How to (re)install gnome-control-center, with multiple broken dependencies?

Question

I was unable to open Settings within Ubuntu, or from right-clicking the desktop. Understandably I was missing gnome-control-center, however it turns out I am missing several dependencies, which are missing further dependencies.

Doing sudo apt-get update and sudo apt-get upgrade returns no packages installed.

$ gnome-control-center
Command 'gnome-control-center' not found, but can be installed with:
sudo apt install gnome-control-center

However, apt install gnome-control-center returns me broken packages. Doing a reinstall also nets the same error messages.

$ sudo apt install gnome-control-center
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
or been moved out of Incoming.
The following information may help to resolve the situation:
The following packages have unmet dependencies:
 gnome-control-center : Depends: gnome-control-center-data (< 1:3.37) but 1:3.38.5-1ubuntu2 is to be installed
                        Recommends: gnome-online-accounts (>= 3.25.3) but it is not going to be installed
                        Recommends: network-manager-gnome (>= 0.9.8) but it is not going to be installed
                        Recommends: gnome-control-center-faces but it is not going to be installed
                        Recommends: rygel but it is not going to be installed or
                                    rygel-tracker but it is not going to be installed
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.
$ apt policy gnome-control-center
gnome-control-center:
  Installed: (none)
  Candidate: 1:3.36.5-0ubuntu4
  Version table:
     1:3.36.5-0ubuntu4 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-updates/main amd64 Packages
     1:3.36.1-1ubuntu5 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal/main amd64 Packages

The packages can't be installed:

$ sudo apt install gnome-control-center-data
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
gnome-control-center-data is already the newest version (1:3.38.5-1ubuntu2).
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
$ apt policy gnome-control-center-data
gnome-control-center-data:
  Installed: 1:3.38.5-1ubuntu2
  Candidate: 1:3.38.5-1ubuntu2
  Version table:
 *** 1:3.38.5-1ubuntu2 100
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     1:3.36.5-0ubuntu4 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-updates/main amd64 Packages
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-updates/main i386 Packages
     1:3.36.1-1ubuntu5 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal/main amd64 Packages
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal/main i386 Packages

Something similar is encountered for the others:

$ sudo apt install gnome-online-accounts
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
or been moved out of Incoming.
The following information may help to resolve the situation:
The following packages have unmet dependencies:
 gnome-online-accounts : Depends: libgoa-1.0-0b (= 3.36.1-0ubuntu1) but 3.38.1-1ubuntu1.1 is to be installed
                         Depends: libgoa-backend-1.0-1 (= 3.36.1-0ubuntu1) but 3.38.1-1ubuntu1.1 is to be installed
                         Depends: python3-macaroonbakery but it is not going to be installed
                         Recommends: gnome-control-center (>= 3.6.1) but it is not going to be installed
E: Unable to correct problems, you have held broken packages.
$ apt policy gnome-online-accounts
gnome-online-accounts:
  Installed: (none)
  Candidate: 3.36.1-0ubuntu1
  Version table:
     3.36.1-0ubuntu1 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-updates/main amd64 Packages
     3.36.0-1ubuntu1 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal/main amd64 Packages

Here is more system info:

$ uname -a
Linux <username> 5.14.0-1054-oem #61-Ubuntu SMP Fri Oct 14 13:05:50 UTC 2022 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

I have consulted these pages but to no avail. In fact some of the autoremove made more dependencies break.

gnome-control-center can be successfully installed thanks to this post, however it does not launch at all. The cursor goes into a loading state, and returns back to the pointer after a few minutes.

apt policy gnome-control-center now gives

apt policy gnome-control-center
gnome-control-center:
  Installed: 1:3.36.5-0ubuntu4
  Candidate: 1:3.36.5-0ubuntu4
  Version table:
 *** 1:3.36.5-0ubuntu4 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-updates/main amd64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
     1:3.36.1-1ubuntu5 500
        500 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal/main amd64 Packages

Attempting to launch gnome-control-center from terminal returns me this error

gnome-control-center: symbol lookup error: /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libsamdb-common.so.0: undefined symbol: ldb_msg_element_add_value, version LDB_2.2.3

However, apt cache policy is unable to find the package. Not sure if the samba matters so i added it in as well, but it is the same result.

apt-cache policy libsamdb-common.so.0
N: Unable to locate package libsamdb-common.so.0
N: Couldn't find any package by glob 'libsamdb-common.so.0'
N: Couldn't find any package by regex 'libsamdb-common.so.0'
apt-cache policy samba/libsamdb-common.so.0
N: Unable to locate package samba/libsamdb-common.so.0
N: Couldn't find any package by glob 'samba/libsamdb-common.so.0'
N: Couldn't find any package by regex 'samba/libsamdb-common.so.0'

I saw on another post to try running the ldd command, which gave me this.

