Error updating

[thereverend]

I am trying to do a update and getting this error :
Any idea what this is?

Code: Select all

debconf: DbDriver "config": /var/cache/debconf/config.dat is locked by another process: Resource temporarily unavailable
Setting up ca-certificates (20210119~20.04.2) ...
debconf: DbDriver "config": /var/cache/debconf/config.dat is locked by another process: Resource temporarily unavailable
dpkg: error processing package ca-certificates (--configure):
 installed ca-certificates package post-installation script subprocess returned error exit status 1
Errors were encountered while processing:
 ca-certificates
E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)
A package failed to install.  Trying to recover:
Setting up ca-certificates (20210119~20.04.2) ...
debconf: DbDriver "config": /var/cache/debconf/config.dat is locked by another process: Resource temporarily unavailable
dpkg: error processing package ca-certificates (--configure):
 installed ca-certificates package post-installation script subprocess returned error exit status 1
Errors were encountered while processing:
 ca-certificates

[vimes666]

Reboot and retry the update.

[karlchen]

Hello, thereverend.

In lines 1 and 3, which you had shared, you read:
debconf: DbDriver "config": /var/cache/debconf/config.dat is locked by another process: Resource temporarily unavailable
At any given point in time, only one application (either Software Manager or Update Manager or Synaptic or apt-get) can apply changes to the installed software. Updating software is such a change.
The error message suggests that at the time, when you read these message, two processes were trying to perform changes to your installed software.

Inspecting the list of running processes at the point in time, ps axu | sort | more e.g., might have helped identify which were the two conflicting processes.
By now the conflict may have been resolved automatically, because the process, which had locked the file /var/cache/debconf/config.dat, has terminated.

So you might [Refresh] in Update Manager and try to [Install Updates] again.

In case you should run into the same problem again, you might close all applications, reboot the system and then try again.

HTH,
Karl
--
P.S.:
In case you need more help, please, do not forget to
+ share your Linux Mint system information with us. How-to is > here <.
+ explain whether you are using Update Manager in order to install software updates or whether you are using the apt terminal command instead.