[Pkg-utopia-maintainers] Bug#561505: another instance

[Wookey]

I have the same problem here:

Setting up hal (0.5.14-1) ...
usermod: user haldaemon is currently logged in
Reloading system message bus config...done.
Starting Hardware abstraction layer: haldinvoke-rc.d: initscript hal,
action "start" failed.
dpkg: error processing hal (--configure):
 subprocess post-installation script returned error exit status 1
 
which is holding back this lot:
hal
gnome-device-manager
thunar-volman
xfburn
sound-juicer
xfce4-power-manager
pulseaudio-module-hal
xserver-xorg
xorg
xserver-xorg-core
xserver-xorg-input-wacom
xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
xserver-xorg-input-evdev
xserver-xorg-input-synaptics
xserver-xorg-input-all
xserver-xorg-input-mouse
xserver-xorg-video-nv
xserver-xorg-input-kbd

I haven't rebooted since this occurred so can confirm that the current
state is:
#ls -lr /var/run/hal*
/var/run/hald:
total 0

/var/run/hal:
total 0

# ps aux | grep hal
root      3964  0.0  0.0   7280   796 pts/7    R+   13:06   0:00 grep hal
root     13729  0.0  0.0  22040   704 ?        S    Jan08   1:19 hald-addon-storage: polling /dev/hda (every 2 sec)
105      21624  0.0  0.0  33916  1616 ?        Ss   Jan07   0:04 /usr/sbin/hald
root     21625  0.0  0.0  19924   780 ?        S    Jan07   0:00 hald-runner
root     21684  0.0  0.0  22052   680 ?        S    Jan07   0:00 /usr/lib/hal/hald-addon-cpufreq
105      21686  0.0  0.0  25932   768 ?        S    Jan07   0:08 /usr/lib/hal/hald-addon-acpi
wookey   28139  0.0  0.0  45428  1040 ?        S    Jan07   0:00 /usr/lib/gvfs/gvfs-hal-volume-monitor

#grep hal /etc/passwd
haldaemon:x:105:107:Hardware abstraction layer,,,:/home/haldaemon:/bin/false

So I seem to have one hald running, owner by haldaemon user, but there
is no pid recorded in /var/run/hal (which seems odd)

/var/log/apt/term.log shows:

Preparing to replace libhal1 0.5.11-8 (using
.../libhal1_0.5.14-1_amd64.d$
Unpacking replacement libhal1
....(some more packages unpacked)
...
Processing triggers for hal ...
Regenerating hal fdi cache ...
Restarting Hardware abstraction layer: hald.
...
Preparing to replace hal-info 20081219-1 (using
.../hal-info_20091130-1_a$
Unpacking replacement hal-info ...
Preparing to replace hal 0.5.11-8 (using .../hal_0.5.14-1_amd64.deb) ...
Stopping Hardware abstraction layer: hald.
Removing obsolete conffile /etc/udev/rules.d/90-hal.rules ...
Unpacking replacement hal ...

Then on all subsequent aptitude runs:
Setting up hal (0.5.14-1) ...
usermod: user haldaemon is currently logged in
Reloading system message bus config...done.
Starting Hardware abstraction layer: haldinvoke-rc.d: initscript hal,
act$
dpkg: error processing hal (--configure):
 subprocess post-installation script returned error exit status 1
 
I hope that helps you pin down the problem and best solution.

#killall hald
and then re-runing aptitude allows the upgrade to complete.

Wookey
-- 
Principal hats:  iEndian - Balloonboard - Toby Churchill - Emdebian
http://wookware.org/