Apt-get :: apt-get problems

After downloading and uncompressing dpkg.tar.gz successfully, I try to update apt-get but I got the following message:

"E: Could not open lock file /var/lib/dpkg/lock - open (2 No such file or directory)
E: Unable to lock the administration directory (/var/lib/dpkg/), are you root?"

Three things:
Are you doing it as root?
Is DSL installed on your hard drive (not running from CD)?
Did you type 'dsl-restore' as root with a functional net connection?

Run 'dpkg-restore' as root.

original here.