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geoffrey
Asked: 2012-08-02 23:18:13 +0800 CST

'Important security update' for Firefox and flash plugin, but the update cannot be selected

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[This question has been updated as I now have the same problem with Firefox in addition to flash plugin]

The update manager (on Ubuntu 12.04, 64bit) shows an 'important security update' for flashplugin-installer:i386, firefox, and firefox-globalmenu. The update is unticked, and cannot be selected, and therefore cannot be updated (I can update other packages without problems). Actually the flashplugin-installer package does not appear to be installed on my computer (judging from the Software Centre). I can't remember how I installed flash, probably directly from the Adobe website. The updater asks me if I want to do a partial upgrade.

When running sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade from terminal, I get the following:

The following packages have been kept back: firefox firefox-globalmenu flashplugin-installer:i386

firefox

1 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    When running apt-get upgrade, apt-get will not upgrade packages that requires new and/or different dependencies in the newer versions and they will be kept back.

    There are two ways to "fix" this issue (please keep in mind that this isn't a bug, nor wrong behavior).

    sudo apt-get install firefox firefox-globalmenu flashplugin-installer:i386

    The previous command will upgrade the packages that you selected, in this case they are firefox firefox-globalmenu flashplugin-installer:i386. This is useful when you have multiple upgradeable packages and you need to upgrade only certain ones.

    You can also upgrade using the following command:

    sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

    This is the same as sudo apt-get upgrade, with one difference being that it will install packages that requires new or different dependencies. And the difference between this and the previous command is that it will upgrade all your upgradeable packages.

    EDIT:
    Ok I just noticed that you said you have Ubuntu x64 and not 32, so you don't have to install the flashplugin-installer:i386 package as this is the 32bit version. Instead you can install flashplugin-installer, which will download the 64bit version.

    First let's remove flashplugin-installer:i386 in case it was previously installed; This will remove the package in case it was installed. If it wasn't installed, then it will print this message:

    Package flashplugin-installer:i386 is not installed, so not removed

    sudo apt-get remove flashplugin-installer:i386

    This step is optional, it will remove all installed and unused packages (Which are usually dependencies for previously installed then removed packages, like in this case). Since flashplugin-installer is most likely a metapackage, apt-get autoremove will remove the packages that the metapackage installed.

    sudo apt-get autoremove

    If the previous commands worked without any problem, try installing the 64bit version and see if your problem persists.

    sudo apt-get install flashing-installer
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