Right, it's likely that the system was busy doing a refresh of the indexes or even installing security upgrades in background, those situations are not reflected nicely in the graphical session (and the gnome-software warning is not really nice either)
-- You received this bug notification because you are a member of Desktop Packages, 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)" Status in gnome-software package in Ubuntu: New Bug description: 1. Start Software Center. 2. Select an application to install 3. Click install Expected: application installs Actual: error message "E: could not get lock /var/lib/dpkg/lock-frontend - open (11: Resource temporarily unavailable)" (see attached screenshot) Solutions attempted: 1. Closing and re-opening software center 2. Checking 'updates' tab in software center ('Software is up to date') --- Version information: $ lsb_release -rd Description: Ubuntu 18.04.2 LTS Release: 18.04 $ apt-cache policy gnome-software gnome-software: Installed: 3.28.1-0ubuntu4.18.04.8 Candidate: 3.28.1-0ubuntu4.18.04.8 Version table: *** 3.28.1-0ubuntu4.18.04.8 500 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu bionic-updates/main amd64 Packages 100 /var/lib/dpkg/status 3.28.1-0ubuntu4 500 500 http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu bionic/main amd64 Packages ProblemType: Bug DistroRelease: Ubuntu 18.04 Package: gnome-software 3.28.1-0ubuntu4.18.04.8 ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 4.15.0-45.48-generic 4.15.18 Uname: Linux 4.15.0-45-generic x86_64 ApportVersion: 2.20.9-0ubuntu7.5 Architecture: amd64 CurrentDesktop: ubuntu:GNOME Date: Fri Mar 1 20:06:51 2019 InstallationDate: Installed on 2019-01-20 (40 days ago) InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 18.04.1 LTS "Bionic Beaver" - Release amd64 (20180725) InstalledPlugins: gnome-software-plugin-flatpak N/A gnome-software-plugin-limba N/A gnome-software-plugin-snap 3.28.1-0ubuntu4.18.04.8 ProcEnviron: PATH=(custom, no user) XDG_RUNTIME_DIR=<set> LANG=en_US.UTF-8 SHELL=/bin/bash SourcePackage: gnome-software UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install) To manage notifications about this bug go to: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/gnome-software/+bug/1818315/+subscriptions -- Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages Post to : [email protected] Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~desktop-packages More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp
