[SOLVED] "yum" cannot access mirror sites but "Add/Remove Software" can.

[feimingchen]

Hi: I'd like to ask a question on installing software.

I cannot install software using "yum" but I can with the GUI program "Add/Remove Software". For example, I tried:

$ su -c 'yum install screen.i686'

It will exhaust all the mirror sites without success. All the error messages look like:


Package(s) data still to download: 16 k
http://mirrors.usu.edu/fedora/linux/...14.noarch.rpm: [Errno 12] Timeout on http://mirrors.usu.edu/fedora/linux/...14.noarch.rpm: (28, '')
Trying other mirror.
http://mirror.pnl.gov/fedora/linux/r...14.noarch.rpm: [Errno 14] PYCURL ERROR 7 - ""
Trying other mirror.
http://linux.mirrors.es.net/fedora/r...14.noarch.rpm: [Errno 14] PYCURL ERROR 7 - ""
Trying other mirror.


But I can install "screen.i686" easily from the "Add/Remove Software" GUI and it is very fast.

However, what's puzzling is that I could install some certain packages although I still see the same kind of error messages. For example,

su -c 'yum install nano.i686'

will work. But in general, "yum" is running very slow and is rejected at every mirror sites.

My settings: I just installed "Fedora 14" (Linux 2.6.35.11-83.fc14.i686) as a virtual machine (using VirtualBox) on a Windows XP (Professional, SP3) host on my laptop (CPU: Intel Core2 Duo), which accesses internet through a HTTP Proxy server since it is behind a corporate firewall.

Could anyone help? Thanks a lot!

Sincerely,
Feiming Chen

[feimingchen]

After reading some posts, I tried:

$ yum clean all
$ yum update

in root account. And I can do the "yum install" in Root Account. But I still could not do it in a user's account: "su -c 'yum install *" still generates all the mirror sites errors.

[DBelton]

you need to set up your proxy server in either yum or your shell.

one way is to set up the proxy server by creating 2 files in /etc/profile.d like so (advantage to doing it this was is that your proxy is set up for any applications running in a shell, not just yum):

#proxy.sh
export http_proxy=http://host.com:port/
export ftp_proxy=http://host.com:port/
export no_proxy=.domain.com
export HTTP_PROXY=http://host.com:port/
export FTP_PROXY=http://host.com:port/

#proxy.csh
setenv http_proxy http://host.com:port/
setenv ftp_proxy http://host.com:port/
setenv no_proxy .domain.com
setenv HTTP_PROXY http://host.com:port/
setenv FTP_PROXY http://host.com:port/

You can also set up a proxy in the [main] section of /etc/yum.conf

proxy=http://<server>:<port>

also, there is a reason you can't do a "yum install" in a user account. It requires root privileges

to run yum from a user account, you must su (or sudo) to root.

su -
(root password)
yum install

[giulix]

If you use Gnome to setup your proxy server (System->Preferences->Network Proxy) the environment variables will be set up for you. You can check them out with

env |grep -i proxy

from a terminal

[feimingchen]

Hi: Thank you very much for your valuable suggestions!

giulix: I did set up the proxy server through the GUI interface. Using your code, I get:

$ env | grep -i proxy
NO_PROXY=localhost,127.0.0.0/8
http_proxy=http://bddsproxy.bdx.com:80/
FTP_PROXY=http://bddsproxy.bdx.com:80/
ftp_proxy=http://bddsproxy.bdx.com:80/
all_proxy=socks://bddsproxy.bdx.com:80/
ALL_PROXY=socks://bddsproxy.bdx.com:80/
https_proxy=http://bddsproxy.bdx.com:80/
HTTPS_PROXY=http://bddsproxy.bdx.com:80/
no_proxy=localhost,127.0.0.0/8
HTTP_PROXY=http://bddsproxy.bdx.com:80/

DBelton: I implemented all of your code suggestions. And they solved the problem! Now I could use:

sudo yum install ...
sudo yum info ...
# etc

in my user's account without getting any errors (rejection from mirror sites). Thanks a lot!

Thanks a lot for your support! I am just starting to use Fedora Linux and find the experience pleasant and exhilarating.

[DBelton]

I believe that setting up the proxy in Gnome, only set them up for the current user, and yum runs as root. At least that's how it has worked in the past.

Glad you have it working now and are able to get your updates with yum

[giulix]

I think that running gpk-application from your "normal" user means it inherits that user's environment. That is different from running

su -

from a terminal, as
"`-'
`-l'
`--login'
Make the shell a login shell. This means the following. Unset all
environment variables except `TERM', `HOME', and `SHELL' (which
are set as described above), and `USER' and `LOGNAME' (which are
set, even for the super-user, as described above), and set `PATH'
to a compiled-in default value. Change to USER's home directory.
Prepend `-' to the shell's name, intended to make it read its
login startup file(s). Additionaly `DISPLAY' and `XAUTHORITY'
environment variables are preserved as well for PAM functionality.

(info coreutils 'su invocation'). In fact, running simply

su

(i.e. no dash) preserves the user environment, including the "proxy" environment variables

[feimingchen]

Thanks again for all of your information and solutions!