Friday, November 11, 2011

System Proxy Problem in Ubuntu 11.10

Recently I installed Ubuntu 11.10 in a computer in our lab. Since we have to go through a proxy server in our university to access Internet, I set the system proxy for it.















But when I try to update the system or even try to install new software, it seemed the Internet connection was not working properly. After trying different things, I realized that the system proxy settings that I apply system wide is not worked properly. However when I set proxy settings in the Firefox web browser, it could go Internet. All the other things of the system that goes through the proxy settings didn't work.

After searching over the web I realized that this is a bug in Ubuntu 11.10 version that the system proxy is not applying system wide. The only option is to set the proxy manually without using the GUI. I found this from a forum in the web.

This is how to set proxy manually.

First open a command line and type this,

sudo gedit /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/02proxy

In the gedit editor enter the following lines,

1:  Acquire::http::Proxy "http://192.248.16.90:3128/";  
2:  Acquire::ftp::Proxy "ftp://http://192.248.16.90:3128/";   

You have to replace the "address" field and "port" field with the actual IP address and port number of the proxy server. Then save and close the editor. Now you should be able to update the system and install software from the software center.





10 comments:

  1. WOW, IT TOTALLY WORKS!! THANKS A LOT. but i still cant use the "use system proxy" setting when i use firefox browser it still requires a manual proxy. any tips??

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  2. this help me so much, it took me so long to locate your fix but it works like magic.

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  3. If you use authentication on your proxy, add it like so:

    "http://:@proxy:9999/"

    For some reason this always seems to be done in /etc/apt/apt.conf manually rather than via the GUI.

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  4. Well, that got mangled...

    "http://user:pw@proxy:port/"

    .. let's try that...

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  5. The same problem occurs when I switch back to "NONE" in proxy settings.

    Can you kindly Guide me how to manually revert back to "NO PROXY" settings too.

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    Replies
    1. I think if you have a file named "02proxy" at /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/ simply deleting it and restarting the machine will work. But I haven't tried it. Therefore it's better to backup the file somewhere else before you delete it so that you can put it there again if something goes wrong.

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  6. my proxy is "proxy.uonbi.ac.ke" and port is 80,
    should I enter it like this

    1: Acquire::http::Proxy "proxy.uonbi.ac.ke";
    2: Acquire::ftp::Proxy "80";

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  7. I'm not sure whether putting a domain name works. Try that. If it doesn't work, you can find the IP address of the proxy server and use it.
    Please let us know what was your results :)

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