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After a fresh ubuntu 12.10 installation, I faced some problems installing Nvidia drivers.

After some research discovered that linux-headers are not being upgraded when executing sudo apt-get dist-upgrade. I had to install the new headers manually although linux-image packages are installed.

Anyone knows why is this happening to me? Is it normal or there's something wrong?

Pro Backup
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Ammar Lakis
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2 Answers2

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If you installed linux-headers matching your running kernel version only, for example, linux-headers-3.5.0-18, then they will not be upgraded. Instead, do:

sudo apt-get install linux-headers-generic

The -generic header package will update headers every time linux-image is updated.

chili555
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I recently ran into a similar problem during Nvidia drivers installation. I am not a Linux expert so I didn't really know where to start looking, but one thing caught my attention. When I run uname -r, I get

3.2.0-30-generic-pae

Then, dpkg -l | grep linux-headers:

ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-18                                      3.5.0-18.29                               all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-18-generic                              3.5.0-18.29                               i386         Linux kernel headers for version 3.5.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-19                                      3.5.0-19.30                               all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-19-generic                              3.5.0-19.30                               i386         Linux kernel headers for version 3.5.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-21                                      3.5.0-21.32                               all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-21-generic                              3.5.0-21.32                               i386         Linux kernel headers for version 3.5.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-22                                      3.5.0-22.34                               all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-22-generic                              3.5.0-22.34                               i386         Linux kernel headers for version 3.5.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-23                                      3.5.0-23.35                               all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-23-generic                              3.5.0-23.35                               i386         Linux kernel headers for version 3.5.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-24                                      3.5.0-24.37                               all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-24-generic                              3.5.0-24.37                               i386         Linux kernel headers for version 3.5.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-25                                      3.5.0-25.39                               all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-25-generic                              3.5.0-25.39                               i386         Linux kernel headers for version 3.5.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-26                                      3.5.0-26.42                               all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-26-generic                              3.5.0-26.42                               i386         Linux kernel headers for version 3.5.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-27                                      3.5.0-27.46                               all          Header files related to Linux kernel version 3.5.0
ii  linux-headers-3.5.0-27-generic                              3.5.0-27.46                               i386         Linux kernel headers for version 3.5.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-headers-generic                                       3.5.0.27.43                               i386         Generic Linux kernel headers
ii  linux-headers-generic-pae                                   3.5.0.27.43                               i386         Transitional package

And finally, dpkg -l | grep linux-image:

rc  linux-image-3.2.0-23-generic-pae                            3.2.0-23.36                               i386         Linux kernel image for version 3.2.0 on 64 bit x86 SMP
ii  linux-image-3.2.0-30-generic-pae                            3.2.0-30.48                               i386         Linux kernel image for version 3.2.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
rc  linux-image-3.2.0-31-generic-pae                            3.2.0-31.50                               i386         Linux kernel image for version 3.2.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP
rc  linux-image-3.5.0-27-generic                                3.5.0-27.46                               i386         Linux kernel image for version 3.5.0 on 32 bit x86 SMP

Shouldn't the linux-headers and linux-image packages match? That was also the problem when installing the Nvidia drivers: it couldn't find the package linux-headers-3.2.0-30-generic-pae. It seems the updates somehow got messed up. What can I do about it?

crypto_rsa
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