apt-get update error for a local repository

Question

I set up a local repository with the following file structure:

/var/www/html/dists$ find . -name "*"
.
./boston
./boston/main
./boston/main/binary-amd64
./boston/main/binary-amd64/python-openvswitch_2.1.2-51_all.deb
./boston/main/binary-amd64/Packages.gz
./boston/main/binary-amd64/openvswitch-switch_2.1.2-51_amd64.deb
./boston/main/binary-amd64/openvswitch-datapath-dkms_2.1.2-51_all.deb
./boston/main/binary-amd64/openvswitch-common_2.1.2-51_amd64.deb

The /etc/apt/sources.list has the following entry

deb http://10.209.0.10 boston main

However the apt-get update fails with the following message:

sudo apt-get update

Ign http://10.209.0.10 boston Release.gpg
Ign http://10.209.0.10 boston Release
Ign http://10.209.0.10 boston/main TranslationIndex
Err http://10.209.0.10 boston/main amd64 Packages
403  Forbidden
Ign http://10.209.0.10 boston/main Translation-en_US
Ign http://10.209.0.10 boston/main Translation-en
W: Failed to fetch http://10.209.0.10/dists/boston/main/binary-amd64/Packages  403      Forbidden

There is no Packages file but there is Packages.gz. When I monitor the apache log, there is no activity shown.

The output of apt-get update --print-uris is:

'10.209.0.10/dists/boston/main/binary-amd64/Packages.bz2';  '10.209.0.10_dists_boston_main_binary-amd64_Packages 0 : 
'10.209.0.10/dists/boston/main/i18n/Index.bz2'; 10.209.0.10_dists_boston_main_i18n_Index 0 : 
'10.209.0.10/dists/boston/Release'; 10.209.0.10_dists_boston_Release 0 
'10.209.0.10/dists/boston/Release.gpg'; 10.209.0.10_dists_boston_Release.gpg 0 

I created the Packages.gz with the following command:

dpkg-scanpackages binary-amd64 > /dev/null | gzip > binary-amd64/Packages.gz 

based on the Debian HowTo. I added a Release file:

/var/www/html/dists/boston$ cat Release 
Archive: boston 
Version: 2.1.2 
Component: main 
Origin: kam 
Label: kam 
Architecture: amd64 
MD5Sum: 
 4059d198768f9f8dc9372dc1c54bc3c3 14 main/binary-amd64/Packages.gz

Any ideas on debugging this problem?

Thanks,

Answer 1

I think that that proxy is the fail, edit the file /etc/apt/apt.conf

Acquire::http::proxy "http://user:pass@proxyIP:8080/"

Hope it works :)

In my case, the node was brought up using Juju which had put MAAS server as the proxy. Once I deleted that entry, the apt-get update started working.