# Precompile Package Error: " IOError: could not spawn setenv"

**URL:** <https://discourse.julialang.org/t/precompile-package-error-ioerror-could-not-spawn-setenv/101743>\
**Category:** Package Management\
**Created:** [July 18, 2023, 4:56pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/precompile-package-error-ioerror-could-not-spawn-setenv/101743 "2023-07-18T16:56:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![AidanRS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dc4da7/32.png) [@AidanRS](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/AidanRS)\
**Post date:** [July 18, 2023, 4:56pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/precompile-package-error-ioerror-could-not-spawn-setenv/101743/1 "2023-07-18T16:56:53Z")

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I have been using Julia for about 6 months now very heavily on two devices a Mac and Linux (Pop!\_OS 22.04) and suddenly one day the package manager with Julia on my Linux machine broke. All the packages that I had been using weren’t recognized any more and when I went to re-download them I am given this error that gets stuck in a loop continuously outputting this to the terminal until I kill the process. I genuinely have no idea what caused this happen. This is an example of what happens when I run "] add SpecialFunctions "

 ![Screenshot from 2023-07-18 09-55-59](https://global.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/original/3X/3/8/388cf227b76166b1a49745e2b74220311a65b15d.png)  
Any idea how to fix this?

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**Author:** ![dogtired](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/dogtired/32/52670_2.png) [@dogtired](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/dogtired)\
**Post date:** [August 12, 2023, 12:00pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/precompile-package-error-ioerror-could-not-spawn-setenv/101743/2 "2023-08-12T12:00:52Z")

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I am getting the same error and am wondering if you fixed this in your case. If you did, what did you do?

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**Author:** ![giordano](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/julialang/user_avatar/discourse.julialang.org/giordano/32/2166_2.png) [@giordano](https://discourse.julialang.org/u/giordano)\
**Post date:** [August 14, 2023, 2:00pm UTC](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/precompile-package-error-ioerror-could-not-spawn-setenv/101743/3 "2023-08-14T14:00:47Z")

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For the record, based on the thread [Could not spawn setenv error - #5 by giordano](https://discourse.julialang.org/t/could-not-spawn-setenv-error/102734/5) the problem may be that the Julia package in PopOS is broken. You may want to use the [official binaries](https://julialang.org/downloads/), or use [juliaup](https://github.com/JuliaLang/juliaup) to automatically manage multiple installations.