Mirroring the Update Directories for YOU

Support knowledgebase (mlasars_yousync)

Situation

You want to mirror the current patches and updates locally and distribute them to other computers on your network. This might be necessary if the machines are protected by a firewall or if you want to save bandwidth.

The configuration of a local YOU server exceeds the scope of our free of charge installation support. However, you are welcome to refer to our Business Support Service. Further information is available under:

Procedure

First, find a server that allows mirroring (not ftp.suse.com) and read the server's mirror policy carefully. For mirroring purposes, use, for example, rsync

rsync -tvrl --stats --exclude=*.src.rpm --delete ftp.gwdg.de::SuSE-8.0_update /dist/updates/i386/update/8.0/

In the example above, the entire SuSE-8.0_update directory with the exception of the src.rpm packages has been mirrored. The target is /dist/updates/i386/update/8.0/. Modify the rsync command as desired to mirror only certain directories or to limit the bandwidth. For more information, refer to< man rsync. To find out which directories are available via rsync, use

A cron entry can be used to automate the mirroring. For more information, check man crontab.

The target should point directly to the directory reachable via FTP. An FTP server might be required for this purpose.

The entry YAST2_LOADFTPSERVER can be set either with YaST2 and the sysconfig editor or manually, for example:

Change the configuration to

The servers will be saved in the file /etc/suseservers. Insert your local FTP server in the first position:

Make sure you enter the right path. YaST2 error messages are logged in the file /var/log/y2log or, since SuSE Linux 8.1, /var/log/YaST2/y2log. If the clients report errors, search for the possible causes in this file first.

Some instructions for the automatic update of clients by way of a cronjob can be found in the last section of