Eventually, I got an upgrade notification (it listed a bunch of packages which were scheduled to be updated). I assume whatever process was doing silent updates in the background grabbed the lock, and once I closed the dialog software centre was able to install packages.
Some sort of communication between that background upgrade system and gnome-software would probably help alleviate this sort of confusion. Thanks, Qasim -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Desktop Bugs, which is subscribed to gnome-software in Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1818315 Title: Can't install applications: "E: could not get lock /var/lib/dpkg/lock- frontend - open (11: Resource temporarily unavailable)" To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gnome-software/+bug/1818315/+subscriptions -- desktop-bugs mailing list desktop-bugs@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/desktop-bugs