muon no longer asking for authentication (and failing)

[Robert Marshall]

On Tue, Jun 24 2014, George Dvorak <gldvorak at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Mon, Jun 23, 2014 at 5:20 PM, George Dvorak <gldvorak at gmail.com> wrote:
> <snipped partial reply>
>> On Mon, Jun 23, 2014 at 9:53 AM, Robert Marshall <robert at capuchin.co.uk>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> On Sun, Jun 22 2014, Robert Marshall <robert at capuchin.co.uk> wrote:
>>>
>>> > On Sat, Jun 21 2014, George Dvorak <gldvorak at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> >> On Fri, Jun 20, 2014 at 11:08 AM, Robert Marshall <robert at capuchin.co.uk>
>>> >> wrote:
>>> >>
>>> >>> On Fri, Jun 20 2014, Robert Marshall <robert at capuchin.co.uk> wrote:
>>> >>>
>>> >>> > Starting with the update to apt of this week (and the problem
>>> >>> > occurring on that update) when muon/apper informs me that
>>> >>> > there are upgrades, if I view them and attempt to upgrade I no
>>> >>> > longer get asked for authentication (my password) and then the
>>> >>> > upgrade fails because it doesn't have (sudo) permissions :-(
>>> >>> >
>>> >>> > I'm not aware of changing anything, has something else changed, is
>>> >>> > anyone else seeing this?
>>> >>> >
>>> >>> > Before this change a dialog used to pop up asking for my password, I
>>> >>> > entered it and the update was done. For the moment I'm doing command
>>> >>> > line `sudo apt-get upgrade`..
>>> >>> >
>>> >>>
>>> >>> Arrgh! should have added this is with 14.04
>>> >>>
>>> >> I was having similar problems and I went to
>>> >> /var/cache/apt/archives/ and deleted the lock file and now all is
>>> >> well. Muon just gave up. Synaptic pointed me at the problem. I
>>> >> wish that Kubuntu/KDE supported Synaptic rather than their
>>> >> packages that do not work as well.
>>> >>
>>> >
>>> > Thanks for this suggestion I see I also have a
>>> > /var/cache/apt/archives/lock file - dated Aug 22 2012 - maybe muon
>>> > has only now started noticing it?  I'm deleting it and will see if
>>> > the next update runs without problem!
>>> >
>>>
>>> And just to log the fact that without the lock file (I've just double
>>> checked to ensure it hasn't reappeared after deleting it yesterday) the
>>> latest update also fails with muon with the libreoffice updates.
>>>
>>> Running muon from the command line I see (obv without [gk]sudo):
>>>
>>> Couldn't find the releasechecker script
>>> /usr/bin/python3: can't find '__main__' module in ''
>>> found error while replying
>>> QDBusError("org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.InvalidArgs", "")
>>> found error while replying
>>> QDBusError("org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.InvalidArgs", "")
>>> found error while replying
>>> QDBusError("org.freedesktop.DBus.Error.AccessDenied", "")
>>> auth error reply!
>>>
> Well, again as I was typing my screen disappeared and a partial message was
> sent.
>
> Deleting the lock file cured my problem. Looking at the file with a hex
> editor does not reveal anything that I can understand.
>
>

Having looked again I see I now have a lock file - my guess is that this
is a symptom of the problem rather than the actual problem - the date &
time on the file is the time when the latest install failure happened

  -rw-r----- 1 root   root          0 Jun 23 17:48 lock

but how did it create a file there with that ownership without the reqd
permissions? As my lock file is empty the contents are unlikely to be helpful!

Looking at /var/log/auth I see these 2 errors

Jun 23 17:47:55 myhost dbus[1059]: [system] Rejected send message, 0 matched rules; type="method_return", sender=":1.59" (uid=0 pid=2775 comm="/usr/bin/python /usr/share/apt-xapian-index/update") interface="(unset)" member="(unset)" error name="(unset)" requested_reply="0" destination=":1.684" (uid=1000 pid=31877 comm="muon ")
Jun 23 17:48:21  myhost dbus[1059]: [system] Rejected send message, 0 matched rules; type="method_return", sender=":1.59" (uid=0 pid=2775 comm="/usr/bin/python /usr/share/apt-xapian-index/update") interface="(unset)" member="(unset)" error name="(unset)" requested_reply="0" destination=":1.684" (uid=1000 pid=31877 comm="muon ")

Deleting the lock file and trying again just gives the same problem

Maybe I should be logging a bug...

Robert
-- 
La grenouille songe..dans son château d'eau