Re: Upgrading with a low data cap
On 10/08/2018 10:56 AM, David Wright wrote:
On Mon 08 Oct 2018 at 06:35:19 (-0500), Richard Owlett wrote:
[snip]
I was under the impression that your networking consisted of
point-to-point links via machines' USB ports.
That effort is on hold [almost abandoned]. It's goal was primarily
educational not something for routine use.
Fair enough. You still don't say whether you're running a conventional
LAN nowadays.
I have no LAN.
Can you simultaneously
connect the machine being installed to both the internet and the
system running apt-cache-ng (and using http:)?
I haven't yet read the documentation for apt-cache-ng and don't know
if it would match my mental image.
You might think of a triangle with router and two computers at the
vertices. Each device needs an internet connection to the others
simultaneously during installation for apt-cache-ng to work.
(Typically the two computers will communicate through the router
rather than directly, but you don't have to think about that because
routers just know how to do it.)
OK that won't work as I have no LAN.
I was assuming that that all the
packages that I downloaded/upgraded were still in a cache which could
be transferred to the target machine via a flash drive. The machines
are adjacent.
Yes, that's the simpler method that I outlined in my first post.
That's the one that mentions /target, which is a fact that needs to
be discovered and isn't well documented, hence my post.
(Most people installing Debian will never need to be made aware of
the existence of /target.)
OK
My current priority is verifying my Buster system is
properly setup.
That may well be, but the sooner you deploy some method of reusing
packages, the more you avoid exceeding your cap.
I've a low cap. But I use even less and have built up a cushion.
If I have enough built up, I'll correct my BUSTER problems now.
Otherwise I can wait for the actual release and spend my time studying
how to use a cache.
Something just brought to mind apt-offline. The introductory paragraph
in the man page states:
apt-offline brings offline package management functionality to Debian > based system. It can be used to download packages and its dependencies
to be installed later on (or required to update) a disconnected machine.
Packages can be downloaded from a different connected machine.
Don't know how suitable it would be FOR ME. However studying its use may
prompt questions &/or answers I haven't thought about.
That's why the
simplest method may be the best to start with. I'd been using it
(originally with Iomega Zip and Jaz drives) a decade before I had
any sort of Internet service at home, and before apt-cache-ng was
released (3 months later).
Cheers,
David.
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