apt-get failing to find upgrades

[David Coventry]

Okay, David, I apologise if I sound a little tetchy.

The fact is that I wrote my first progam in FORTRAN back in 1972 on 
punch cards at Wits University.

Quite often I get young guys assuming that if I'm over 40, I know 
nothing about computers. Generally, these guys assume that if they can 
negotiate Windows, then they are experts.

Honestly, though, Ubuntu seems to be throwing up a whole lot of 
unnecessary dificulties in the face of their users.

Why would you need to comment out the sources.list file, for example?

In any case, I can't install anything onto my machine: well, that's not 
strictly true, I can download the tarball, untar and ./configure, make 
and make install.

But I'm used to apt-get doing it all for me. And I don't see why it 
needs to be such a chore.

Dave



David M. Carney wrote:

>On Sun, 07 Nov 2004 23:37:48 -0500, David Coventry <dc at davec.uklinux.net> wrote:
>  
>
>>David M. Carney wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>>    
>>
>>>On Sun, 07 Nov 2004 16:54:41 -0500, David Coventry <dc at davec.uklinux.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>      
>>>
>>>>Hi,
>>>>
>>>>I'm a reasonably experienced linux user having started with SUSe some
>>>>years back, and ended up with Ubuntu by way of Mandrake 6, Corel Linux,
>>>>Gentoo and Knoppix, so I know my way around apt-get.
>>>>
>>>>However, on my install of Ubuntu, apt-get fails.
>>>>
>>>>I have used apt-spy to get mirrors, but am no closer to installing
>>>>anything on my system.
>>>>
>>>>I have tried (for example) to install wine.
>>>>
>>>>The error message I get is 'E: Package wine has no installation candidate'
>>>>
>>>>Also 'W: You might want to run apt-get update to correct these problems'
>>>>
>>>>Replacing the original sources.list file (AFTER uncommenting out all the
>>>>entries: what's the matter; are you deliberately laying down gotchas?),
>>>>well that still produced the same errors.
>>>>
>>>>Dave
>>>>
>>>>--
>>>>ubuntu-users mailing list
>>>>ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
>>>>http://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-users
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>        
>>>>
>>>Have you uncommented the "Universe" repository in your apt sources list?
>>>
>>>David
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>      
>>>
>>David:
>>
>>You see, I'm looking at your reply and I see somebody poking fun at how
>>pathetic I am.
>>
>>As I tried to explain, I am not a newbie.
>>
>>As I tried to explain, I know enough to go into the sources.list file in
>>/etc/apt/ and uncomment out the comments (why do you have to make it so
>>difficult, are you trying to trip all the newbies up?).
>>
>>If that's how you guys get your kicks, that's fine.
>>
>>I'll just go and find another 64 bit distro.....
>>
>>    
>>
>
>You did make it sound as if you had maybe done that, but I wanted to
>be sure. It's a simple thing to miss; I did at first.
>
>People on this list, including me, don't try to make people feel
>pathetic. I was only trying to help.
>
>David
>
>  
>