** Description changed:
- As noted in
-
https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/msttcorefonts/+bug/1371783/comments/45,
- the current 3.4 version of ttf-mscorefonts-installer searches for the
- font files in an incorrect network location. The consequence of this is
- that the core fonts are never installed.
+ [Symptoms]
- The Debian (upstream) version 3.6 of ttf-mscorefonts-installer searches
- for the font files in the correct network location, and will
- successfully install the core fonts.
+ When installing or updating the package ttf-mscorefonts-installer in
+ Ubuntu 16.04 or 16.10, an error message appears in a GUI window,
+ indicating "failure to download extra data files" (the fonts themselves)
+ "after package installation" (the package itself appears to have been
+ installed). This error message re-appears regularly, as a cron-job re-
+ tries the failed download.
- This problem occurs with Ubuntu 16.04 as of July 2016. (And with earlier
- versions, including current LTS.)
+ If installing or updating from the command line, additional failure
+ information is given in an error message prefixed by "E:", but this
+ error message depends on the mirror server which is contacted for the
+ download: "404 Not Found" is common, but there is also "Protocol http
+ not supported or disabled in libcurl", and complains about invalid
+ Content-Range headers.
+
+ [Cause]
+
+ The current 3.4 version of ttf-mscorefonts-installer in Ubuntu 16.04
+ delegates the download of the proprietary Microsoft Core Fonts for the
+ Web (Andale, Arial...) to the package update-notifier, which itself
+ delegates it to the program apt-helper provided by the package apt. The
+ download URL points to the host downloads.sourceforge.net, which
+ redirects to a randomly-chosen mirror server
+ <mirror>.dl.sourceforge.net.
+
+ Unfortunately, the program apt-helper has a bug in the way it treats
+ redirections. This bug makes apt-helper keep a space in the URL instead
+ of encoding it to %20 before contacting the mirror. It is more
+ extensively documented in bug 1655431 and bug 1651923. The mirror
+ replies to this malformed request with an error message (e.g. "404 Not
+ Found"), and download fails.
+
+ Some mirrors appear to understand the malformed request nonetheless, and
+ send the requested font file, however since there are 11 fonts to
+ download, the chances of getting 11 understanding mirrors are low. Hence
+ why the error message usually concerns andale32.exe or arial32.exe
+ instead of webdin32.exe.
+
+ [Workaround 1]
+
+ Download the fonts manually and put them all in the same directory. You
+ can use wget for that, because contrary to apt-helper, it handles
+ redirections fine (command line formatted for readability, do not
+ include line breaks and line indents):
+
+ $ wget http://downloads.sourceforge.net/corefonts/
+ {andale32.exe,arial32.exe,arialb32.exe,comic32.exe,courie32.exe,
+ georgi32.exe,impact32.exe,times32.exe,trebuc32.exe,verdan32.exe,
+ webdin32.exe}
+
+ Or you can use your browser: point it to
+ https://sourceforge.net/projects/corefonts/files/the%20fonts/final and
+ download the same files.
+
+ Make sure the package is purged and no remaining setup triggers are
+ remaining, using your favorite package manager or command-line APT:
+
+ $ sudo apt-get purge ttf-mscorefonts-installer
+
+ Then reinstall the package, this time pointing to the previously-
+ downloaded fonts in a second step:
+
+ $ sudo apt-get install ttf-mscorefonts-installer
+ # (this will most likely fail again)
+ $ sudo dpkg-reconfigure ttf-mscorefonts-installer
+
+ The second command should return a "graphical" interface in the
+ terminal. Use it to point to the directory where you downloaded the
+ fonts (/path/to/directory/containing/the/fonts). Make sure no .deb files
+ are in this directory, they seem to be picked up too and then it fails.
+
+ If a pop-up shows up for a post-install action later, just let it run,
+ it shouldn't come back. It may triggered by the file /var/lib/update-
+ notifier/user.d/data-downloads-failed and you may be successful in
+ avoiding the regularly-reappearing message by removing this file. But
+ this point is less clear.
+
+ Once everything is working, you can delete the downloaded fonts in .exe
+ format, they have been uncompressed and installed in
+ /usr/share/fonts/truetype/msttcorefonts in .ttf format.
+
+ Adapted from: Vincent Gerris (comment 17), Lesley Binks (comment 18).
+
+ [Workaround 2]
+
+ Remove Ubuntu's version of ttf-mscorefonts-installer and install
+ Debian's version instead. Indeed, Debian's version uses wget to download
+ the fonts, and contrary to apt-helper, wget handles redirections fine.
+
+ Download the package from https://packages.debian.org/ttf-mscorefonts-
+ installer. Version 3.6 has been tested by several users. This workaround
+ should work with Debian's version 3.4+nmu1 too, but then you'd be
+ prompted to update to Ubuntu's problematic version 3.4+nmu1ubuntu2 next
+ time you update your packages.
+
+ To download the package with wget (command line formatted for
+ readability, do not include line break and line indent):
+
+ $ wget http://httpredir.debian.org/debian/pool/contrib/m/
+ msttcorefonts/ttf-mscorefonts-installer_3.6_all.deb
+
+ Purge your currently-installed Ubuntu version of the package using your
+ favorite package manager or command-line APT, and install the Debian
+ version with dpkg:
+
+ $ sudo apt-get purge ttf-mscorefonts-installer
+ $ sudo dpkg --install /path/to/ttf-mscorefonts-installer_3.6_all.deb
+
+ You should keep the deb-file around, so when this bug is fixed in Ubuntu
+ 16.04 and 16.10, you can uninstall Debian's version of the package and
+ go back to Ubuntu's version:
+
+ $ sudo dpkg --purge /path/to/ttf-mscorefonts-installer_3.6_all.deb
+ $ sudo apt-get install ttf-mscorefonts-installer
+
+ Adapted from: yas (comment 19), Richard Elkins (comment 40)
+
+ [Fix]
+
+ The bug was fixed by Julian Klode in version 1.4~beta3ubuntu1 of package
+ apt for the upcoming 17.04 release, see bug 1651923 comments 24 25. If
+ everything works fine in the development release, Julian may backport
+ his fix to the previous 16.04 and 16.10 releases, but this process
+ currently takes a few weeks to a few months.
+
+ Subscribe to this bug and bug 1651923 to follow on the progress.
+
+ This bug used to be a duplicate of bug 1651923, but was temporarily de-
+ duplicated to hopefully make it easier for people to find it, instead of
+ reporting the issue as a new bug. Otherwise, duplicates are hidden.
** Changed in: msttcorefonts (Ubuntu)
Status: Confirmed => In Progress
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https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1607535
Title:
ttf-mscorefonts-installer 3.4+nmu1ubuntu2 fails to install core fonts
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