FWIW I have just encountered this bug on multiple Ubuntu systems here, a mix of 10.*, 11.*, and 12.04 All these systems run stock LaTeX and Emacs from the default repos. I have repaired the damage manually with the following steps using Synaptic (NOT the new Software Centre, which hides too much from view):
0. Back up your site-lisp and .emacs files somewhere safe 1. Remove completely ALL emacs* and related *.el packages 2. Exit Synaptic and run it again (otherwise it gets the dependencies wrong) 3. Install emacs23 and whatever other packages you removed in [1] including ispell 4. It will fail to complete because the soft-links in emacs23/site-lisp don't have any files at the end of them in emacs/site-lisp 5. In emacs/site-lisp/dictionaries-common, grab copies of debian-ispell.el, flyspell.el, and ispell.el from somewhere else (I used http://stuff.mit.edu/afs/athena/system/amd64_deb50/os-ubuntu-10.04/usr/athena/share/emacs/site-lisp/dictionaries-common but YMMV) 6. cd .. and repeat for debian-startup.el 7. Install something harmless like css-mode.el in order to trigger apt into trying to configure emacs23, and monitor the console carefully to see what directories it fails to stat 8. In my case, because I have a very full installation of TeX, I had to re-install latex-cjk-common, thailatex, and latex-cjk-thai for some obscure reason: your system will almost certainly be different, and you may have to re-install a different set of packages. 9. When it has finished rebuilding the ls-R databases it doesn't say so, so you need to close the window. 10. Copy back any personal .el files and/or your .emacs file from backup if they were removed. This got my system back and working; I believe from other reports that it is the absence of the three ispell files that causes the configuration to fall over; quite why debian-startup.el was missing is not clear. -- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu Bugs, which is subscribed to Ubuntu. https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/673350 Title: Can't install emacs23 To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/emacs-snapshot/+bug/673350/+subscriptions -- ubuntu-bugs mailing list ubuntu-bugs@lists.ubuntu.com https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-bugs
