Category: CentOS

Full error code:

[[email protected] ~]# yum install emacs

Loaded plugins: fastestmirror

Determining fastest mirrors

Traceback (most recent call last):

  File "/usr/bin/yum", line 29, in ?

    yummain.user_main(sys.argv[1:], exit_code=True)

  File "/usr/share/yum-cli/yummain.py", line 229, in user_main

    errcode = main(args)

  File "/usr/share/yum-cli/yummain.py", line 104, in main

    result, resultmsgs = base.doCommands()

  File "/usr/share/yum-cli/cli.py", line 339, in doCommands

    self._getTs(needTsRemove)

  File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/yum/depsolve.py", line 101, in _getTs

    self._getTsInfo(remove_only)

  File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/yum/depsolve.py", line 112, in _getTsInfo

    pkgSack = self.pkgSack

  File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/yum/__init__.py", line 591, in

    pkgSack = property(fget=lambda self: self._getSacks(),

  File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/yum/__init__.py", line 434, in _getSacks

    self.repos.populateSack(which=repos)

  File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/yum/repos.py", line 223, in populateSack

    self.doSetup()

  File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/yum/repos.py", line 71, in doSetup

    self.ayum.plugins.run('postreposetup')

  File "/usr/lib/python2.4/site-packages/yum/plugins.py", line 176, in run

    func(conduitcls(self, self.base, conf, **kwargs))

  File "/usr/lib/yum-plugins/fastestmirror.py", line 181, in postreposetup_hook

    all_urls = FastestMirror(all_urls).get_mirrorlist()

  File "/usr/lib/yum-plugins/fastestmirror.py", line 333, in get_mirrorlist

    self._poll_mirrors()

  File "/usr/lib/yum-plugins/fastestmirror.py", line 376, in _poll_mirrors

    pollThread.start()

  File "/usr/lib/python2.4/threading.py", line 416, in start

    _start_new_thread(self.__bootstrap, ())

thread.error: can't start new thread

[/code]

Fix:
This error is due to the inadequate memory for yum operation. This occurs due to Yum’s fastest-mirror plugin. So, if you have a low end VPS then you may see this error often. To solve this just disable that plugin.
You can disable this plugin in 2 ways :
Login using root issue and issue this command.
vi /etc/yum/pluginconf.d/fastestmirror.conf[/code]

And change this line

enable=1[/code]

to

enable=0[/code]

OR
Login using root issue and issue this command.
yum --disableplugin=fastestmirror update[/code]

This plugin is used to find the fastest mirrors/sources available for the software so that the update/install process is quicker. To re-enable the plugin, just run the command.
yum --enableplugin=fastestmirror update[/code]

OR

change enable=1 in fastestmirror.conf file