Re: mini-dinstall, repository signing and apt-get authentication
Ian> And this is my main question: have you figured out what causes this error?
Neil> Yes - the error is caused by not using reprepro.
Neil> :-)
I am afraid from my POV this is not particularly funny. The
documentation (i.e. the apt manual and the secure apt wiki) doesn't
mention reprepro (or mini-dinstall), I was trying to do this the
documented way (well, except having a flat directory), and it didn't
work. I don't feel "just use whiz-bang tool foo" is the correct answer
in such a situation, or at least it is not the complete answer. That
would include at least acknowledging that the documentation is wrong.
Ian> Let me describe my situation: I have a flat (single directory) archive
Ian> of personal debs. I see absolutely no point in maintaining "code names"
Ian> and "suites" and what not.
Neil> reprepro doesn't force these on you but it does not stop you adding
Neil> them later either.
OK, I'll take a look at reprepro.
Ian> I generate the Packages.gz file by
Ian>
Ian> cd /var/local/debian && apt-ftparchive packages ./ | gzip - >
Ian> Packages.gz
Neil> Yuk. There should be no need to do this.
Ian> and the Release file by
Ian>
Ian> cd /var/local/debian && apt-ftparchive release ./ > /tmp/Release &&
Ian> mv /tmp/Release .
Neil> Nor that.
This is all straight from the wiki.
Ian> All this works flawlessly until I introduce signing. As soon as I
Ian> add a Release.gpg file (generated by cd /var/local/debian && gpg
Ian> -abs -o Release.gpg Release) apt-get starts giving me the above
Ian> error message. Now the wording made me think that perhaps perhaps
Ian> I should NOT compress the Packages file, so I tried to omit the
Ian> gzip step above. But then apt-get complains it cannot retrieve
Ian> Packages file!
Neil> No. The error is because mini-dinstall doesn't support what you want.
Huh? I didn't use mini-dinstall at all. I was generating the metadata
manually, in the documented format.
Neil> No. IMHO mini-dinstall is the quick hack which isn't capable of
Neil> supporting advanced features like SecureApt.
Again, I didn't use mini-dinstall - I generated the Secure Apt files
as documented.
--
This line is completely ham.
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