ldd /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libsamdb-common.so.0
    linux-vdso.so.1 (0x00007ffdfcfcb000)
    libsamba-hostconfig.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libsamba-hostconfig.so.0 (0x00007f787c5ba000)
    libreplace.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libreplace.so.0 (0x00007f787c5b5000)
    libndr-samba.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libndr-samba.so.0 (0x00007f787c45e000)
    libcli-ldap-common.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libcli-ldap-common.so.0 (0x00007f787c454000)
    libsamba-sockets.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libsamba-sockets.so.0 (0x00007f787c439000)
    libflag-mapping.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libflag-mapping.so.0 (0x00007f787c432000)
    libsamba-errors.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libsamba-errors.so.1 (0x00007f787c2e7000)
    libsamba-util.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libsamba-util.so.0 (0x00007f787c274000)
    libsamba-security.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libsamba-security.so.0 (0x00007f787c252000)
    libndr.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libndr.so.1 (0x00007f787c235000)
    libsocket-blocking.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libsocket-blocking.so.0 (0x00007f787c230000)
    libtevent-util.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libtevent-util.so.0 (0x00007f787c227000)
    libsamba-debug.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libsamba-debug.so.0 (0x00007f787c21c000)
    libsys-rw.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libsys-rw.so.0 (0x00007f787c217000)
    libpthread.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libpthread.so.0 (0x00007f787c1f5000)
    libtalloc.so.2 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libtalloc.so.2 (0x00007f787c1e6000)
    libldb.so.2 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libldb.so.2 (0x00007f787c1b2000)
    libtevent.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libtevent.so.0 (0x00007f787c19b000)
    libc.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libc.so.6 (0x00007f787bfaf000)
    libserver-role.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libserver-role.so.0 (0x00007f787bfaa000)
    libgnutls.so.30 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgnutls.so.30 (0x00007f787bdad000)
    libtdb.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libtdb.so.1 (0x00007f787bd93000)
    libbsd.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libbsd.so.0 (0x00007f787bd7b000)
    libndr-nbt.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libndr-nbt.so.0 (0x00007f787bd4f000)
    libasn1util.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libasn1util.so.0 (0x00007f787bd46000)
    libndr-standard.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libndr-standard.so.0 (0x00007f787b9e3000)
    libz.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libz.so.1 (0x00007f787b9c7000)
    libiov-buf.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libiov-buf.so.0 (0x00007f787b9c2000)
    libinterfaces.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libinterfaces.so.0 (0x00007f787b9bb000)
    libnsl.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libnsl.so.1 (0x00007f787b99f000)
    libtime-basic.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libtime-basic.so.0 (0x00007f787b99a000)
    libgenrand.so.0 => /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/samba/libgenrand.so.0 (0x00007f787b995000)
    libicuuc.so.66 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libicuuc.so.66 (0x00007f787b7af000)
    libsystemd.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libsystemd.so.0 (0x00007f787b6f7000)
    libicui18n.so.66 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libicui18n.so.66 (0x00007f787b3f8000)
    libdl.so.2 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libdl.so.2 (0x00007f787b3f1000)
    /lib64/ld-linux-x86-64.so.2 (0x00007f787c62f000)
    libp11-kit.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libp11-kit.so.0 (0x00007f787b2b8000)
    libidn2.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libidn2.so.0 (0x00007f787b296000)
    libunistring.so.2 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libunistring.so.2 (0x00007f787b112000)
    libtasn1.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libtasn1.so.6 (0x00007f787b0fc000)
    libnettle.so.8 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libnettle.so.8 (0x00007f787b0b6000)
    libhogweed.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libhogweed.so.6 (0x00007f787b06e000)
    libgmp.so.10 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgmp.so.10 (0x00007f787afeb000)
    libmd.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libmd.so.0 (0x00007f787afde000)
    libicudata.so.66 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libicudata.so.66 (0x00007f787951b000)
    libstdc++.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libstdc++.so.6 (0x00007f7879302000)
    libm.so.6 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libm.so.6 (0x00007f78791b4000)
    libgcc_s.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgcc_s.so.1 (0x00007f7879199000)
    librt.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/librt.so.1 (0x00007f787918e000)
    liblzma.so.5 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/liblzma.so.5 (0x00007f7879161000)
    libzstd.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libzstd.so.1 (0x00007f7879094000)
    liblz4.so.1 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/liblz4.so.1 (0x00007f7879074000)
    libcap.so.2 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libcap.so.2 (0x00007f7879069000)
    libgcrypt.so.20 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgcrypt.so.20 (0x00007f7878f46000)
    libffi.so.8 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libffi.so.8 (0x00007f7878f3a000)
    libgpg-error.so.0 => /lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libgpg-error.so.0 (0x00007f7878f10000)

sudo ubuntu-drivers autoinstall gives this output. As far as I know, my NVIDIA graphics card should be using driver-470, so it is odd that the others are even included.

