APT

apt crashes in std::string::compare in debPackagesIndex::FindInCache

Bug #63850 reported by Thomas Folz-Donahue on 2006-10-03

This bug report is a duplicate of: Bug #16467: [MASTER] aptitude/apt-get segmentation fault on corrupted cache. Edit Remove

Affects		Status	Importance	Assigned to	Milestone
	APT	Incomplete	Unknown	debbugs #383223
	apt (Ubuntu)	New	Undecided	Unassigned

Bug Description

Binary package hint: apt

So today I decided that I would like to install Eclipse.

[eigenlambda@muon:~ ^_^]$ sudo apt-get install eclipse
Password:
Bus errorackage lists... 0%

Well, that was a surprise. Similar results from "apt-cache search foo" and "apt-get update".

I enabled core dumps, ran gdb, and I'm even attaching the core dump for my "apt-cache search eclipse" command.

The bus error appears to be in std::string::compare in debPackagesIndex::FindInCache . I can't find out anything else because without apt, I can't "apt-get source apt" to debug further, and I don't know c++ anyway.

Revision history for this message

Thomas Folz-Donahue (eigenlambda) wrote on 2006-10-03:

core file from "apt-cache search eclipse", apt-cache version "apt 0.6.43.3ubuntu2 for linux i386 compiled on Apr 18 2006 19:46:35" Edit (348.0 KiB, application/octet-stream)

Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater) on 2006-10-04

Changed in apt:
status:	Unknown → Unconfirmed

Revision history for this message

Michael Vogt (mvo) wrote on 2006-10-04:

Thanks for your bugreport.

Can you please remove:
/var/cache/apt/*.bin

and re-run your test?

Thanks,
Michael

Revision history for this message

Thomas Folz-Donahue (eigenlambda) wrote on 2006-10-04:

I'm posting this here because the solution to this bug is not actually the same as the solution to the one it's flagged as a dupe of, and you asked here.

What happens now is
Reading package lists... Error!
E: Encountered a section with no Package: header
E: Problem with MergeList /var/lib/apt/lists/security.ubuntu.com_ubuntu_dists_dapper-security_restricted_binary-i386_Packages
E: The package lists or status file could not be parsed or opened.

I didn't delete those files, though, I just shoved them to my home directory in the hopes of examining them or the conditions of the bus error more thoroughly in the future. Why do you say that it would be hard to print a real error message instead of crashing? It seems to me that catching SIGSEGV or SIGBUS and printing something wouldn't be too hard.

...So I just moved them back, expecting another bus error, and I still got a decent error message... and didn't get any error on my next apt-get update. That's actually kind of frustrating. Problems shouldn't just go away like that.

Bug Watch Updater (bug-watch-updater) on 2007-12-27