Speeding up "apt update" with Acquire::Languages=none and Contents-deb::DefaultEnabled=false - It's so much faster!

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To manually test, non-persistently:

sudo apt update -o Acquire::Languages=none -o Acquire::IndexTargets::deb::Contents-deb::DefaultEnabled=false

Or same persistent as configuration drop-in file /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/30lowfat:

Acquire::Languages none;
Acquire::IndexTargets::deb::Contents-deb::DefaultEnabled false;

It’s roughly 140 KB vs 43 MB. Seconds vs real delay.

I wonder if this should become the default for Whonix and Kicksecure.

We’d loose translations something. I don’t even know where - since I always use English as default language - to be on par with the defaults that users will use. Probably translations for apt-cache show pkg-name or so. But only for those who change the system language for APT. Dunno if anyone is doing that actually. If that’s a problem, it would be better to have instructions how to reactivate this for desired languages only.

We might also loose default apt-file list pkg-name but those who want that can (and probably have to use anyhow) sudo apt-file update.

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Yes please. I currently dread updating my machine with the amount of time a package list refresh takes.

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FYI, The latter of these two options (Acquire::IndexTargets::deb::Contents-deb::DefaultEnabled false;) breaks apt-file. Disabling it may be useful for debugging purposes (determining which packages are responsible for particular files).

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Indeed. That’s not great indeed. Btw user documentation to “repair” apt-file is documented here:

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