Bug#524600: update-manager: Crashes after failing to read configuration

[Olaf Mandel]

Package: update-manager
Version: 0.68.debian-7
Severity: important

Hello,

depending on how it is started, update-manager crashes before even
displaying a window. Especially, it crashes when started by
update-notifier (which I assume is how most users start the program). As
this renders update-notifier unusable by the average user, I marked the
bug-report as "important".

When starting the program as a normal user from an xterm in one of these
ways, it works as expected.

$ /usr/sbin/update-manager
$ sudo update-manager

Just some warning messages are shown, where the second message about the
dbus signal not being sent is only shown when actually trying to install
an update:

current dist not found in meta-release file
could not send the dbus Inhibit signal:
org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.ServiceUnknown: The name
org.gnome.PowerManager was not provided by any .service files

If the program is started in one of these two ways, it fails. The first
entry is how update-notifier wants to start the program:

$ gksu update-notifier
$ su -c update-notifier

The error-message is (with LANG=C):

warning: could not initiate dbus
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/sbin/update-manager", line 76, in <module>
    app = UpdateManager(data_dir)
  File
"/var/lib/python-support/python2.5/UpdateManager/UpdateManager.py", line
400, in __init__
    self.restore_state()
  File
"/var/lib/python-support/python2.5/UpdateManager/UpdateManager.py", line
831, in restore_state
    expanded =
self.gconfclient.get_bool("/apps/update-manager/show_details")
gobject.GError: Failed to contact configuration server; some possible
causes are that you need to enable TCP/IP networking for ORBit, or you
have stale NFS locks due to a system crash. See
http://projects.gnome.org/gconf/ for information. (Details -  1: Failed
to get connection to session: Did not receive a reply. Possible causes
include: the remote application did not send a reply, the message bus
security policy blocked the reply, the reply timeout expired, or the
network connection was broken.)

Any suggestion what might be wrong? I only observed the bug with
update-manager, but I cannot rule out that it is related to one of these
packages:

python-gnome2
gconf2
orbit
orbit2

If you need more information, I am happy to provide it.

Best regards,
Olaf Mandel

-- System Information:
Debian Release: 5.0.1
  APT prefers stable
  APT policy: (900, 'stable'), (400, 'testing'), (90, 'unstable')
Architecture: i386 (i686)

Kernel: Linux 2.6.26-2-686 (SMP w/1 CPU core)
Locale: LANG=de_DE.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=de_DE.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash

Versions of packages update-manager depends on:
ii  gconf2                   2.26.0-1        GNOME configuration
database syste
ii  libgnome2-perl           1.042-1+b1      Perl interface to the GNOME
librar
ii  python                   2.5.2-3         An interactive high-level
object-o
ii  python-dbus              0.82.4-2        simple interprocess
messaging syst
ii  python-glade2            2.12.1-6        GTK+ bindings: Glade support
ii  python-gnome2            2.22.3-3        Python bindings for the
GNOME desk
ii  python-support           0.8.4           automated rebuilding
support for P
ii  python-vte               1:0.16.14-4     Python bindings for the VTE
widget
ii  software-properties-gtk  0.60.debian-1.1 manage the repositories
that you i
ii  synaptic                 0.62.1+nmu1     Graphical package manager
ii  update-manager-core      0.68.debian-7   APT update manager core
functional

update-manager recommends no packages.

Versions of packages update-manager suggests:
ii  update-notifier          0.70.7.debian-5 Daemon which notifies about
packag

-- no debconf information
-- 
Olaf Mandel   <olaf at mandel.name>   <http://www.olaf.mandel.name/>
PGP key:      1024D/33398848 2002-09-19
Fingerprint:  0E33 BEA6 1A71 9C5E 62BD  FC0E 99A7 D2C6 3339 8848

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