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Debian Tips
by Rick Moen
revised 1999-12-09

[Please pardon this document's Intel-centrism.  Probably, almost all of
it will generalise to Debian for Motorola 680x0, DEC Alpha, and Sun
SPARC, but I cannot guarantee that.]

This document, or a successor, will reside somewhere in
http://linuxmafia.com/debian/

Basic documentation
-------------------

Debian Installation Guide ("Installing Debian GNU/Linux") by Adam Di
Carlo and other authors
ftp://www.debian.org/debian/dists/stable/main/disks-i386/current/install.html
20 pages  -- PRINT AND READ THIS BEFORE INSTALLING.

Debian FAQ  http://www.debian.org/doc/FAQ/  75 pages

Debian Users Guide (by Dale Sheetz)

http://www.debian.org/~elphick/ddp/manuals.html#devel is helpful

Debian Packaging Manual,
http://www.debian.org/~elphick/manuals.html/packaging-manual/

Debian Documentation Project, http://www.debian.org/~elphick/ddp/, which
  is generally a good place to find docs, some of which may not be in a
  finished state.

Installation notes
------------------

Most people will elect to install from CD-ROM.  If so, configure your
system to boot from CD-ROM before starting, if it supports that.  Doing
so allows you to dispense with installation boot floppies, a very
frequent source of problems.

If you need to start the installation process from floppy (i.e., cannot
boot from CD-ROMs), then you need to generate (write) a floppy from
image files on Debian CD #1.  The installation diskette-image file is
somewhat confusingly called a "rescue" floppy.  (Some machines, such as
IBM ThinkPads, will need the alternate "tecra" rescue floppy, because of
drive-addressing peculiarities.)

As is usual with Linux distributions, you can write the floppy from its
image file using either the provided RAWRITE.EXE DOS utility or a Unix
machine's "dd" utility.  Watch carefully for errors or early
termination of the write process:  More installations fail because of
subtly defective boot floppies than for any other reason.

Debian 2.1 "Slink" has a fairly old XFree86 (v. 3.3.2.3a).  (This software
group comprises the video graphics engines for various video-card chipsets,
and you may need to upgrade it to support recent video cards.)  Newest are
available at "http://www.netgod.net/x".  You can either retrieve them
using apt-get, or retrieve them manually and install using "dkpg -i".

ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/dists/potato/main/binary-i386/x11/
(i.e., the current beta-version Debian distribution, "potato") also has
X upgrade packages, _but_ those packages require GNU libc version 2.1,
which would be essentially going partially to "potato", which you would
probably consider undesirable.

You should get upgrades for at least the following X-related packages:

  xserver-vga16   Generic 640x480x16 plain-VGA support.  Good to have
                  for testing, etc.  Not all current cards have VGA16
                  backwards compatibility, but most do.
  xserver-[...]   Whichever X server is required for your video card.
                  See: http://www.xfree86.org/cardlist.html
  xserver-common
  xfree86-common
  xf86setup
  xbase           Only if you're upgrading from Debian 2.0
  xbase-clients
  xlib6           Libraries
  xlib6g
  xprt            X printing support
  xfs             X Font Server
  xfstt           TrueType server
  xfonts-scalable
  xfonts-base
  xfonts-75dpi
  xfonts-100dpi

Debian's installer puts you in cfdisk.  If you prefer the traditional
Linux fdisk, exit cfdisk and switch to a different virtual terminal
(Ctrl-Alt-F2), then use fdisk there, then switch virtual terminals
back (Ctrl-Alt-F1).  (You should exit cfdisk because it would otherwise
render fdisk unable to write to the disk device.)

The installer may prompt you for an expansion card's (e.g., an ethernet
card's) hardware resources, such as I/O base address and IRQ.  Try
_omitting_ that data, which induces a fairly reliable autoprobe process,
to find the correct values:  The installer fails to clarify that it
will default to autoprobing, which is unfortunate, because that is
almost always a better choice.

Also, make sure you know the following hardware-configuration details
before you start:  What port your mouse is on (PS/2, ttyS0=COM1,
ttyS1=COM2, etc.), what video chipset your video card uses, how much
RAM your video card contains, what chipset your ethernet card (if any)
is built on, and what device type your CD-ROM is if you'll be installing
from it (SCSI, hda=primary master IDE device, hdb=primary slave, hdc=
secondary master, hdd=secondary slave, or whatever else).  Ignore video
details if you're omitting X support (but most users won't be).

