I do use Synaptic in both KDE and GNOME and it works to install and
remove, but it show no updates when there are updates that I can manage in
apt-get. I am curious why they show in one and not in the other as both
access the same sources list. It seems that the update function in my
Synaptic is not working. I can update in Kpackagekit, BTW. It is only
Synaptic and the Update Manager that is broken. If it was broken on only one
machine then it would be easier to troubleshoot. Being broken in two
machines suggests something is wrong beyond my settings. I am going to
remove Synaptic completely and re-install and see if that helps. I'll post
the results.