Errors trying to upgrade from GG to HH Ubuntu.

[James Takac]

On Sunday 11 May 2008 06:48:30 Daniel Mons wrote:
> ==============Sebastian Spiess wrote:
> > I did a clean install and everything went smooth but when I started
> > installing all the stuff missing I had problems with the AU mirror as
> > well. I ended up switching quite often, but this could have something to
> > do with the "others" upgrading... good to hear that it worked for you.
> >
> > I am now back to the AU mirror, all is fine so far. keep the traffic on
> > the continent :-)
>
> Some general comments on APT mirrors, ISPs, and sources.list config from
> a Debian veteran of 7 years, and an Ubuntu user for 2 years now:
>
> au.archive.ubunut.com is hosted by Optus:
>
> dan at bnenb007:~$ dig au.archive.ubuntu.com
> *snip*
> ;; ANSWER SECTION:
> au.archive.ubuntu.com.	600	IN	CNAME	mirror.optus.net.
> mirror.optus.net.	86400	IN	A	211.29.132.173
>
> Now I don't intend this to be a "crap on Optus" session.  Optus
> generously host Ubuntu's au mirror as well as the primary au mirror for
> sourceforge.  But the fact of the matter is the mirrors are slow to
> respond, and seem to be heavily QoS'ed.  I completely understand why
> they do this, but sadly it makes for random brokenness when doing upgrades.
>
> In particular, the two weeks before, and up to a month after any Ubuntu
> release see these mirrors get hammered.  I honestly don't think the
> world understands just how popular Ubuntu is right now. :)
>
> My advice is to keep your mirrors pointed to your local ISP if possible.
>
> For example, I'm with iiNet, and my /etc/apt/sources.list looks like (4
> lines, each one long line - ignore the line break enforced by email):
>
> deb http://ftp.iinet.net.au/pub/ubuntu hardy main multiverse restricted
> universe
> deb http://ftp.iinet.net.au/pub/ubuntu hardy-updates main multiverse
> restricted universe
> deb http://ftp.iinet.net.au/pub/ubuntu hardy-backports main multiverse
> restricted universe
> deb http://ftp.iinet.net.au/pub/ubuntu hardy-security main multiverse
> restricted universe
>
> So there's deb repos for hardy, hardy-updates, hardy-backports
> (optional), and hardy-security for the main, multiverse, universe and
> restricted sections.
>
> Many ISPs provide mirrors.  Internode are another I have regular
> dealings with that provide full Ubuntu mirrors.  If you are on any one
> of the PIPE Networks ISPs, PIPE host their Pacific Mirror site, which
> can be accessed free of charge (ie: not counting towards quota) for PIPE
> users (iiNet, Internode, Westnet, AAPT, Swiftel, and many others):
>
> deb http://mirror.pacific.net.au/linux/ubuntu hardy main universe
> multiverse restricted
>
> ... and so on for the other repos.
>
> If in doubt, ring your ISP and ask.  It's within the best interests of
> an ISP to host local mirrors of heavily used traffic.  It saves them
> money, and means they can deliver a high quality of service to their
> customers.  For you as a user, it means being able to perform mass
> upgrades for convenience and/or security without eating into your
> monthly download quota or getting dreaded "404 not found" errors.
>
> Remember too that you can have multiple mirrors in your sources.list,
> which will be tried in order.  Put your own ISP at the top of the list,
> and au.archive at the bottom of the list.  If your ISP is slow to update
> and is missing a package, APT will fall back to au.archive.  There's no
> rule saying you must only have one mirror in your list.  The only
> downside is that running an "apt-get update" (package refresh) can take
> a while if you have a long sources.list, but it's a small price to pay
> to ensure you get the packages you need during an normal package
> upgrade, or during an entire distro upgrade.
>
> -Dan


Hi Dan

Interestingly enuf the whole thing resolved by removing the last part of the 
second line in my etc/hoats file, e.g. it read 127.0.1.1 
localhost.p3nn-desktop.network_name

I dropped the network_name at the end at all worked fine again

James