Mirrors
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Mirrors
The distribution of Ubuntu cd-images and packages can always be improved. There's a team working on improving user experiences every day, making Ubuntu available to you. You can help too, by creating a mirror of your own and provide people near you with a reliable mirror.
These pages tell you what to expect, and what Ubuntu expects. You can also find example scripts to sync, and guidelines on maintaining your mirror.
There are two types of mirrors:
- Country mirrors (e.g. nl.archive.ubuntu.com/nl.releases.ubuntu.com)
- Normal mirrors (reachable via their own hostname)
If you wish to create a new mirror please see this page and the links provided there. If you want to apply for being a country mirror, please read these requirements.
Registration
If your mirror is meant to be used by others, please go and register it at Launchpad. You may need to create a Launchpad account first. When your registration is successful and approved, it will show up on the mirror lists on Launchpad. It will also be checked by Launchpad. If you registered a CD-mirror and registration is successful and approved, it will also show up on the Ubuntu download pages.
Mirror Guidelines
To keep your mirror up to date and working, please follow these guidelines:
Know what you're starting with. A mirror may cause a lot of traffic. If your server has insufficient bandwidth, users cannot download very well and your machine may become unreachable. If you pay for traffic, please note that traffic might increase, a lot.
Make sure you have enough diskspace. The Ubuntu archive currently uses about 260GB and is slowly growing. A full disk will get you out of sync and cause problems for your users.
Keep up to date. Please try to mirror about six times a day (so every four hours) for archive mirrors. Since Ubuntu only releases every six months or so, a daily check on a releases mirror is sufficient.
Monitor the output of your sync scripts. Sometimes, syncing of the mirrors fails. That's ok, but it is very important that you monitor that and correct faults. Missing packages are not very userfriendly, so try to avoid that.
Country mirror requirements
Please note, these requirements are still awaiting official approval. If you want to apply for being a country mirror, please email mirrors@ubuntu.com.
If you want to apply for being a country mirror, you MUST follow these requirements:
- In case of an archive mirror, update every four hours (six times a day)
In case of an archive mirror, use a two stage sync
- In case of an releases mirror, update every 24 hours (once a day)
- Provide the following services:
- HTTP
- Rsync
- Keep your Launchpad-account up to date, so we can reach you if needed.
- In case of an archive mirror, the archive must be available at the following URL:
- In case of an releases mirror, the releases must be available at the following URL:
Communication
If you want to get in touch with other mirror-admins, feel free to join us at #ubuntu-mirrors on Freenode. Also, if you have questions, email us at mirrors@ubuntu.com.