RE: Issues installing packages from melpa

[Akber Khan via Users list for the GNU Emacs text editor <help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org>]

Hi Janelle and Phil,

Good suggestion! 

So I ran the command "emacs -Q", and in my init.el file I uncommented the portion with the lisp code that inhibits the default init file: 

(setq inhibit-default-init t)

- I think -Q handles that, but I made sure to uncomment that just in case. 

I checked the *Messages* buffer, and upon load, this was all I got: 

For information about GNU Emacs and the GNU system, type C-h C-a.

When I open the package manager, all that's available are packages from the gnu archive, and indeed none of those show the "Process melpa.org connection broken by remote peer" error message in their description. However, I also want to add the melpa archive, so in that same vanilla session, I added the archive with: 

(require 'package)
(add-to-list 'package-archives '("melpa" . "https://melpa.org/packages/") t)

I don't see anything in *Messages* when I run that code, but when I open the package manager, it never seems to finish loading the package list. The text I see in the buffer status menu is: "(Package Menu: Loading)", and all I can see are installed, built-in, and gnu archive packages.

Nothing more seems to happen, but when I click on any of the gnu packages, the following appears in the *Messages* buffer: 

Contacting host: elpa.gnu.org:443
gnutls.el: (err=[-54] Error in the pull function.) boot: (:priority NORMAL:%DUMBFW :hostname elpa.gnu.org :loglevel 0 :min-prime-bits nil :trustfiles (/etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt) :crlfiles nil :keylist nil :verify-flags nil :verify-error nil :callbacks nil)

I got a slightly different message when trying again on another package: 

Contacting host: elpa.gnu.org:443
gnutls.el: (err=[gnutls-e-invalid-session] The specified session has been invalidated for some reason.) boot: (:priority NORMAL:%DUMBFW :hostname elpa.gnu.org :loglevel 0 :min-prime-bits nil :trustfiles (/etc/ssl/certs/ca-certificates.crt) :crlfiles nil :keylist nil :verify-flags nil :verify-error nil :callbacks nil)

It might be essentially the same information, so I won't post any of the other messages I get when clicking on other packages. 

Thanks all for your help - hopefully this is useful!

Best, 
Akber

-----Original Message-----
From: Philip Kaludercic <philipk@posteo.net> 
Sent: Wednesday, October 13, 2021 10:32 AM
To: Janelle Rose <Janelle.T.Rose@frb.gov>
Cc: Akber Khan <Akber.Khan@frb.gov>; Tassilo Horn <tsdh@gnu.org>; help-gnu-emacs@gnu.org
Subject: Re: Issues installing packages from melpa



Janelle Rose <Janelle.T.Rose@frb.gov> writes:

> We do have a lot of customizations to our emacs install. Is there a 
> way to launch a "vanilla" version to ignore those customizations.

Yes, you add a -Q argument to Emacs like so:

     emacs -Q

-- 
	Philip Kaludercic