EDIT:
These scripts for creating backup of maemo packages are now obsolated (but still can be used to verify openess of packages).

I created patch for apt-mirror which can download packages also from downloads.maemo.nokia.com, so apt-mirror is good way to backup apt rpositories. See wiki page: http://wiki.maemo.org/Apt-mirror

We know that Nokia abandoned Maemo5 and some day Nokia will stop Maemo5 repositories (SDK, apps, extras...). So I'm started creating shell scripts which will backup maemo 5 fremanle repositories (downloads.maemo.nokia.com and repository.maemo.org).

Scripts can also create package index (from repositories) and separate open and closed source. Some info about closed packages wrote Carsten Munk on his page - but it was for PR1.1. I asked him for application which generated his page, but he refuse publish it. So I'm created my own (scripts + wiki page).

I published all my scripts attached in this post/thread. It may contains bugs and download script is very very slow - but it works.

Size:
downloads.maemo.nokia.com mr0+apps 280MB
repository.maemo.org sdk+tools+nokia-binaries 5.8GB

Backed repositories are fully compatible with apt, so it may be used for n900 as mirror server.

How to use scripts:
download.sh - backup packages (source + binary) from repositories specified in sources.list and use authorisation informations from file auth (both files are in n900 in /etc/apt)

other scripts needs downloaded indexes files from repositories

installed-packages.sh need dpkg status file (copy from n900 after reflash /var/lib/dpkg/status)

Now I can say, that in default PR1.3 image is 355 closed packages and 364 open. But a lot of closed packages are now open (on meego.gitorious.org or maemo.gitorious.org or in CSSU) and a lot of are marketing/third-party (skype, flash, installers) and some maybe be replaced (ofono, icd2, ...)

I created wiki page where is table of all closed packages + info:
http://wiki.maemo.org/Fremantle_closed_packages

I wrote some informations about packages (if exists alternative, if is now open, ...) - but not for all packages. Maybe this will be good start point how to clean/rewrite Maemo 5. Anybody who is interesting in this is welcome.

Also, it seems like someone from one of those countries where copyright is ignored to go ahead and make a large torrent image with *everything*(all closed packages, open packages, firmware images, etc.) just in case...

maemo5 may well have the kind of support that diablo has, but I don't see them closing down the repositories any time soon.
But then again, can we trust them not to do just that?

great work, thank you so much

This is good news if i ever seen on here and i hope pali is not hindered by anyone, i did note from his post that Carsten once again refuses to cooperate and that is still sad news but never the less good luck with this because i can tell you many people want this to happen !.

Out of interest how large are the repos currently (extras, testing + dev, plus the others, Nokia etc)?

Can't see them closing them down any time soon, but would be a good idea to back everything up and I'd be happy to help (with server space etc or anything else)

pali: Please see my email in regards to downloads.maemo.nokia.com deb files, amongst that link that I provided, there are other bits and pieces of things that I have found and noted which maybe can be of use to you

(edit) I'm currently on IRC on the same #maemo channel if you need to contact me (/edit)

extras, extras-testing and extras-devel are very very big. I will not backup it (sorry, but with my scripts can other users do it).

downloads.maemo.nokia.com has 280MB and SDK+tools+nokia-binaries has now on my disk 5.8GB (and still downloading)

Well I don't mind backing up the lot (plus updating as new stuff is added - so if they do shut it down we have a complete backup), just need to know how big it is first, to ensure I have enough space. Can anyone give me an estimate, or is there anyway to work it out

My old mirrored downloads.maemo.org amongst a few other repositories totalled around half a terabyte. This doesn't include downloads.maemo.nokia.com (which requires a slightly different method to download) and it includes repositories from other 3rd party developers. Also it doesn't contain any harmattan stuff.

If I were to run that mirror script now it would probably tell me there would be another 4+GB worth of downloads to grab minus downloads.maemo.nokia.com and harmattan-dev repositories.