Good morning, first of all I must say that I love Zorin OS and in 1 year I have never had any problem.
Two days ago I installed python 3.11 and PIP3, but PIP3 was not working and was showing me a series of errors which led me to search for solutions in forums, one of them was to remove "dist-packages" from some "Python" folders inside /bin and /lib using Thunar in SU mode.
Shortly after I got errors when using the Package Manager and immediately I got a "Software Updater" error in the taskbar and since then it does not open that program:
Is there any way to repair my system?
If I need to reinstall the system, how do I do it? I currently have it in Dual Boot with Windows 10 and I would not know how to perform a clean install of Zorin LIte. Would it be the same procedure of deleting the old Zorin partition and creating a new one?
Remarks:
1- The Package manager errors I solved them with this Zorin Article: Fix Package Manager Issues.
2- Why Zorin OS Lite has such OLD versions of NodeJS and Python? At least they should add the LTS versions of Node and not version 12.
I mention this because if I had not had this error and conflict of Python2 with Python3 and PIP by Zorins OS, my system would still be perfect...
If I understand this correctly you cannot open the Software store at all? Can you try to run it from the terminal with gnome-software? Also, are you able to run sudo apt update without errors?
I'm not sure how to fix this but in order to get a better look it would be helpful to know which files you deleted exactly.
As for the clean install, you would have to select the current partition in which ZorinOS is installed and that would override it. Everything in that partition would be overwritten so make a backup first. In fact, this incident may be a good excuse to make backups of your files if you haven't done so already, even if a complete re-install is not necessary.
Part of the reason has to do with stability. Not every package needs to be at their latest version available, and updating without need can potentially introduced instability and cause issues in the system as you've just found out. It's true that sometimes packages do lag quite behind, though.
If you do need more recent version of Node.js, you can add additional repositories as described in the official project website. I'm not sure if there's something equivalent for Python but I would recommend using Docker for that, instead.
@zenzen Hi friend, when I run gnome-software it opens the software store app (which works fine) but I mean the software updater (orange icon) does not open and only shows the update-notifier icon that says: "a problem occurred when checking for the updates".
Regarding what I deleted, I deleted the "python3.8" folder from /lib (or /bin, I don't remember) AND the dist-packages folder from the "python" named folders I found.
And about the clean install, which option should I select? I know it will overwrite everything, but should I use "Install Zorin OS alongside" or "Manual partitioning"? My main fear is that there is a problem and the dual boot selection screen (GRUB) will stop working.
I would do the "Something else..." Manual Install. This way you won't have multiple operating systems installed alongside of each other.
You can click on your Zorin Partition in the Gparted Partition Manager, then click the (-) button.
It will then show as Free Space.
Click on the free space and then click the (+) button.
Select your options, such as primary, ext4, set the Mouont point to /
Whatever you need to do in the Format Pop Over window.
Then proceed to install on that partition.
My understanding is that multiple version of Python can be installed alongside each other, so in the future I would recommend trying to do this and simply create an alias to point to whichever version you'd like to use by default.
For now, though, I would personally reinstall to make absolutely sure that no broken bits are left behind. I don't remember the exact wording of the options while you're installing but I would trust what Aravisian said.
