Package installation fails when attempting to download GeoIP database files

[Kye Russell]

Selecting previously unselected package geoip-database-contrib.
dpkg: considering removing geoip-database in favour of geoip-database-contrib ...
dpkg: yes, will remove geoip-database in favour of geoip-database-contrib
(Reading database ... 46544 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to unpack geoip-database-contrib_1.19_all.deb ...
Unpacking geoip-database-contrib (1.19) ...
Setting up geoip-database-contrib (1.19) ...
debconf: unable to initialize frontend: Dialog
debconf: (TERM is not set, so the dialog frontend is not usable.)
debconf: falling back to frontend: Readline
debconf: unable to initialize frontend: Readline
debconf: (This frontend requires a controlling tty.)
debconf: falling back to frontend: Teletype
Downloading: http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/GeoLiteCountry/GeoIP.dat.gz
Failed to download http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/GeoLiteCountry/GeoIP.dat.gz
Downloading: http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/GeoIPv6.dat.gz
Downloading: http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/GeoLiteCity.dat.gz
Failed to download http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/GeoLiteCity.dat.gz
Downloading: http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/GeoLiteCityv6-beta/GeoLiteCityv6.dat.gz
Downloading: http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/asnum/GeoIPASNum.dat.gz
Failed to download http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/asnum/GeoIPASNum.dat.gz
Downloading: http://geolite.maxmind.com/download/geoip/database/asnum/GeoIPASNumv6.dat.gz

Creating config file /etc/cron.d/geoip-database-contrib with new version
update-alternatives: error: alternative path /usr/share/GeoIP/GeoLiteCity.dat doesn't exist
dpkg: error processing package geoip-database-contrib (--install):
 subprocess installed post-installation script returned error exit status 2
Errors were encountered while processing:
 geoip-database-contrib

This is due to Maxmind retiring their v1 geolite database.

https://blog.maxmind.com/2018/01/02/discontinuation-of-the-geolite-legacy-databases/

The new versions are at URLs but - more importantly - are in a completely different format.

[Kye Russell (kye.russell-thecut)]

Oops, was meant for geoip-database-contrib. My bad.

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Vova Petrushkevych (petvova)]

Will it ever be addressed?

[Jani Uusitalo (uusijani)]

The Debian BTS has a related report [1] which suggests to me this issue should have been fixed way back in v1.11. But even if installing wasn't broken, with the legacy databases discontinued, it's not much use in the long term.

Geoip-database-contrib has already been removed from Debian entirely [2] due to deprecation by upstream, apparently in favor of geoipupdate [3].

(I'm not affiliated with either package and have no solutions; I'm just documenting the connections here.)

* [1] https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=666063
* [2] https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=900400
* [3] https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=885441