how I fixed Ubuntu APT upgrade error: The base-files package cannot be installed because /lib32 is a dangling symbolic link.
Problem
On one of my Ubuntu VMs, while upgrading from Ubuntu 24.04 to 26.04, I encountered the following error during upgrade:
apt-upgrade-error.txt
******************************************************************************
*
* The base-files package cannot be installed because
* /lib32 is a dangling symbolic link.
*
* This is an unexpected situation. Cannot proceed with the upgrade.
*
* For more information please read https://wiki.debian.org/UsrMerge.
*
******************************************************************************The upgrade did not proceed properly after that
Solution
This was easy to fix by just
remove-lib32-symlink.sh
sudo rm /lib32which removes the /lib32 symbol link. Then, proceed with the upgrade:
apt-dist-upgrade.sh
sudo apt dist-upgrade -yCheck out similar posts by category:
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