Debian's installer needs to be told these things because of a design
tradeoff:  Because it doesn't autoprobe for this data, the installer
can be stable and usable even on bizarre hardware that tends to confuse
autoprobe programs.  On the minus side, it means the user must know his
system in more detail than usual.

Because of that aspect and other rough spots in the installation
noted throughout this piece, I recommend _against_ trying Debian
as one's first Linux distribution.  However, if you've tried (any of)
SuSE, Red Hat, Turbo Linux, Caldera Open Linux, Slackware, Stampede
Linux, Mandrake, etc., and generally know your hardware, you're more
than qualified.

Surviving "dselect":  dselect is a software package-selection and
configuration tool, liked by a few, detested by many, and due to be
replaced soon.  During Debian installation, you will briefly encounter
it but need not ever use it thereafter, post-installation.  (Better
tools are available, e.g., apt-get, dpkg.)

Suggestion:  DO NOT attempt to adjust package selection in any way
inside dselect, during your initial installation.  Doing so can prolong
your installation time by many hours, as you wrestle with dselect.
One avoids this pitfall by selecting, on an installer screen just prior
to entering dselect, a "profile" (a predefined set of packages to install,
for a machine role such a network server, scientific workstation, etc.).
You can recognise that installer screen by the following (rather
confusing) text on it:

    Now you may choose one of several selections of packages to
    be installed.  If you prefer to select one by one which packages
    to install on the system you may skip this step, else you may
    skip the 'Select' step later when I run the 'dselect' program.

Let's translate that into English:

It's saying you may choose either of two ways to specify packages to
be installed.

(1) You might elect to pick a "profile".  After doing so, you will be
run through a program called 'dselect' whose main menu consists of
about six numbered steps.  Ignore step number 3, 'Select', since having
already specified a profile makes that step redundant.

  or...

(2) You might prefer _not_ to use a "profile", in order to pick and
choose individual packages during initial installation.  In that case,
you'll definitely want to perform all of the dselect program's numbered
steps, including step number 3, 'Select'.

You are strongly advised to go with the first option during initial
installation:  DO NOT attempt to tweak dselect's package selection to
do a "kitchen sink" installation, or for any other reason.  People who
do that end up dealing with dependency issues in dselect for hours.
You Have Been Warned.

(Among many faults, dselect's 'Select' step presents you with a
non-collapsible scrolling list of 2200+ packages.  Horrors.)

While you are in dselect, as the program is installing your packages, it
will scroll past your eyes quite a lot of configuration information,
sometimes prompting you for setup choices.  (Unlike some other
distributions, Debian has you make those choices during initial package
installation rather than providing generic values for them.)  You are
strongly advised to take notes on paper and take your time, since some
of the information displayed is valuable, and to my knowledge is not
logged.  (The latter fact is the single biggest reason I think dselect
is Evil and Must Die, by the way.)

In particular, don't think of dselect as a general system-administration
and setup tool (like SuSE's "yast").  It isn't one.  Other utilities
perform those functions:
   -- Use xf86config or XF86Setup (those names are case-sensitive) to
      configure the X Window System after installing needed X packages.
   -- Use Wvdial or ppp-config to configure Internet dial-up networking.
   -- Use apt-get and dpkg to install/remove/configure Debian packages.
   -- Use ipmasq to set up firewalling.

===>   PACKAGE-INSTALLATION OPTION #3 (the most interesting):  Instead of
_either_ picking a package "profile" _or_ picking and choosing packages in
dselect, you can simply _quit_ the installer (ctrl-C) when shown the profile
list.  You will then have run completely through the first half of Debian
installation (the "debootstrap" utility) and omitted the "dselect" second half.
You will have thereby installed just the "Debian base system".

