Changing my Debian mirror

[ExpertLearner]

My network has slowed down. I found out that it was the server. so i found a better mirror using 'netselect-apt'. But i don't know how to add that to the '/etc/apt/sources.list'. I have tried the cat command but it doesn't seem to work. when i 'apt-get update' the old mirror was not replaced. So i would like know how to change the mirror server.

[GarryRicketson]

Interesting user name, and welcome to the forum,...
How to edit the sources.list file on Debian
================
1st hit : https://wiki.debian.org/SourcesList
There also is this command :

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man sources.list

It will give you the manual, which is full of details.

In a nut shell, it is simple enough.
To edit the sources.list file and add a new source/mirror to it, or change the
others,.
You must use "su", or "sudo", "gksudu", or something that gives you root privileges,..
'cd' to /etc/apt ,
then use any editor you like, but it is best to use vi or nano (in my opinion),
open the sources.list file, edit as desired, adding the additional mirror, etc.
The above links give more details and some examples of what the source lines
should look like.
When you have finished, and save the file, you do need to run

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apt-get update

or

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apt update

first, to update the sources.
Any way, that is how I edit mine, there may be other ways as well.

[Head_on_a_Stick]

The current advice is to use deb.debian.org, full details here:

http://deb.debian.org/

I recommend installing apt-transport-https and using the https lines, it works very well in my stretch systems.

[ExpertLearner]

I am glad. Thanks.
I did try to edit the file /etc/apt/sources.list manually using gedit but it managed to disrupt the whole file, luckily i made a copy of the file before making the changes (so i can revet back). I tried
$ cp /sources.list/etc/apt/sources.list
$ mv /sources.list/etc/apt/sources.list
$ cat /sources.list/etc/apt/sources.list
didn't help either.

I found this and it seemed to work
$ netselect-apt stable -n -o /etc/apt/sources.list

but the usual
#This is a comment
deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ wheezy main
deb-src http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ wheezy main

deb http://security.debian.org/ wheezy/updates main
deb-src http://security.debian.org/ wheezy/updates main

deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian wheezy-updates main
deb-src http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian wheezy-updates main

was changed into

# Debian packages for stable
deb http://ftp.sg.debian.org/debian/ stable main contrib
# Uncomment the deb-src line if you want 'apt-get source'
# to work with most packages.
# deb-src http://ftp.sg.debian.org/debian/ stable main contrib

# Security updates for stable
deb http://security.debian.org/ stable/updates main contrib

Should i worry about it?

[dilberts_left_nut]

If you're running wheezy (which is oldstable), then yes.
Your new sources.list points to 'stable' - currently jessie and soon to be stretch, so surprise upgrades and likely borkage is in your immediate future.

I tried
$ cp /sources.list/etc/apt/sources.list
$ mv /sources.list/etc/apt/sources.list
$ cat /sources.list/etc/apt/sources.list

The file you want to back up and edit is /etc/apt/sources.list - correct paths (and spaces) are required - along with being root (as it is a system file that your regular user should not be messing with:

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$ su
Password: <enter root password>
# cp /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list.bak
# nano /etc/apt/sources.list

[ExpertLearner]

Thank you

[Head_on_a_Stick]

If you use this command to edit /etc/apt/sources.list, the file will be checked for errors before saving:

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# apt edit-sources

[ExpertLearner]

When I did that

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$ apt edit-sources 

it just took me to the editor (i e)it asked me to choose between 3 editors and i chose nano, it opened the sources.list for me.