Keep your Ubuntu System up to date for free

Have you ever been at home just browsing the net, when all of a sudden that orange update icon pops us? You click on it only to discover a new version of Open Office and an associated 200MB download. You look at your internet usage only to find that you are only 250MB away from your monthly limit with two days to go. So reluctantly you click to download and install the package and then realize you have to go find something to do for half an hour while the package downloads.
This how-to tells you how to avoid having to waste time and bandwidth by using the university's repository. It should be particularly useful for people with slow connection speeds or low monthly data allocations.

To do this we need to first write down the names of the packages that need updating, their version numbers and which section of the repository they are from (main, universe, multiverse).

1. Start up Synaptic and click on the section 'Installed (upgradable)' in the left hand listbox. In the right hand section of the window you should see the packages that need upgrading.

e.g. tcpdump from version 3.9.5-2 to 3.9.5-2ubuntu1

2. Right click on a package and select 'Properties'. In the 'Common' tab, there is a line which says 'Section: .....'
Packages from the main repository will just have the section name. Packages from the universe repository will have '(universe)' at the end of the line. Packages from the multiverse repository will have '(multiverse)' at the end of the line.

e.g. for our example package tcpdump it says 'Section: Networking' meaning that it is in the main repository.

We now have the info we need. Now we can go to uni and navigate to http://intraftp.ece.auckland.ac.nz/. This is the ftp server of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and is only available at uni. The server has a lot of software available, so feel free to look around.

3. The part we are interested in is the ubuntu repository. So we are going to navigate to ubuntu --> pool --> [the repository of your package] --> [the first letter of your package] --> [the name of your package] -->

e.g. -> ubuntu --> pool --> main --> t --> tcpdump -->

4. Once there, simply find the files which match the version number of our upgrade and end in .deb

e.g. tcpdump_3.9.5-2ubuntu1_amd64.deb
tcpdump_3.9.5-2ubuntu1_i386.deb

5. Select the file which matches your processor architecture and save it to your USB drive.

6. Take it home and double click on the file. You will get a warning saying that the package is available through the internet and that you should install it from there. Ignore it and install the package.

If you have a laptop or you feel like taking your computer to uni one day the process is even easier. Simply open your sources.list file and add

Code:

deb http://intraftp.ece.auckland.ac.nz/ubuntu/ feisty main restricted universe multiverse

and then run apt-get or synaptic.

This method is also good for upgrading or installing new software.