I accidentally deleted /usr/bin/test and now I can't update, upgrade and install packages

I accidentally deleted /usr/bin/test and now I can't update, upgrade and install packages.

I already tried the solution here: apt-get raises /usr/bin/test: Permission denied, but this is the output I got:

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
  java-common libutempter0
Use 'sudo apt autoremove' to remove them.
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 1 reinstalled, 0 to remove and 29 not upgraded.
Need to get 1,353 kB of archives.
After this operation, 0 B of additional disk space will be used.
Ign:1 http://ph.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu impish/main amd64 coreutils amd64 8.32-4ubuntu2
Ign ...
Ign ...
Err:1 http://ph.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu impish/main amd64 coreutils amd64 8.32-4ubuntu2
  Could not connect to ph.archive.ubuntu.com:80 (202.79.184.254), connection timed out
E: Failed to fetch http://ph.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/c/coreutils/coreutils_8.32-4ubuntu2_amd64.deb  Could not connect to ph.archive.ubuntu.com:80 (202.79.184.254), connection timed out
E: Unable to fetch some archives, maybe run apt-get update or try with --fix-missing?

I also tried sudo apt update --fix-missing and got this output:

Err:8 http://ph.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu impish InRelease
  Could not connect to ph.archive.ubuntu.com:80 (202.79.184.254), connection timed out
Err:9 http://ph.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu impish-updates InRelease
  Unable to connect to ph.archive.ubuntu.com:http:
Err:10 http://ph.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu impish-backports InRelease
  Unable to connect to ph.archive.ubuntu.com:http:
Fetched 125 kB in 37s (3,339 B/s)
sh: 1: /usr/bin/test: not found
sh: 1: /usr/bin/test: not found
sh: 1: /usr/bin/test: not found
Reading package lists... Done

Please help me.

You could use the test commandlet provided by busybox to temporarily replace a missing /usr/bin/test binary file.

First, check that you have busybox, and that its test works:

$ /usr/bin/busybox test -x /usr/bin/busybox && echo Works
Works

Then create a symbolic link:

$ sudo ln -s busybox /usr/bin/test
$ 
$ file /usr/bin/test
/usr/bin/test: symbolic link to busybox

Then re-install the coreutils package, which will overwrite the symlink with the proper binary implementation.

If you don't have busybox, you could even create /usr/bin/test as a shell script and leverage the shell's test builtin:

#!/bin/sh

test "$@"

(don't forget to make it executable, chmod +x /usr/bin/test) again re-installing coreutils right after.

The simplest solution I can think of, without using the package manager (since it does not work anymore):

1. Download the coreutils package:

   wget http://de.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/c/coreutils/coreutils_8.32-4ubuntu2_amd64.deb
   

   note: use browser if you don't have wget installed. Also note that the exact names are as of January 2022 - if you need to do this at a later date, file names will most likely have changed to reflect updated packages.

2. Unpack downloaded package

   dpkg-deb -R coreutils_8.32-4ubuntu2_amd64.deb coreutils_unpacked
   

3. Copy the missing test binary

   sudo cp coreutils_unpacked/usr/bin/test /usr/bin/test
   

4. Add executable permission

   sudo chmod +x /usr/bin/test
   

Or if you'd like to download the full .iso file

1. Download the iso file from the official site

2. Create a temp directory to mount iso file into

   mkdir ubuntu_iso_tmp
   

3. Mount iso file into newly created dir

   sudo mount -o loop ~/Downloads/Ubuntu_whatever.iso ubuntu_iso_tmp
   

4. Copy the missing test binary

   sudo cp ubuntu_iso_tmp/usr/bin/test /usr/bin/test
   

For the specific case of /usr/bin/test, there's another program /usr/bin/[ which is identical except that it requires an additional last argument which is ]. GNU coreutils, which is the implementation of these programs under Ubuntu and other non-embedded Linux systems, ships those two programs as separate executables, so even if one is corrupted or missing, you can use the other. Create /usr/bin/test with the following content:

#!/bin/sh
/usr/bin/\[ "$@" \]

Make it executable (chmod a+rx /usr/bin/test) and you have a completely valid replacement for /usr/bin/test.

Then run apt reinstall coreutils to get the normal /usr/bin/test back.

You could reinstall the main package and let the triggers do the job. In this case coreutils and any provided tool of it will be reinstalled by the scripts of coreutils. Not only test.

1. Download the version installed on your system

   wget http://ph.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/pool/main/c/coreutils/coreutils_8.32-4ubuntu2_amd64.deb
   

2. Unpack it to its destination

   sudo dpkg --unpack coreutils_8.32-4ubuntu2_amd64.deb
   

3. Configure or reconfigure it using its triggers:

   sudo dpkg --configure coreutils
   

Done.

Simply install the OS flavor locally on virtualbox and copy out and upload the binary to the system that’s missing it.