[quote]The queston is ...why is dpkg requesting the database server to start? Is the server required in order for dpkg toconfigure an upgrade? If not, why the call?[/code] I think that there were files upgraded that were in use by the server.

When I got the error message about the missing file 'server.crt' I searched a while with Google. Then I found the command
Code:
sudo make-ssl-cert generate-default-snakeoil --force-overwrite
followed by
Code:
sudo dpkg -a --configure
sudo apt-get -f install
Using a self-signed certificate could provide a security issue in a production environment but I think that it is safe to use in Knoppix.