apt-file fails using a proxy (such as apt-cacher-ng)

[Fabián Rodríguez]

Binary package hint: apt-file

I am using apt-cacher-ng to proxy apt package installation.

When installing apt-file on a desktop system, it fails, most probably not recognizing a proxy is in place.

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 11.04
Package: apt-file 2.4.0
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 2.6.38-8.42-generic 2.6.38.2
Uname: Linux 2.6.38-8-generic x86_64
Architecture: amd64
Date: Wed Apr 20 07:26:26 2011
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu 11.04 "Natty Narwhal" - Alpha amd64 (20110315)
PackageArchitecture: all
ProcEnviron:
 LANGUAGE=en_US:en
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: apt-file
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

WORKAROUND:

- Edit /etc/apt/apt.conf to comment out the proxy configuration line temporarily
- Re-launch apt-file update

[Fabián Rodríguez (magicfab)]

Upstream bugs exist about this, although marked "resolved":

http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=350716
http://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=476961

[Peter Wu (lekensteyn)]

/etc/apt/apt.conf does not exist by default, what did it contain?

[Thijs Kinkhorst (kink)]

The basic problem here is that APT doesn't publish a good interface to downloading files which apt-file could use, requiring apt-file to reimplement all special cases like proxy handling. I'm not eager to reinvent this wheel and hope the APT developers will at one point provide a good interface to this process.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

This bug was fixed in the package apt-file - 3.1.4

---------------
apt-file (3.1.4) unstable; urgency=medium

  * Fix typo in 60disable-contents-fetching.conf. Thanks to
    Felix Geyer for spotting it. (Closes: #843453)
  * apt-file: Fix two spelling mistakes in the --help output.
    Thanks to "axhn" on IRC and Guillem Jover for spotting
    them.

 -- Niels Thykier <email address hidden> Mon, 23 Jan 2017 20:39:04 +0000