Could not get lock /var/lib/dpkg/lock - open (11 Resource temporarily unavailable)

E: Could not get lock /var/lib/dpkg/lock - open (11 Resource temporarily unavailable)
E: Unable to lock the administration directory (/var/lib/dpkg/)



 
 

     
     

      
      41 
      
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      accepted
     
     

     
     

      
      
WARNING: This answer is applicable to Ubuntu version < 11.04, do not use it in a newer version as it will hard freeze your system
      
      
As per the other answers there is a package management app holding the lock.When unsure do not manually remove the lock, first run:
      
      
sudo fuser -cuk /var/lib/dpkg/lock; sudo rm -f /var/lib/dpkg/lock

      
      
This will kill any processes opening the file before removing it.
     
     




 
 

     
     

      
      24 
      
      down vote 
     
     

     
     

      
      
You can delete the lock file with
      
      
sudo rm /var/lib/apt/lists/lock

      
      
you may also need to delete the lock file in the cache directory
      
      
sudo rm /var/cache/apt/archives/lock

      
      
after that try open synaptic again