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Ubuntuser
Asked: 2011-04-16 02:27:57 +0800 CST

syntax for SOCKS proxy in apt.conf

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I want to add SOCKS proxy settings to /etc/apt/apt.conf. What is the syntax for it? Is it same as http and ftp syntax?

Thanks.

apt

6 Answers

  1. Acquire::http::proxy "socks5h://server:port";

    This works for me on Ubuntu 18.04. As the man page says, socks5h, not socks5, is supported by apt, which means socks5 proxy with DNS resolving ability.

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  2. Best Answer

    A possible solution can be to use tsocks, an application that can redirect the network traffic through a socks proxy. Install tsocks package, modify /etc/tsocks.conf to set address and port number of your socks proxy, and run:

    $ sudo -s
# tsocks apt-get update
# tsocks apt-get dist-upgrade
# exit
$

    or

    $ sudo -s
# . tsocks -on
# apt-get update
# apt-get dist-upgrade
# . tsocks -off # not really necessary, given the exit
# exit
$

    You can think to a number of options, to simplify and automate its use.
    Don't forget the leading dot, the Manpage has more deatails on this.

    Edit: a shorter way to use it:

    $ sudo tsocks apt-get update
$ sudo tsocks apt-get dist-upgrade
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  3. Using the next config line works for me:

    Acquire::socks::proxy "socks5://server:port";

    To keep apt.conf clean and avoid problems at Linux upgrade I created a new file (/etc/apt/apt.conf.d/12proxy) and added the config file to it.

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  4. I couldn't find anything on Acquire::socks::proxy in the apt.conf manual of Ubuntu Xenial. You could fix this by running a local http proxy that supports upstream socks proxy, for example Polipo. You need to configure Polipo as follows:

    proxyAddress = "::1"
proxyPort = 8118
socksParentProxy = "sockshost:socksport"
socksProxyType = socks5

    and then set the http proxy in your apt.conf file:

    Acquire::http::proxy "http://127.0.0.1:8118/";
Acquire::https::proxy "https://127.0.0.1:8118/";
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  5. Or tou can put in your /etc/apt/apt.conf something like this:

    Acquire::socks::proxy "socks://user:pass@host:port/";
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  6. In Debian, you can read the manpage apt-transport-http(1) and look for supported URI schemes. As was answered before, put

    Acquire::http::proxy "socks5h://server:port";

    in

    /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/12proxy

    You can read more about the APT-config in general in apt.conf(5) and read the examples in /usr/share/doc/apt/examples/configure-index.gz mentioned at the end of the manpage.

    This can be combined with ssh -D <LOCAL PORT> <USER>@<HOST> to create a SOCKS proxy to a different system so that apt can then use the proxy as if everything originated on <HOST>.

    If you use ssh -D 0.0.0.0:<LOCAL PORT> <USER>@<HOST> or ssh -D [::]:<LOCAL PORT> <USER>@<HOST> (for IPv6) to enable other systems to use the SOCKS proxy on all interfaces. This can be a security risk or breach of (corporate) policy. Make sure you know what you are doing.

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