The theory behind doing so is that you can then efficiently add _just_
the packages you want, resulting in a lean, sparse, _secure_, and
yet full-featured system.  _However_, the Debian base system must be
supplemented -- and can be as follows, on any network connected to the
Internet:

   1.  Login as user "root".  Stay in directory "/root".
   2.  If your machine requires a DHCP-issued dynamic IP address, get and
       add the dhcpcd-[version].deb package.  ("dpkg -i dhcpcd-[version].deb")
   3.  Add the "apt" package-management system.  (dpkg -i apt-[version].deb")
   4.  Do:   script        (this logs what follows to text file "typescript")
             apt-get update && apt-get -u dist-upgrade
       (This upgrades all installed packages to latest versions.  The
       "-u" adds packages listed as "suggests" companions for those being
       installed .)
   5.  Install the following additional packages omitted from the
       Debian base system, by typing "apt-get install [deb1] [deb2] ...":
       autoconf automake bin86 binutils bison cpp doc-base dpkg-multicd
       file flex g++ gcc gettext gettext-base groff info kbd kbd-data
       less libc5 libc6-dev libg++27 libg++272 libstdc++2.10-dev
       libstdc++2.8 lilo make man-db manpages psmisc sysutils

   6.  If your system will support the X Window System, add:
       xbase-clients xlib6 xlib6g xlib6g-dev

   7.  Your system is now fairly functional (initially without X setup).
       Browse the package listings in the /var/state/apt/lists/*Packages
       files, and "apt-get install" what you need.  You'll only need to do
       a few such "install" commands, to (e.g.) add a full-blown X
       setup, because apt-get retrieves additional packages as needed
       to meet dependencies.

pine/pico:

Debian does not by default install "non-free" packages -- those under
restrictive software licences (although many are provided and available
for installation).  If you are a user of the "pine" e-mail client or
the "pico" text editor that pine provides, please be aware that pine
is non-free and therefore is not a default installation item.

The U. of Washington's licence forbids distribution of pine/pico (v.
4.62 or later) in binary form.  This restriction is routinely violated
by many GNU/Linux distributions, but not by Debian.  (U. of Washington
is aware of this licencing problem, but elects not to fix it.)  You can
thus install pine and pico (in Debian) by installing the pine
source-code package and then compiling the programs.

    apt-get build-dep pine
    apt-get source --compile pine
    dpkg -i *.deb

or, equivalently:

    apt-get build-dep pine
    apt-get source pine
    dpkg-buildpackage
    dpkg -i *.deb

However, there's a better alternative.  Just put the following
script in /usr/local/bin as "pine", and chmod it to 755 (executable):

   #!/bin/sh
   /usr/bin/mutt -F /usr/doc/mutt/examples/Pine.rc

pico can be emulated by a symbolic link to the simple editor "ae", which
is really very close to pico:

   cd /usr/local/bin
   ln -s ../../../bin/ae   pico

Qmail (the SMTP e-mail server) is available in the same way as pine/pico,
as a source-code package (qmail-src) with a canned build script, in the
Debian non-free packages collection.

Post-installation adjustments:
------------------------------

-- Consider manually creating symlinks cdrom, floppy, and mouse in the /dev
   directory.

-- Consider changing the mountpoints for your floppy and CD-ROM devices
   from /floppy and /cdrom to /mnt/floppy and /mnt/cdrom (to make them
   more standards-compliant).  Remember that you can always put personal
   symlinks in your home directory as shortcuts to frequently-visited
   directories.

-- Consider cleaning up the format of /etc/fstab in a text editor, and
   adding entries for your CD-ROM and floppy devices, e.g.:

     #<filesys> <mount pnt> <type> <options>               <dump><pass>
     /dev/sda1  /           ext2   defaults,errors=remount-ro 0   1
     /dev/sda2  none        swap   sw                         0   0
     /dev/fd0   /mnt/floppy ext2   noauto                     0   0
     /dev/scd0  /mnt/cdrom  iso9660 noauto,ro                 0   0
     proc       /proc       proc   defaults                   0   0

(The "noauto" options for the floppy and CD-ROM ensure that any floppies
and CDs in those devices will not be automounted at boot time.)

Post-installation addition/removal of software packages.
-- dpkg: very decent command-line package installer/uninstaller
-- The wonder that is apt-get:
     -- automatically retrieves additional packages as needed to
        satisfy dependencies
     -- can be used to systematically track either a named Debian
        version (e.g., potato, slink, hamm, bo) or the symlinks
        "stable" and "unstable".  Sysadmin can either run apt-get
        manually or as a cron job.
    apt-get is intended, in the long term, to be just a "method"
    (subsidiary app) invoked by apt, the intended replacement
    for dselect.  Thus, it is a command-line tool.

