Hosted APT repo Packages file does not follow spec

[deejay-ursys]

The Nexus Repo generated Packages file does not follow the DebianRepository spec in regard to the Filename: field.

The Filename: field that Nexus Repo generates contains a leading /, this is in direct violation of the spec which requires it to be a relative path (source). The UNIX spec defines a relative path as a path without a leading slash (source).

This creates issues with some apt utilities such as deb-mirror which will always clone the repo to the root dir /pool instead of the correct relative location.

Proxied APT repos do not have this issue.

Example Nexus-Generated Packages file:

Package: testing-package
Version: 0.0.1
Architecture: amd64
Maintainer: John Smith
Installed-Size: 8
Section: admin
Priority: optional
Description: testing-package
Filename: /pool/t/testing-package/testing-package_0.0.1_amd64.deb
Size: 1026
MD5Sum: 3f500ff9ba0155ff13f479e9f2c32e58
SHA1: c78c79bfac5ff30bbc119cd3cf147240e9af5612
SHA256: b77eea986449414922abda82c639b24d6a24da261603ddebc37b1540982accd2

Note the leading slash at the start of the Filename: field.

For comparison, here is the head of the Ubuntu Jammy repo's Packages file (from a Nexus Proxy APT repo)

Package: accountsservice
Architecture: amd64
Version: 22.07.5-2ubuntu1
Priority: optional
Section: gnome
Origin: Ubuntu
Maintainer: Ubuntu Developers <[email protected]>
Original-Maintainer: Debian freedesktop.org maintainers <[email protected]>
Bugs: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+filebug
Installed-Size: 500
Depends: dbus (>= 1.9.18), libaccountsservice0 (= 22.07.5-2ubuntu1), libc6 (>= 2.34), libglib2.0-0 (>= 2.63.5), libpolkit-gobject-1-0 (>= 0.99)
Recommends: default-logind | logind
Suggests: gnome-control-center
Filename: pool/main/a/accountsservice/accountsservice_22.07.5-2ubuntu1_amd64.deb
Size: 69644
MD5sum: 7b8d61673a0a9cd753e09eb70b371e44
SHA1: 07d578c08aa7cfad79573112b080f28aa0ed24d6
SHA256: d5c81dfde47811982c5f3c81c98cf4074d367f7a8f20c8e0aa55a5630ef6f920
SHA512: 5a8ebaa001acf17d8114eca1335ca37565b6366a72a90deb943ade14214a1bd7a7a077d09bde86e08519e8bec61ed2cfde866bd5af746fb1a8169b3a5bedbd41
Homepage: https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/AccountsService/
Description: query and manipulate user account information
Task: ubuntu-desktop-minimal, ubuntu-desktop, ubuntu-desktop-raspi, kubuntu-desktop, xubuntu-core, xubuntu-desktop, lubuntu-desktop, ubuntustudio-desktop-core, ubuntustudio-desktop, ubuntukylin-desktop, ubuntu-mate-core, ubuntu-mate-desktop, ubuntu-budgie-desktop, ubuntu-budgie-desktop-raspi
Description-md5: 8aeed0a03c7cd494f0c4b8d977483d7e

Note how the Filename: field does not contain a leading slash.