Issue 1:

Ngnix default directory for me was

/usr/share/nginx/html/ not /var/www/html/

Issue 2: was getting error:

– Status code: 404 for http://192.168.1.96/BaseOS/repodata/repomd.xml (IP: 192.168.1.96)
Error: Failed to download metadata for repo ‘LocalRepo_BaseOS’: Cannot download repomd.xml: Cannot download repodata/repomd.xml: All mirrors were tried

Also was getting error:

No available modular metadata for modular package ‘python36-3.6.8-2.module_el8.1.0+245+c39af44f.x86_64’, it cannot be installed on the system

Read below for Fix

Thanks

Error 1 : rm: cannot remove ‘index.html’: No such file or directory

[root@centos8-client ~]# yum install python36-devel.x86_64 -y
Failed to set locale, defaulting to C.UTF-8
LocalRepo_BaseOS            
Errors during downloading metadata for repository 'LocalRepo_BaseOS':
  - Status code: 404 for http://192.168.1.96/BaseOS/repodata/repomd.xml (IP: 192.168.1.96)
Error: Failed to download metadata for repo 'LocalRepo_BaseOS': Cannot download repomd.xml: 
Cannot download repodata/repomd.xml: All mirrors were tried

[root@centos8-client ~]# vi /etc/yum.repos.d/local-rhel8.repo
[root@centos8-client ~]# dnf clean all
Failed to set locale, defaulting to C.UTF-8
6 files removed
[root@centos8-client ~]# yum install python36-devel.x86_64 -y
Failed to set locale, defaulting to C.UTF-8
CentOS-8 - Extras                                                                                                                                       
LocalRepo_BaseOS                                                                                                                                      
LocalRepo_AppStream                                                                                                                                  
Dependencies resolved.
-
Total      

Error 2:
Running transaction check
No available modular metadata for modular package 'python36-3.6.8-2.module_el8.1.0+245+c39af44f.x86_64', it cannot be installed on the system
No available modular metadata for modular package 'python36-devel-3.6.8-2.module_el8.1.0+245+c39af44f.x86_64', it cannot be installed on the system
The downloaded packages were saved in cache until the next successful transaction.
You can remove cached packages by executing 'yum clean packages'.
Error: No available modular metadata for modular package

[root@centos8-client ~]# vi /etc/yum.repos.d/centos8.repo
[root@centos8-client ~]# vi /etc/yum.repos.d/
CentOS-AppStream.repo   CentOS-CR.repo          CentOS-Devel.repo       
CentOS-HA.repo          CentOS-PowerTools.repo  CentOS-Vault.repo       
CentOS-fasttrack.repo    CentOS-Base.repo       CentOS-Debuginfo.repo   
CentOS-Extras.repo      CentOS-Media.repo       CentOS-Sources.repo    
CentOS-centosplus.repo  local-rhel8.repo

[root@centos8-client ~]# vi /etc/yum.repos.d/local-rhel8.repo

Service side:

I created the repo metadata using following command, after rebuilding it

# createrepo_c /usr/share/nginx/html/local_repo

Client side:

I had to specifically list each of the directories for the Base repo and the AppStream Repo

[root@centos8-client ~]# cat /etc/yum.repos.d/local-rhel8.repo
[LocalRepo_BaseOS]
name=LocalRepo_BaseOS
enabled=1
metadata_expire=-1
gpgcheck=0
baseurl=http://192.168.1.96/local_repo/BaseOS
gpgkey=file:///etc/pki/rpm-gpg/RPM-GPG-KEY-centosofficial
[LocalRepo_AppStream]
name=LocalRepo_AppStream
enabled=1
metadata_expire=-1
gpgcheck=0
baseurl=http://192.168.1.96/local_repo/AppStream
gpgkey=file:///etc/pki/rpm-gpg/RPM-GPG-KEY-centosofficial

I got the error [Errno 14] PYCURL ERROR 22 – “The requested URL returned an error: 403 Forbidden” may be related to this