[Bug 366293] [NEW] Non-existent i18n files lead to needless server failover

[Daniel Richard G.]

Public bug reported:

Binary package hint: apt-cacher

I have an apt-cacher setup in which the main path_map element lists two
servers, in the following order:

    ubuntu.media.mit.edu/ubuntu
    us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu

I.e. a random mirror server, and the official Ubuntu US archive server.

Yesterday (April 23), I invoked "apt-get update" on a system pointed at
this apt-cacher server, and inexplicably, it hung while downloading the
first Translation-en_US.bz2 file. Run the update again, another hang at
that same point.

Half an hour of investigation later, I found the problem. There are two
things going on here:

1. There is no Translation-en_US file. It is not present (e.g. for the
Jaunty main repository) in either of

    http://ubuntu.media.mit.edu/ubuntu/dists/jaunty/main/i18n/
    http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/jaunty/main/i18n/

apt-cacher fails to find the file at the first location, so it tries the
second one, and when that turns up nothing it gives up (and so does apt-
get, continuing on to the next file).

2. The US archive server is, of course, being completely hammered by the
release of Jaunty on the 23rd. It is taking an unusually long time to
respond to even minor HTTP requests.

Indeed, if I run "apt-get update" with LANG=C, then no i18n files are
downloaded, and the whole update procedure breezes through like it
usually does.

So it seems to me that this is a corner case that apt-cacher ought to
handle more gracefully. There was no need for apt-get to hang while
updating; no need for apt-cacher to fail over to another server for a
file that need not exist (as opposed to, say, a package file, whose non-
existence would necessarily be an error). Addressing this behavior would
not only make updating on release day feasible, it would also make
updating on other days faster, and reduce 404s on the archive server, as
the needless failover could be avoided altogether.

** Affects: apt-cacher (Ubuntu)
     Importance: Undecided
         Status: New

-- 
Non-existent i18n files lead to needless server failover
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/366293
You received this bug notification because you are a member of Ubuntu
Bugs, which is subscribed to Ubuntu.

-- 
ubuntu-bugs mailing list
ubuntu-bugs at lists.ubuntu.com
https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-bugs