update module fails to install on Ubuntu 12.04 host [#1991334]

Problem/Motivation

The install.php script is failing at step "Installation Profile" on step 41 of 41.

I was able to reproduce this error in five attempts on my web server (Ubuntu 12.04 LTS). I tried installing various php5 packages to resolve a possible dependency -- no success.

The drupal-8.x-dev build dated 2013-May-9 installs successfully in the same environment.

Javascript console error from browser client:

AjaxError: An AJAX HTTP error occurred. HTTP Result Code: 500 Debugging information follows. Path: http://mysite.org/drupal/core/install.php?langcode=en&profile=spark&id=1&op=do_nojs&op=do StatusText: Internal Server Error ResponseText:
[Break On This Error]

Apache2 server error log:

http://mysite.org/drupal/core/install.php?langcode=en&profile=spark
[Thu May 09 12:49:14 2013] [error] [client 10.10.10.10] PHP Fatal error:  Call to undefined function taxonomy_term_save() 
in /var/www/mysite.org/drupal/profiles/spark/spark.install on line 106, referer: 
http://mysite.org/drupal/core/install.php?langcode=en&profile=spark&op=start&id=1

Watchdog logs via SQL query (full txt is attached, first error below):

39	%type: !message in %function (line %line of %file).	a:6:{s:5:"%type";s:58:"Symfony\\Component\\Routing\\Exception\\RouteNotFoundException";s:8:"!message";s:77:"Route &quot;field_ui.display_overview.node.search_index&quot; does not exist.";s:9:"%function";s:51:"Drupal\\Core\\Routing\\RouteProvider->getRouteByName()";s:5:"%file";s:87:"/var/www/mysite.org/drupal/core/lib/Drupal/Core/Routing/RouteProvider.php";s:5:"%line";i:146;s:14:"severity_level";i:3;}	3		http://mysite.org/drupal/core/install.php?langcode=en&profile=spark&id=1&op=do_nojs&op=do	1368120537

Reloading install.php allows to complete installation (i.e. "Configure Site" and "Finished" steps), but the site malfunctions resulting in this blocking issue:
#1986140: User 1 profile Access Denied (view and edit) -> Warning Illegal offset type in isset or empty