Basic update of the already-installed packages:

    apt-get update && apt-get -u dist-upgrade

If the dist-upgrade has problems, do "apt-get -f install" (to fix).

To switch to tracking the "unstable" Debian branch:

-- add the following to your /etc/apt/sources.list file:
   deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian unstable main contrib non-free
   deb http://non-us.debian.org/debian-non-US unstable/non-US main contrib non-free
-- Re-run "apt-get update", to get the new available-package listings.
-- In order to upgrade crucial packages first, do:
   "apt-get install perl libc6 dpkg apt apt-utils debconf"
   Whenever you're switching to a new development track, or are
   for any reason expecting a major jump in package versions, the
   foregoing command is a worthwhile precaution.
-- Re-run "apt-get -u dist-upgrade".  You are now upgraded to (and
   can track in the future) the "unstable" branch.

You can make apt-get search your CD-ROM first (which is faster than
getting packages from the Net) by adding something like the following as
the first non-comment line in /etc/apt/sources.list:

   deb file:/mnt/cdrom/debian stable main non-free

After installing packages, run

   apt-get clean
to clear out /var/cache/apt/archives where .deb packages otherwise
accumulate.

   apt-get autoclean
will clear out only "useless" package files.

Don Marti reports that he runs this, instead, as a nightly cron script:

   apt-get update && \
   apt-get -y --download-only dist-upgrade && \
   apt-get autoclean

That updates the available-packages lists, retrieves into /var/lib/dpkg/archive
but doesn't install any new packages, and removes those no longer
essential.  He later does a manual "apt-get dist-upgrade" to install the
pre-fetched packages with human supervision.

(Alternative: use aptcron, which is designed to be automated and to
cooperate with debconf.)


   apt-get update && apt-get build-upgrade
will update your system and then recompile all installed software.
(The "build-upgrade" parameter is supported only by recent CVS betas
of apt-get, at this date -- but is very slick.)

You can edit your /etc/apt/sources.list file to make apt-get
use a variety of sources, including various unofficial ".deb"
archives.  A list of the latter is maintained by StΘphane Bortzmeyer at
http://www.internatif.org/bortzmeyer/debian/apt-sources/.
(Consider particularly "deb http://security.debian.org/ stable updates".)

(2002-12 update:  Mike Markley's http://apt-get.org/ has mostly taken
over from Bortzmeyer's list.)

Tweak /etc/apt/build-options  (?) to set compiler flags, etc.
(This would be another cutting-edge feature in the betas.)

Tip:  Before using apt-get (or dselect, or dpkg) to do anything,
start the "script" utility to make a session logfile.  You are
strongly advised to do this, since package-installers in Debian
output meaningful information that may be important for you later.

slink vs. potato
----------------
At any given time, there is a Debian "stable" distribution and
an "unstable" (development) distribution.  At this writing,
Debian-stable is named "slink" (v. 2.1, based on installation kernel
2.0.36), and Debian-unstable is "potato" (no version number yet
assigned).  potato is quite solid and close to release as the next
"stable" branch, but installation diskette images for it are still being
tested.  Therefore, the only practical way to reach potato is to install
slink first, and then upgrade.

There is one exception:  Debian developer Joey Hess has produced an
ISO-9660 (CD-ROM filesystem) image of what he calls "slink-and-a-half",
available at ftp://ftp.valinux.com/pub/support/joey/slink-and-a-half.iso .
This is an upgraded slink, based on Linux kernel 2.2.12, with the vastly
expanded hardware support that one gets with more-recent kernels.
(Therefore, it will install on advanced, recent hardware that slink
doesn't yet support.)  The file is 620 MB, and pretty much the only
practical thing to do with it is burn it to a CDR or CDRW disk (using a
CD-burner drive).  You can do that on any operating system; for tips on
doing it on Linux, see http://www.linuxdoc.org/HOWTO/CD-Writing-HOWTO.html .

Be aware that, if you upgrade a slink (or "slink-and-a-half") system to
potato, you may encounter occasional problems inherent in the Debian
development process.  (In other words, before you complain, realise
that they called it "unstable" for a reason.)  To date, the problems
have been small and resolved in a day or two.  Many of us find these
risks worthwhile to have access to the lastest software.  Your call.





