On 09/09/2010 07:40 AM, Fess wrote:
Page "Local mirros" was removed from wiki by this reason:
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It is generally frowned upon to create a local mirror due the bandwidth that is
required.
There is not a good reason to create a local mirror, since one of the
alternatives below will likely meet your needs.
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I think it's very useful ability, and why this page was removed... i don't
know. It's silly.
If anyone else think it must be return - maybe we should do it?
P.S.
A lot of guys agreed with me this morning, so i think many people want this
article back.
I looked into an Arch local 'mirror/repo' when I started using Arch, similar to
what I used to maintain for my SuSE installs. (the local mirror page was a mess
and wrong then as well) However, since Arch will check for the presence of
packages in /var/cache/pacman/pkg before/(instead of) re-downloading the
packages, for local network boxes, it was just easier to use rsync to grab the
packages from whatever box did the most recent update and transfer then to the
nextbox you need to update (same architecture only).
The only caveat is you need a way to manage duplicate (old packages) in
/var/cache/pacman/pkg so I came up with a script that does that.
So instead of worrying about a 'local mirror', just:
(1) rsync -uav updatedbox:/var/cache/pacman/pkg nextbox:/var/cache/pacman
(2) grab the following 2 scripts:
(the wrapper script that calls the main script [twice - see why below])
http://www.3111skyline.com/dl/Archlinux/scripts/fduparch.sh
(the main duplicate identification and removal script)
http://www.3111skyline.com/dl/Archlinux/scripts/fduppkg
Put them both in /usr/local/bin (or link them there), edit fduparch.sh and
change the directories you want the duplicates from /var/cache/pacman/pkg moved
to (default is /home/backup/pkg-old and for the second pass to
/home/backup/pkg-older). Then after updating one box, just call fduparch.sh (the
wrapper script) as root and the duplicates in /var/cache/pacman/pkg are moved as
follows:
Pass 1:
/var/cache/pacman/pkg => /home/backup/pkg-old
Pass 2:
/home/backup/pkg-old => /home/backup/pkg-older
Which leaves you with the current set of packages in:
/var/cache/pacman/pkg
The last used packages before update in:
/home/backup/pkg-old
And finally all older packages in:
/home/backup/pkg-older
which can be deleted or archived. (of course you can delete the packages in
/home/backup/pkg-old if you like as well)
NOTE: the duplicate removal script uses the file ctime and/or mtime to determine
which is the newer package, so when copying machine to machine with rsync, make
sure you preserve the file attributes. (rsync's -a option works fine).
Once you set this up, maintaining a local set of packages is a breeze, just:
(1) pacman -Syu as normal on one box (works the same for new installs too)
(2) fduparch.sh (as root to remove the older versions of new packages)
(3) rsync -uav updatedbox:/var/cache/pacman/pkg nextbox:/var/cache/pacman
(only for boxes of the same architecture of course)
(4) pacman -Syu on the box you rsync'ed the packages to (nextbox)
(5) call fduparch.sh on the box you just updated (nextbox), and so on, and so
on...
As long as your boxes have reasonably similar packages installed, this
eliminates 90+% of re-downloading, takes no additional bandwidth because you
have to download the updated packages once anyway, and is simple enough for me
to manage so you guy will have no problems with it :p
And if you wanted to get even more creative, you could simply write a script on
your main box that you update to automate the entire process for all your local
boxes using nothing more than rsync and ssh calls of run the updates and dup
removal scripts. (I haven't been that creative yet) Just remember to separate
your boxes into groups/classes by architecture (i686 & x86_64)
Cheers.
--
David C. Rankin, J.D.,P.E.
Rankin Law Firm, PLLC
510 Ochiltree Street
Nacogdoches, Texas 75961
Telephone: (936) 715-9333
Facsimile: (936) 715-9339
www.rankinlawfirm.com
