Re: HOWTO Create a Debian mirror using only CDs
On Thu, Feb 20, 2003 at 07:39:02AM +0100, Linux Leman Digest wrote: On Tue, Feb 18, 2003 at 06:57:05PM +0100, Erik Rossen wrote: Why are the original package lists from the CDs even necessary? Each .deb has enough info in its control file to rebuild the Packages lists and frankly I don't care how the .debs are organised, as long as they can be found afterwards. They are not. For example, my Debian CD update generation script: [ ... ] if [ $? = 0 ]; then # Generating the Packages.gz file (cd $DEST_PACKAGES dpkg-scanpackages . /dev/null | gzip -9 Packages.gz) mkisofs -A $LABEL -r -o $OUTPUT_FILE $TMP_DIR || fail mkisofs md5sum $OUTPUT_FILE $OUTPUT_FILE.md5sum || fail md5sum rm -rf $TMP_DIR else rm -rf $TEMPDIR exit 1 fi OK, that seems to answer the question of whether or not apt-move is really necessary, but there seems to be a mis-comprehension of my problem by both you and Fred. I already knew about dpkg-scanpackages (it gets called when one does apt-move packages) for rebuilding the Packages file. It worked fine for me already and I have been able to using my mirror for normal apt-get operations. The problem comes when trying to do an install on a completely new machine. debootstrap seems to choke when it cannot find a valid Release file in each major subsection (main, contrib, non-free) of the mirror and it refuses to use the mirror for the install. I can use it afterwards, but NOT for the initial install. My question is *not* how do I make the Packages file?, but how do I make the Release files? At the limit I can write a little shell script to call md5sum on all of the Packages files and build something like dists/stable/Release: Origin: Debian Label: Debian Suite: stable Version: 3.0 Codename: woody Date: Fri, 19 Jul 2002 19:03:33 UTC Architectures: alpha arm hppa i386 ia64 m68k mips mipsel powerpc s390 sparc Components: main contrib non-free Description: Debian 3.0 Released 20th July 2002 MD5Sum: 678eab2d1d603992726f697765dadf33 3208 main/disks-alpha/current/md5sum.txt 678eab2d1d603992726f697765dadf33 3208 main/disks-alpha/3.0.23-2002-05-21/md5sum.txt 002a42ea167a6eede449472e086c0d4a 6240918 main/binary-alpha/Packages 1815a1f31a9d5613622f49cab5407e7c 1700336 main/binary-alpha/Packages.gz e061181295feeeabcd2df379e95aa349 94 main/binary-alpha/Release 036d9f86a89a86f5b1db46b963e1c1e2 1774 main/disks-arm/current/md5sum.txt 036d9f86a89a86f5b1db46b963e1c1e2 1774 main/disks-arm/3.0.23-2002-05-21/md5sum.txt aa6e9dd49434eb152673511ca6c0 6141671 main/binary-arm/Packages be6d465f85178d97341779ff3ca6718b 1682660 main/binary-arm/Packages.gz 37dc7628af7ce694c0009be246178406 92 main/binary-arm/Release ...etc, but I do not want to do it if there is already a well-used Debian tool for this job. It seems to me that the ftpmaster would have such a tool, no? If so, where is it? For autoinstalling machines, you could look into FAI: they may have some instructions for setting up mirrors. OK, I will take a look. If you install from one CD, you usually don't need the base.tar.gz and other things on the mirror. True, but it is nice to not have to depend on having access to a CDROM drive like, for example, when I installed Debian on my Sony Vaio notebook that has neither a CDROM nor a floppy drive. I was able to do that (and redo and redo and redo...) because I had a local mirror set up using apt-proxy that downloads and caches Release files and everything else. Very, very, convenient. -- Erik Rossen ^OpenPGP key: 2935D0B9 [EMAIL PROTECTED] /e\ Use GnuPG, see the http://people.linux-gull.ch/rossen ---black helicopters. -- http://www-internal.alphanet.ch/linux-leman/ avant de poser une question. Ouais, pour se désabonner aussi.
Re: HOWTO Create a Debian mirror using only CDs
Le Thu, 20 Feb 2003 21:53:47 +0100, tu as ecrit : The problem comes when trying to do an install on a completely new machine. debootstrap seems to choke when it cannot find a valid Release file in each major subsection (main, contrib, non-free) of the mirror and it refuses to use the mirror for the install. I can use it afterwards, but NOT for the initial install. My question is *not* how do I make the Packages file?, but how do I make the Release files? At the limit I can write a little shell script The only information I have is this howto: http://www.isotton.com/debian/docs/repository-howto/repository-howto.html It explain how to create manually a release file for the subdir, but not how to create the master Release file. So I guess a shell script is the way to go. ...etc, but I do not want to do it if there is already a well-used Debian tool for this job. It seems to me that the ftpmaster would have such a tool, no? If so, where is it? The tools used by the ftpmasters are still dark magic. You can find them at http://cvs.debian.org/dak/?cvsroot=dak, but do not expect much documentation. Documenting and packaging these tools is a long standing item on Debian todo list (http://www.debian.org/devel/todo/) -- I guess it'll be easier to write a new script rather than understanding how everything works. Frédéric -- http://www-internal.alphanet.ch/linux-leman/ avant de poser une question. Ouais, pour se désabonner aussi.
