): sudo apt-get install jenkins
   


6. And finally sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade