I cant update or install anything in the package manager it just says authentication error

Support
,
1

from looking at other posts like this one

I was led to believe that polkit not running is the problem. but I can’t figure out how to start it or even check if it’s running. I know it’s installed.
I need help.
I’m still kinda new to Linux.

2

For starters, what do you see as output for

systemctl status polkit.service
3

this is the output

● polkit.service - Authorization Manager
     Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/polkit.service; static)
     Active: active (running) since Mon 2023-03-20 22:00:18 MDT; 1h 36min ago
       Docs: man:polkit(8)
   Main PID: 721 (polkitd)
      Tasks: 3 (limit: 77043)
     Memory: 6.5M
        CPU: 411ms
     CGroup: /system.slice/polkit.service
             └─721 /usr/lib/polkit-1/polkitd --no-debug

Mar 20 22:21:54 ManjaroGameingPC polkitd[721]: Reloading rules
Mar 20 22:21:54 ManjaroGameingPC polkitd[721]: Collecting garbage unconditionally...
Mar 20 22:21:54 ManjaroGameingPC polkitd[721]: Loading rules from directory /etc/polkit-1/rules.d
Mar 20 22:21:54 ManjaroGameingPC polkitd[721]: Loading rules from directory /usr/share/polkit-1/rules.d
Mar 20 22:21:54 ManjaroGameingPC polkitd[721]: Finished loading, compiling and executing 7 rules
Mar 20 22:21:54 ManjaroGameingPC polkitd[721]: Reloading rules
Mar 20 22:21:54 ManjaroGameingPC polkitd[721]: Collecting garbage unconditionally...
Mar 20 22:21:54 ManjaroGameingPC polkitd[721]: Loading rules from directory /etc/polkit-1/rules.d
Mar 20 22:21:54 ManjaroGameingPC polkitd[721]: Loading rules from directory /usr/share/polkit-1/rules.d
Mar 20 22:21:54 ManjaroGameingPC polkitd[721]: Finished loading, compiling and executing 7 rules

so i guess thats not the problem?

4

I readily admit that I don’t know all that much about polkit and am mainly hoping to gather information that other, more experienced, people can use to help you.

I’m on KDE Plasma, so I would not expect my log to be identical to yours, but after I finish loading rules, I see two additional lines:

polkitd[498]: Acquired the name org.freedesktop.PolicyKit1 on the system bus
polkitd[498]: Registered Authentication Agent for unix-session:2 (system bus name :1.46 [/usr/lib/polkit-kde-authentication-agent-1], object path /org/kde/PolicyKit1/AuthenticationAgent, locale en_US.UTF-8)

So maybe there is an issue with your polkit authentication agent. The ArchWiki states that polkit-gnome serves as xfce’s agent.

5

yea I also have polkit-gnome installed

image
image1465×264 32.6 KB

along with plkit-kde-agent for some reason, even though I’m on XFCE I don’t remember installing any of these.

6

I am a little curious about that polkit-kde-agent too, but unfortunately, I have reached the limits of my knowledge, and can’t really offer anything else useful.

But just out of curiosity, if you select polkit-kde-agent and check its Dependencies, what shows up under Required By:?

7

this?
image

8

Yes, I was wondering which package pulled polkit-kde-agent in as a dependency, and it looks like there isn’t any such package. I’m not quite sure what to make of that. Sorry that I wasn’t able to be of more help.

9

You can see this with pactree

10

I have no idea but for some reason, it’s working now.

11

Yes, however this is more direct and to the point. :wink:

pacman -Qi polkit-kde-agent | grep 'Required By\|Optional For'
12

In addition to:

  • pactree -r PKG
  • pacman -Qi PKG

VIew the pacman log and scroll up/down to see what else was being installed and/or removed at the time:

  • less -N +?PKG /var/log/pacman.log

    NOTE: -N: line numbers, +? search for last occurrence. Using n will continue to search for the previous occurrence. Up/Down arrow keys work. Replace PKG as required (i.e., polkit-kde).

Two commands that are paramount these days, both part of systemd, are:

Last, if I were using pamac as my main package manager tool and was having a problem that I could not correct, I would try the command line, pacman. But first, I would verify the mirrors I’m using via pacman-mirrors and make sure my local repositories were current and do an update via pacman -Syyu. And I’d report the results to this forum and/or gitlab so the issue can possibly get resolved or others can benefit from the experience.

Maybe the machine was rebooted :person_shrugging:

Might want to take a gander at:

  • systemctl --failed
  • journalctl -b -p3 --no-pager

The results don’t necessarily mean there is a problem or you need to take action, but rather may provide a clue if you are having problems.

13

This topic was automatically closed 2 days after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.