Re: HOWTO Create a Debian mirror using only CDs
On Tue, Feb 18, 2003 at 06:57:05PM +0100, Erik Rossen wrote: Why are the original package lists from the CDs even necessary? Each .deb has enough info in its control file to rebuild the Packages lists and frankly I don't care how the .debs are organised, as long as they can be found afterwards. They are not. For example, my Debian CD update generation script: [ ... ] if [ $? = 0 ]; then # Generating the Packages.gz file (cd $DEST_PACKAGES dpkg-scanpackages . /dev/null | gzip -9 Packages.gz) mkisofs -A $LABEL -r -o $OUTPUT_FILE $TMP_DIR || fail mkisofs md5sum $OUTPUT_FILE $OUTPUT_FILE.md5sum || fail md5sum rm -rf $TMP_DIR else rm -rf $TEMPDIR exit 1 fi Beware that the Path is '.' because paths on CD-ROM are hardcoded. On a HTTP server you may need to put mirror/ or whatever is appropriate for you. BTW: I have always done my Debian deb repository by copying the pools, then starting a rsync to get the rest. An alternative can be to put all *.deb into one single directory (ala-Red Hat) and then run the above scanpackages. For autoinstalling machines, you could look into FAI: they may have some instructions for setting up mirrors. If you install from one CD, you usually don't need the base.tar.gz and other things on the mirror. -- http://www-internal.alphanet.ch/linux-leman/ avant de poser une question. Ouais, pour se désabonner aussi.
HOWTO Create a Debian mirror using only CDs
I use the following procedure to construct a static Debian mirror from 6 Debian CDs, but there is still a problem that prevents the mirror from being used for doing complete network-only installs - no Release files with checksums are built. What is the proper Debian way of building the Release files? HOWTO Create a Debian mirror using only CDs SCENARIO: You need to build a http/ftp/nfs mirror of Debian in order that several workers can quickly install a bunch of different machines simultaneously. You have a local network, but no Internet connectivity (not even an analog modem), and only a complete Debian Official CD set as a source of .debs. BEGIN Run apt-cdrom for each CD of your set: apt-cdrom add Install the necessary packages for building and running the mirror: apt-get install apt-move apache Create a directory on the server for the Debian mirror: mkdir -p /mirrors/debian/dists ln -s /mirrors/debian /var/www/debian Set Apache to serve the mirror directory (i.e. set up a Directory spec for it in /etc/apache/httpd.conf), reload Apache, and test by browsing http://localhost/debian Edit /etc/apt-move.conf: Insert each complete CD specification in the variable APTSITES like this: APTSITES=CDSPEC1 CDSPEC2 ... CDSPEC7 Where CDSPEC1 is: Debian%20GNU_Linux%203.0%20r0%20%5fWoody%5f%20-%20Official%20i386%20Binary-1%20(20020718) if the corresponding entry in /etc/apt/sources.list is: deb cdrom:[Debian GNU/Linux 3.0 r0 _Woody_ - Official i386 Binary-1 (20020718)]/ unstable contrib main non-US/contrib non-US/main Set DIST=woody Import the package list information from the CDs (found in /var/lib/apt/lists): apt-move get For each CD, import the .deb files into the mirror: [INSERT CD] mount /cdrom apt-move movefile `find /cdrom -name '*.deb'` [WAIT A REALLY LONG TIME] umount /cdrom [EJECT CD] Rebuild the package lists on the mirror: apt-move packages END OPTIONAL: Copy base.tgz and all of the boot floppies into the mirror directory too. ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS: Is there no simpler way of doing this??? What if I want to use apt-move to mirror several distribs? Do I make a seperate config file for each? Why are the original package lists from the CDs even necessary? Each .deb has enough info in its control file to rebuild the Packages lists and frankly I don't care how the .debs are organised, as long as they can be found afterwards. Surely others have needed to do this task. Did I miss a HOWTO or a package? Am I really using the correct tools? -- Erik Rossen ^OpenPGP key: 2935D0B9 [EMAIL PROTECTED] /e\ Use GnuPG, see the http://people.linux-gull.ch/rossen ---black helicopters. -- http://www-internal.alphanet.ch/linux-leman/ avant de poser une question. Ouais, pour se désabonner aussi.
Re: HOWTO Create a Debian mirror using only CDs
Le Tue, 18 Feb 2003 18:57:05 +0100, tu as ecrit : Why are the original package lists from the CDs even necessary? Each .deb has enough info in its control file to rebuild the Packages lists and frankly I don't care how the .debs are organised, as long as they can be found afterwards. Est-ce que tu as essayé dpkg-scanpackages ? NAME dpkg-scanpackages - create Packages files SYNOPSIS dpkg-scanpackages binarydir overridefile [pathprefix] Packages DESCRIPTION dpkg-scanpackages sorts through a tree of Debian binary packages and creates a Packages file, used by dselect(8) to tell the user what packages are available for installa tion. These Packages files are the same as those found on Debian archive sites and CD-ROMs. You might use dpkg- scanpackages yourself if making a directory of local pack ages to install on a cluster of machines. Fred. -- http://www-internal.alphanet.ch/linux-leman/ avant de poser une question. Ouais, pour se désabonner aussi.
