Re: Trouble with Ubuntu updates

I recommend the package cron-apt for clients servers, its redily
available in all debian/ubuntu releases. Its true the ubuntu servers
have been slow recently esp. from Alaska.

cron-apt by default is configured for daily downloads of all
upgradable packages on apt based systems that support dist-upgrade and
upgrade. This is handy when you want to maintain an up to date
package cache on client machines so you aren't sitting on your thumb
waiting for downloads. It logs and has email notification support for
falure reports.

Debian or Ubuntu feeds of choice will never stay 100% online. Infact
it wavers quite a bit recently, you were probably helping a client at
the same time I couldn't access us.archive.ubuntu.com, but it cleared
up pretty quickly if I remember correctly.

Another nifty gem is to maintain an updated cache on a usb flash
drive, basically set up rsync to download all recent updates on a
daily basis to say /ubuntu/ or /debian/ on your flash drive. You can
do this by listing all remote files via rsync and pushing that to a
file every week or month or so for all .deb files, important to only
exclude .deb files. Then use that as the excluded files list for a
daily rsync. I would store the script to do all this on the flash
drive itself. That way if the drive is not around the updates aren't
executed. Then if you are having issues on site you have a week or two
of updates on a flash drive you can just plug in and add to
sources.list.

It does suck when the feeds go offline, but you can be prepared!

Shane
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Received on Sat Feb 10 11:25:41 2007