You could use github https://assafmo.github.io/2019/05/02/ppa-repo-hosted-on-github.html

JFrog is probably overkill but what I use. Yes there are lighter weight ways but it's easy.

Use a standard Webserver like nginx and enable access protection with username + password. For that you can use your favorite web hoster.

You can specify the credentials like this in sources.list format: deb https://user:password@your-server.tld

This is something companies do, but I believe acess control is by firewall/VPN not the repo tools. As far as I can tell, if you can access the IP address of the URL assets you can get the assets. So making it private is a matter of setting up access to the server(s) not a configuration of the tools that manage the repository.

I'd ask on a debian focused irc/chat room/ mailing list to find out more.

Hi. You have two main ways to achieve this: use an artifact store such as Pulp and https://github.com/pulp/pulp_deb plugin or basically do it yourself by creating the APT repo manually and delivering it over HTTP similar to https://linuxopsys.com/topics/create-your-own-repository-for-packages-on-debian#Step_4_Create_the_Required_Repository_Package_Meta_for_APT

There is no magic. Creating Yum or APT repos boils down to having packages and their metadata in a structured format and making it consumable over HTTP. To get started, you can also inspect any upstream repo in your browser.

Good luck. Feel free to report back if you have more specific questions.

apt repositories are just http severs with some metadata generated.

There are some services, like metioned jfrog and maybe nexus that will set it up for you with some additional tooling to aid in package releases.

For a private use, a static file hosting + metadata is all you need.

Here's instructions from Debian docs. It seems fairly straightforward on a cursory look through.

https://wiki.debian.org/DebianRepository/Setup#Debian_Repository_Types

Unsure if this is what you're looking for, but I've seen some FOSS projects use https://www.makedeb.org/ and https://openbuildservice.org/ to create public Debian repos.

Gitea supports Debian and other formats. https://docs.gitea.com/usage/packages/debian