dpkg: invalid nice value

Additional info:
 I just ran adept from the K menu, ran 'fetch updates' and learned that adept is upgradable. I requested installation, and again got the same error.
  The popup window is labelled 'Debconf on rtg-laptop', the message requests an integer between '-20 and 19', and the active buttons are 'Help', 'Next>', and 'Cancel'. Help and Next do nothing, and Cancel aborts the entire installation (at 19% complete). A second popup appears, saying 'There was an error committing changes. Possibly there was a problem downloading some packages or the commit would break packages"
  I'll certainly reinstall from scratch when herd 5 comes out, but in the meantime, is there a magic dpkg incantation I can run from the command line to force the install without nice'ing it?

I keep trying...
  I ran 'apt-get install adept' from a root shell, and it told me that adept was already at the current level. It then went on to tell me that there were 5 packages not fully installed, and it gave me 5 'setting up...' messages for x11-common, libxau6, libxdmcp6, libxcb1, libxcb-xlib0.
I went back to adept, and attempted a 'full upgrade' which presented 5 install, 205 upgrade. As it began, I clicked on 'show detail' just before the 'invalid nice value' popped up.

The last lines in the 'show details window are:
Preconfiguring packages ...
Use of uninitialized value in join or string at /usr/share/perl5/Debconf/DbDriver/Stack.pm line 104, <GEN7> line 4.
/usr/share/perl5/Debconf/DbDriver/Stack.pm line 104, <GEN7> line 9.

hth,

I ran 'apt-get install apt' from a root console. It upgraded 11 packages, including apt-utils, adept-manager, adept-installer, adept-updater, and adept-notifier.
  Then I tried another adept run. 'Full upgrade' told me it would upgrade 195 packages, but when I clicked 'apply changes', the adept window closed immediately.
  I tried starting adept again, but no window appears. ps aux shows 5 PIDs in status S or Ss referencing 'adept'.
  Rebooting...
  A window pops up asking for my password. It wants to restart an active adept-manager session. The adept window opens, and 'ps aux | grep adept' shows four pids.
'Full upgrade' indicates install 5, upgrade 194.
'Apply changes' gives the same popup and error message as before.

Back to the root console
apt-get update;apt-get upgrade; apt-get dist-upgrade' followed by a reboot, and now I can use adept again. I successfully installed the xastir package, as well as the 10 dependencies it pulled in.
  SO this was apparently fixed by one of the ~200 packages updated since the herd 4 release.

Fresh install of Feisty herd 5 X86_64
Adept updater tells me there are 115 updates, two packages to remove.
  After downloading, window shows a progress bar labelled 'preparing...' at 0%.
  A second window opens labelled 'Debconf on rtg-laptop' with the message 'Incorrect nice value; Please enter an integer between -20 and 19', but no input box.
'Next' does nothing. 'Cancel' closes the window and the updater appears to continue.
  At 5% 'Preparing upgrade of x11-common...', I get the same message window again.
  This time, clicking 'cancel' causes the following message window to appear in the center of the adept updater window:

"Could not commit changes - Adept Updater. There was an error committing changes. Possibly there was a problem downloading some packages or the commit would break packages"

This was followed almost immediately by the appearance of a third 'incorrect nice value message window. I close this window, then click OK in the 'could not commit changes' dialog.
  The adept updater window shows 'Update complete', and offers me only a 'Quit' option.

Why don't I have a warm fuzzy about this message???

I click 'quit' and the window closes.

I open a Konsole window, and enter 'ps aux | grep adept', and am presented with three PIDs: adept-notifier, kio-file, and kio-http, all in status S.

I issue 'sudo apt-get upgrade' as I did on herd 4, and I am presented with 77 to upgrade, and 35 not fully installed or removed. The upgrade proceeds without further prompting.
A second upgrade, followed by a dist-upgrade, present no further packages to be upgraded or installed.

I see someone marked this as a duplicate of #68267.
  WHy would anyone think this is a problem with x11-common?
It seems clear from my experience, and comments on others also marked as dups to 68267, that the problem clearly happens when running adept or adept-updater, and does not occur if I run apt-get upgrade in a Konsole window. Wouldn't that indicate that the problem is in adept? Not the package which happens to be in the process of being upgraded?

you are perferctly right, R.Green. I did not realize that first. apt-get works fine with this.

It occurs also with "apt-get upgrade" for me when upgrading package x11-common, thus I thought it's a bug in that particular package only. Sorry if I was mistaken.

I got the error three times:
First, when the adept window just said 'preparing...'
Second, when adept said 'preparing update for x11-common'
and a third time, soon after, when I didn't catch the package name in question.

I also got it when using adept to install a single package 'adept'.
However, when I went to the command line to execute 'apt-get install adept', it not only did that, but noticed five packages only partly installed, including x11-common, and it successfully finished the job on those.

I guess what needs to be done, is another fresh install, and then an immediate 'apt-get update; apt-get upgrade' rather than using the GUI for the initial update.
I'm well beyond that point now, working on some sound issues, so I won't get a chance to do another fresh install until herd 6 comes around.

I've all but given up on using adept, now I only use apt-get for all my upgrades. adept has caused me to rebuild my system one too many times. This is my 3rd rebuild due to adept.

>WHy would anyone think this is a problem with x11-common?
I have the feeling apt-get upgrade run in a non-interactive debconf
level. Pretty much convinced right now, that the bug have to do with
current priority level of debconf. And the fact that x11-common have
no default value set for the nice value it is asking.

So apt-get update just hide the bug according to me.