sudo ubuntu-drivers autoinstall
WARNING:root:_pkg_get_support nvidia-driver-525-server: package has invalid Support PBheader, cannot determine support level
WARNING:root:_pkg_get_support nvidia-driver-515: package has invalid Support PBheader, cannot determine support level
WARNING:root:_pkg_get_support nvidia-driver-515-open: package has invalid Support PBheader, cannot determine support level
WARNING:root:_pkg_get_support nvidia-driver-510: package has invalid Support PBheader, cannot determine support level
WARNING:root:_pkg_get_support nvidia-driver-525-open: package has invalid Support PBheader, cannot determine support level
WARNING:root:_pkg_get_support nvidia-driver-525: package has invalid Support PBheader, cannot determine support level
WARNING:root:_pkg_get_support nvidia-driver-515-server: package has invalid Support PBheader, cannot determine support level
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
The following additional packages will be installed:
  dctrl-tools dkms libnvidia-cfg1-525 libnvidia-common-525
  libnvidia-compute-525 libnvidia-compute-525:i386 libnvidia-decode-525
  libnvidia-encode-525 libnvidia-extra-525 libnvidia-fbc1-525 libnvidia-gl-525
  libxnvctrl0 nvidia-compute-utils-525 nvidia-kernel-common-525
  nvidia-kernel-source-525-open nvidia-prime nvidia-settings nvidia-utils-525
  screen-resolution-extra xserver-xorg-video-nvidia-525
Suggested packages:
  debtags menu nvidia-driver-525
Recommended packages:
  libnvidia-decode-525:i386 libnvidia-encode-525:i386 libnvidia-fbc1-525:i386
  libnvidia-gl-525:i386
The following packages will be REMOVED:
  libnvidia-compute-470
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  dctrl-tools dkms libnvidia-cfg1-525 libnvidia-common-525
  libnvidia-compute-525 libnvidia-compute-525:i386 libnvidia-decode-525
  libnvidia-encode-525 libnvidia-extra-525 libnvidia-fbc1-525 libnvidia-gl-525
  libxnvctrl0 nvidia-compute-utils-525 nvidia-dkms-525-open
  nvidia-driver-525-open nvidia-kernel-common-525
  nvidia-kernel-source-525-open nvidia-prime nvidia-settings nvidia-utils-525
  screen-resolution-extra xserver-xorg-video-nvidia-525
0 upgraded, 22 newly installed, 1 to remove and 5 not upgraded.
Need to get 338 MB/339 MB of archives.
After this operation, 884 MB of additional disk space will be used.

How to install/launch gnome-control-center, with multiple broken dependencies?

Please run apt policy [package] on a few of the troublesome packages and edit the output into your question. — Organic Marble, Dec 31 '22 at 13:55
@OrganicMarble just added some of them in. May i know what these do? — fatbringer, Jan 05 '23 at 04:43
Where did you get your version of gnome-control-center-data? It's not in the Ubuntu repositories; you got it from someplace else. That wrong-version or non-Ubuntu repository is the likely cause of your problems. — user535733, Jan 05 '23 at 05:09
@user535733 i have not specified any versions of it manually. I have just been doing the usual "sudo apt-get update" and sudo apt-get upgrade" whenever necessary. How might i fix this ? — fatbringer, Jan 05 '23 at 06:24
Your own output disputes that claim: You have a mystery version of the package installed that is incompatible with your release of Ubuntu. It did not grow there from a magic bean. It did not come from Ubuntu repositories. Maybe some other admin did it? The solution is to tediously uninstall every one of those wrong-version packages, and reinstall the proper, compatible Ubuntu version of each affected package. — user535733, Jan 05 '23 at 06:27
@user535733 i see. Could you write as an answer to the question? I have checked terminal history and did not see any "force" too. I'd expect incompatible versions are not allowed by default using the usual commands. — fatbringer, Jan 05 '23 at 06:36
apt policy is a useful command for looking into issues like this. It shows all the versions of a package currently available to your system, where they came from, and the same info for the installed package (if any). The specific output for gnome-control-center-data in your case shows that it's installed, but it didn't come from any source currently available to your system. That can only mean that you manually downloaded and installed it, or you installed it from a source that you later removed from your system. — Organic Marble, Jan 05 '23 at 14:15
(By "you" I mean someone with sudo power on your system) The first thing to try is purging that package. Also look for other orphan packages. 'Synaptic' can really be useful in these scenarios. — Organic Marble, Jan 05 '23 at 14:18
@OrganicMarble i have not used the Synaptic before. I'll go check it out and get back to you. Thanks! I am just not sure which command would return the list of broken stuff — fatbringer, Jan 09 '23 at 02:48

How to (re)install gnome-control-center, with multiple broken dependencies?

0 Answers0