apt update error: The repository does not have a Release file

[cnc-bdibene]

Almost identical to #5405
Similar: dotnet/core#6381

WSL2 (Ubuntu 20.04 "focal") on Windows10

Running 'sudo apt update' or 'sudo apt-get update' result in

Ign:8 https://packages.microsoft.com/ubuntu/20.04/prod/dists focal InRelease Get:9 http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu focal-backports InRelease [108 kB] **Err:10** https://packages.microsoft.com/ubuntu/20.04/prod/dists focal Release **404 Not Found [IP: 13.93.224.173** 443] Reading package lists... Done **E: The repository 'https://packages.microsoft.com/ubuntu/20.04/prod/dists focal Release' does not have a Release file.** N: Updating from such a repository can't be done securely, and is therefore disabled by default. N: See apt-secure(8) manpage for repository creation and user configuration details.

Per https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/linux-package-repository-for-microsoft-software,
I ran
curl -sSL https://packages.microsoft.com/keys/microsoft.asc | sudo tee /etc/apt/trusted.gpg.d/microsoft.asc

and the PGP key successfully loads.

The next command
sudo apt-add-repository https://packages.microsoft.com/ubuntu/20.04/prod
results in the same error as above.

I can curl the 'Release' file successfully:
curl -sSL https://packages.microsoft.com/ubuntu/20.04/prod/dists/focal/Release
which gives me
Origin: microsoft-ubuntu-focal-prod focal Label: microsoft-ubuntu-focal-prod focal Suite: focal Codename: focal Date: Fri, 7 Jan 2022 06:09:36 UTC Architectures: amd64 arm64 armhf Components: main Description: Generated by aptly

...followed by a series of files, including 'main/binary-amd64/Release'

$ telnet packages.microsoft.com 443 Trying 13.93.224.173... Connected to csd-apt-wus-d-2.westus.cloudapp.azure.com. Escape character is '^]'. Connection closed by foreign host.

This has been happening for months, so is not a temporary "try again later" type issue.

[lizfrank]

Is there a fix for this issue yet?

[oscartorres9]

still suck in ubuntu20.04,totally not working

[lizfrank]

The problem is that apt reads the files in /etc/apt/sources.list.d to get the list of URLs for software downloads. It reads these files whether or not it needs anything from those sites and attempts to contact them. The site in the file names mssql-release.list no longer exists and apt fails. I added a command in Dockerfile to remove that file and everything worked:

RUN rm /etc/apt/sources.list.d/mssql-release.list

[lnaie]

It does the same on raspi model 4 with the raspi os. It's sad. :)

[dcooper94]

If you run do-realease-upgrade this may fix it