Q4OS Forum

Dai_trying

Member

From: UK

Registered: 2015-12-14

Posts: 2,989

Off-line Installation updates (Scorpion 2.3)

I have a machine that is off-line (no internet connection at all) and wanted to be able to install packages easily and thought I would try apt-offline as it seems to be the right tool.
I started by copying the required .deb file and dependencies to get apt-offline installed using dpkg, which went well and I now have it working on isolated system.
I created the (apt-offline) signature file for update and then downloaded them using the signature file on another machine, this gave many warnings but appeared to download the files I needed.
I then "installed" them onto the isolated machine using apt-offline install (I used a bundle file). I expected to be able to now install packages by creating a new signature file but when attempting to create it I get Unable to locate package XYZ.

I was wondering if this might have something to do with the fact that I have not been able to install the language-pack (due to no internet available).

It could also be that I have done something wrong or not done something that I should have (wouldn't be the first time )

Any ideas?

Dai_trying

Member

From: UK

Registered: 2015-12-14

Posts: 2,989

Re: Off-line Installation updates (Scorpion 2.3)

I just set-up a Virtualbox installation without networking and I have managed to get it working... I'm not sure what I have done differently but will re-install the off-line machine and try again.

Dai_trying

Member

From: UK

Registered: 2015-12-14

Posts: 2,989

Re: Off-line Installation updates (Scorpion 2.3)

Ok I think I found out what I did wrong and thought I would share it in case it helps anyone else.

First some background...
I wanted to set-up Scorpion on a machine that is not connected by cable and the wireless card I have available does not work out of the box. In order to use the wireless card I have to install the fixed firmware from github which is a problem when you cannot  update the system and then install the required packages to add the firmware. My solution was to update the system by using apt-offline to initially populate apt with the correct up-to-date information and then install some packages (dkms, build-essential, linux-headers) in order to use my wifi card.

To install apt-offline I had to copy some deb-files from my working machine onto USB and then install them onto the non-networked machine. The packages needed for a fresh Scorpion installation are as follows:-

1. python-wstools

2. python-defusedxml

3. python-soappy

4. python-magic

5. python-lzma

6. apt-offline

Then install them using sudo dpkg -i package_name (order can be important!)

Now apt-offline is installed and you will need to run it according to the useful debian handbook instructions.

I first performed an update, then a dist-upgrade, and then installed my extra packages.

Now I could get everything I needed installed and am typing from my "problem" machine which now has working wifi

One reason I am posting is to allow anyone with a problematic wifi card get their system installed, updated and allow new packages to be installed until they find a resolution for wifi problem. Hopefully this will help some one.