We all face this problem time to time and it becomes time consuming for the packages that have lots of dependencies. Downloading, copying and installing one-by-one, and by hand is nearly impossible for these packages. So, here’s what you need to do for installing packages offline to your Debian or Ubuntu machine.
In a Machine Connected to the Internet
1- If your target package is not on the Ubuntu/Debian repository by default, add its repository to /etc/apt/source.list or source.list.d/ directory.
2- Update your source list index by using the commands apt update or apt-get update. This index is at /var/lib/apt/lists/.
3- If you need to see what your package depends on, and what it conflicts with, check apt depends {package-name}.
4- Now, you can list URIs of the dependencies of a package. Use the command apt-get -qq –print-uris {package-name} > {temporary-package-list-name}. Now, you have all packages’ URIs listed in the document to be downloaded.
5- We will now create a shell script to download all these. We will do these by using awk. The command we will use is: awk ‘{print “wget ” $1}’ < {temporary-package-list-name} > download_packages.sh.
6- Now you will make the script you’ve generated executable as a user. chmod u+x download_packages.sh
7- Now we will run the script by ./download_packages.sh
At this point, you have all packages you need at the machine that has the Internet connection.
In the Target Machine
By either using SFTP, FTP, or by using a physical connection medium:
1- Copy the source list index from the Internet-connected machine to the offline machine at /var/lib/apt/lists
2- Copy all the source.list.d directory of the Internet-connected machine to the offline machine at /etc/apt/source.list
3- Copy all .deb packages you’ve downloaded to the /var/cache/apt/archives/ directory.
Now you are all set! What is left to do is using apt install {package-name} on the target machine. Now it is done! We’ve done it.
Also, if you’re okay with a sloppier installation, copy .deb packages and use dpkg -i * at the copied destination.
For more information, check Debian’s article about offline apt here. Also, you may check more solutions at my homepage!
