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Maybe a Reinstall will help. Open the Terminal and type sudo apt reinstall zorin-os-upgrader
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This looks to me like a failure on the admin access check.
@Ponce-De-Leon suggests reinstalling it which can be done with
sudo apt install --reinstall zorin-os-upgrader
That unfortunately didn't do anything either, I pasted it in and then restarted and it still came back with
"Sorry, password authentication didn't work.Please try again.
To upgrade Zorin you need to authenticate"
That error message makes me think that you don't have a password set. You can go to settings again and change your user's password. Although that might require entering the a password which you don't have. If that is the case, open up a terminal and run:
sudo passwd <your_username>
This will prompt to change your user's password. After that, you should be asked to enter a password when running sudo commands moving forward. Also, you can use this for authentication when prompted like during the upgrade.
Okay I changed my password and restarted the laptop again and it still said the same thing :
"Sorry, password authentication didn't work.Please try again.
To upgrade Zorin you need to authenticate"
Well, final attempt: change the root user's password:
sudo passwd root
The root user is also referred to as the super user. It can do anything in the system, basically. So, needless to say, make sure this password doesn't fall in the wrong hands.
Once that's done try to run the upgrader again using this new password. Maybe a restart is needed, I'm not sure so try if it doesn't work at first.
No that didn't work either.
I changed it and restarted it and the same message was there.
The only other option I can think of is creating a new user account, and use that to perform the upgrade. Make sure you assign a password to this account, and that is an administrator as well.
Otherwise... I'm just as confused as you are 
You can always make a backup of your data and install from scratch.
It won't let me create a new user.I don't know why.I click it and nothing happens at all. I then logged out and logged back in and tried the same thing under my friends user name and again nothing happens when I click it.
First run apt update and upgrade
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade
reboot and check again
I am at a loss on this one but from everything stated, it sounds a bit like an issue with the sudoers.
@Helpmeplease24, at any time have you aver adjusted the ownership or permissions of directories and files? Maybe when trying to solve a different issue in the past...
Are you the person who installed Zorin OS?
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When I was trying to set up xrdp I followed a guide and it told me to create a file called /etc/polkit-1/localauthority.conf.d/02-allow-colord.conf
After creating the file I had the same issue with authentication and the upgrader.
Maybe you followed the same guide?
I deleted the file with this command:
sudo rm /etc/polkit-1/localauthority.conf.d/02-allow-colord.conf
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Try through the terminal:
sudo useradd <new_username> -G sudo
And I'm also curious if you've made any modifications to system files before?
First run apt update and upgrade
sudo apt update && sudo apt upgrade
reboot and check again
Okay I did this and rebooted and logged back in and tried again but it didn't work, just the same message.Thank you though for trying.
Yes I installed it originally and have never had issues with it.
Well i don't know what xrdp is so I doubt I ever tried to set it up.
Okay I did this :
sudo useradd <new_username> -G sudo
and received back:
bash: new_username: No such file or directory
And I'm also curious if you've made any modifications to system files before?
Possibly ? I don't think I have though. I am not very proficient on Linux and other than the usual colors and fonts and styles and sizes leave things alone if they work.
You need to replace the <new_username> with a name composed of alphanumeric characters, such as "test" or something else. The <new_username> in the snippet of code above was just a placeholder.
The portion <new_username> denotes your choice. For example, let's say you wanted your new username to be friedpickles. Replace the carroted protion: <new_username> with friedpickles. The carrots differentiate was is to be replaced.
sudo useradd friedpickles -G sudo
You installed Zorin OS yourself and did not make any known specific system changes, it seems more likely there is some kind of file corruption if not a possible connection error for the upgrader.
You can try
sudo apt install --reinstall ca-certificates policykit-1-gnome
Thank you ! Thanks everyone" who contributed to this I super appreciate it.
I was able to create a new user and that non-existent "user" then was able to update the laptop to 17.1 lite and get it all set up fast.
Also it seems the wifi connections is much faster on this version !
Thanks !
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I'm glad it worked, although I'm still confused as to why this didn't work for your regular user account as it's basically setup in the same way Oh, well, if it works, it works!
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