The AptURL Protocol Handler is a program that handles special URLs for installing packages. This means that special links in web pages can install software. Ubuntu 7.10 has AptURL installed by default. Installing applications does not get any easier than this:
Click here to install the gweled game.
AptURL should be compatible with most browsers on Ubuntu, I tested it with Firefox and Epiphany and it worked fine. If you haven’t upgraded to Ubuntu 7.10 yet, you can get AptURL by installing the apturl package from the Ubuntu repositories.
Want to make your own AptURLs? The format is simple: apt:packagename.
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Doesn’t work in the newest version of Flock downloaded from their website.
Wow what a great little feature, i hope more sites start using this feature, thanks tom.
Of all the things to link, gweled?
Another great tool for social engineers to use to fool you into installing root kits and such.
@Fr33d0m
Not so long as it only grabs from your pre-configured repos. It may not be the case but from the looks of the URL it is.
If you can do something like apt:http://evil.com/rootkit.deb then maybe.
But you could still easily do this without apturl by just downloading and opening using gdebi, either way you have to grant permission to install it. So it’s the same as before. Install from trusted sources.
I havn’t tested it yet so i’m not sure if the above url would work.
[...] October 24th, 2007 via: http://tombuntu.com/index.php/2007/10/22/the-apturl-protocol-handler-in-ubuntu-710/Â [...]
verbalshadow,
You make a valid point about the repos, and I hope it is that way, but you miss the point with “either way you have to grant permission to install it.”
The only way to get a user to install things is to get their permission. Yes you have to use your password, but it isn’t all that difficult to convince someone to do that. And if you can obfuscate the real link then you can get even the partially aware folks to authorize it.
is this good?
apt:This! Bookmarklet
http://conceptualcaves.com/goodies/aptthis/
[...] As for making software installation easy, CNR is trying to solve a problem that Ubuntu doesn’t have. Ubuntu’s repositories are excellent, and installing software is easy with Synaptic, Add/Remove, and the AptURL protocol handler. [...]
apt-url is awesome, cnr really sucks, all cnr is is another repository added, and with apt-rul you cannot get a rootkit installed because there isnt any in the repo’s lol
[...] dvd video to vcd? The AptURL Protocol Handler in Ubuntu 7.10 | Tombuntu __________________ "Thou shalt not follow the null pointer for at it’s end madness and chaos [...]
This isn’t a URL, rather a URN, read on the difference.
I’d prefer a synthay like .
[...] can be easily added by installing a DEB package. The install links in the games list require AptURL, which is standard in Ubuntu since 7.10, but Playdeb requires an updated version to be installed. A [...]
@ børge
u must have Ubuntu Firefox Modifications/ubufox or open it with apturl.