On Thu, 8 Jul 1999, Richard Stallman wrote: > Maybe the situation is different with apt. I have very little > information about apt, little more than has appeared in the recent > discussion. Is there a a good source of information on how > apt interacts with the user--on what questions it asks?
These days APT comes pre-configured to download packages from our mirror array (http.us.debian.org) as well as from non-us. All available packages maintained by Debian (non-free included) are in that configuration. APT is selected as the default dselect method and the only question it asks is a simple confirmation. There is a setup script that the user can run, it provides recommendations of sites and configuration formats that include non-free and non-us. APT configuration is striaghtforward and doesn't require some of the involved hunting around like the ftp method did. You take a URL from the mirror list and replace the old one in the config file or through the setup interface. Stats show that virtually all the traffic on ftp.debain.org is from automated download tools and not people perusing the archive. Jason
