[Bug 1939665] Re: "apt-get update" fails if another instance is running

[Avi Kivity]

In practice the two processes that run apt-get update are unaware of
each other. When I'm updating of course I wouldn't intentionally run two
instances in parallel. Indeed the other process is likely apt-
daily.service.

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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1939665

Title:
  "apt-get update" fails if another instance is running

Status in apt package in Ubuntu:
  Triaged

Bug description:
  This snippet:

       sudo apt-get update & sudo apt-get update & wait; wait

  will result in one apt-get run succeeding and the other failing on the
  lock:

  [1] 3006473
  [2] 3006474
  Hit:1 http://ports.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-ports groovy InRelease
  Hit:2 http://ports.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-ports groovy-backports InRelease
  Hit:3 http://ports.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-ports groovy-security InRelease
  Hit:4 http://ports.ubuntu.com/ubuntu-ports groovy-updates InRelease
  Reading package lists... Done
  E: Could not get lock /var/lib/apt/lists/lock. It is held by process 3006476 (apt-get)
  N: Be aware that removing the lock file is not a solution and may break your system.
  E: Unable to lock directory /var/lib/apt/lists/
  Reading package lists... Done
  [1]-  Done                    sudo apt-get update
  [2]+  Exit 100                sudo apt-get update

  
  Note that apt-get upgrade will correctly wait.

  ProblemType: Bug
  DistroRelease: Ubuntu 20.10
  Package: apt 2.1.10ubuntu0.3
  ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 5.8.0-48.54-generic 5.8.18
  Uname: Linux 5.8.0-48-generic aarch64
  ApportVersion: 2.20.11-0ubuntu50.7
  Architecture: arm64
  CasperMD5CheckResult: skip
  Date: Thu Aug 12 07:50:16 2021
  ProcEnviron:
   LC_TIME=C.UTF-8
   TERM=xterm-256color
   PATH=(custom, no user)
   LANG=C.UTF-8
   SHELL=/bin/bash
  SourcePackage: apt
  UpgradeStatus: Upgraded to groovy on 2021-03-25 (139 days ago)

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