how to run mandrake update from local source?
 

I am having a bit of trouble with getting Mandrake 9.2 to accept updates that I downloaded from a mirror and have in a local directory. It appears to validate the updates in manager, but then when I try to run Mandrake Update, it tells me that I need to select a source (even though the local copy is selected!)

It continues to do this until I re-enable the mirror. I can understand the security updates being available only from a mirror, but I have to support a 24 station lab, so it seems ridiculous that I should be forced to download ALL the updates 24 times! Specially when it seems like such an easy task to point to a local directory for updates.

I understand that urpmi may help, but I would need to run it for each update I have downloaded (over 500 megs!). That just seems very user UN-friendly. And what if you have the terrible luck to NOT have broadband at all - how would a dialup modem user get updates?


Any help would be greatly appreciated!

For Mandrake Update to use your local source for updating it had to be added with a flag of --update. Software media manager assumes only the update mirrors get this and local files never get this flag.

To fix it you can skip the gui and add the local source at the command line. First remove the mirror and your local file using software media manager and exit. Then in a console as root enter a line something like the following:

urpmi.addmedia --update updates file://mnt/windows/updates/

Use your own names, the name updates is just the media name I use. I tested this and it worked on my machine.

Also, you're wrong about the update capabilities of urpmi. The following will completely update your machine after a clean install if you've added the right sources. (See www.urpmi.org/easyurpmi.)

urpmi.update -a
urpmi --auto --auto-select