DEBIAN 2.2 "POTATO"
-------------------

Until I properly update this "tips" file for 2.2 Potato, here's
some update information I e-mailed to a friend in Ireland.  I had
just burned and sent him a set of the three official Debian 2.2
CD-ROM images, and wanted to help him with his next steps:

1.  Read the installation manual:
http://www.debian.org/releases/stable/i386/install

2.  Read the release note:
http://www.debian.org/releases/2.2/i386/release-notes/

3.  If your machine boots from CD-ROM, do so with disk 1.  This is the
"non-US" variant of disk 1, which differs from the "regular" one only
by inclusion of strong crypto.  If not, you'll have to write out
rescue + root + drivers1 + drivers2 + drivers3 floppies.  Pay close
attention to the floppy-writing screens and listen for writing of bad
sectors.  Floppy quality these days really sucks, and is probably the
biggest cause of Debian installation failure.

Via either path, you'll enter the debootstrap installer routine,
which guides you through the rest of the first-half of installation,
including shelling out to cfdisk for partitioning, and calls the lilo
map installer to write boot files.  You reboot at the end (having now
completed installation of the "Debian base" set), and go into a one-time
shell where you set root password, create a regular user account, decide
whether to enable shadowed passwords and remove PCMCIA support.  Then,
you're put into tasksel, a utility for specifying large-granularity
groupings of packages to be installed.

If you run tasksel and do not select any tasks, you get packages of
priority "standard" and higher.  If for some reason you want an
absolutely bare-bones Debian system (essential packages only), then
break out of the installer completely rather than using tasksel.

You are strongly advised to pick one of those "tasks" (aka "profiles"),
rather than defaulting to fine-granularity package selection in the next
routine, the infamous "dselect" program.  Specifically, it's generally
wise to pick a minimal configuration.  A typical mistake of those
coming from Red Hat (et al.) is to attempt to specify the kitchen sink.
Wrong.  Bad.  Debian does better if you start with a minimal
configuration and build up as needed.  Trust me on this one.

Even if you've picked a profile, you'll be run through the "dselect"
program as the penultimate step of installation.  If you've selected
a profile, make a point of _not_ doing step #2, "Select", on the dselect
program's main menu (because you've already designated a package set
to be installed).

     0.  [A]ccess  Choose the access method to use.
     1.  [U]pdate  Update list of available packages, if possible.
     2   [S]elect  Request which packages you want on your system.
     3.  [I]nstall Install and upgrade wanted packages.
     4.  [C]onfig  Configure any packages that are unconfigured.
     5.  [R]emove  Remove unwanted software.
     6.  [Q]uit    Quit dselect.

You'll be told how to proceed, but in essence dselect will take the
list of packages to be installed (however it arose) and, transparently
to the user, invoke the dpkg command-line tool to actually install them.
Then, it will (again, transparently to the user) invoke "dpkg
--configure -a" to put you through the configuration questions for
all packages that need such.

This is one of numerous reasons to _not_ do an initial kitchen-sink
installation:  dpkg has no logging of screen output, and the output of
dpkg's "configure" mode includes some important facts that you do _not_
want to scroll off the screen before you can note and digest them.

Post-installation, you'll have the opportunity to start the "script"
utility immediately prior to any major package installations, so as to
capture screen output.  You're advised to do so.

After package installation and configuration is complete, dselect will
terminate and log you out.  You're now at the login prompt of a fully
built (but not updated) Debian 2.2 system.

Before I advise you about how to update the system, a few words about
Debian's modular architecture for packages:

"dpkg" always handles the low-level local mechanics of installing, removing,
and configuring packages.  It alone touches the package database files
(which are ASCII) in /var/lib/dpkg.  It knows nothing inherently about
how and where to acquire .deb files from, and gets fed pathspecs by the
user or by other utilities that call it.

"dselect" is one of several package-acquisition and dependency-checking
programs that call dpkg for actual installation.  A few people like it,
and a lot more loathe it.  It, too, is modular, in the sense that it
can invoke external utilities as "methods" for acquiring and
dependency-checking packages before passing their names to dpkg.  Among
the possible "methods" are the utilities apt-get and apt-cdrom, to be
discussed next.

"apt" (Advanced Package Tool) is supposed to eventually supplant dselect
entirely.  It will be a replacement. comprehensive, full-screen
package-handling utility. Unfortunately, it's still alphaware and
entirely too scary, so nobody uses it.  Fortunately, _its_ command-line
"method" utilities, apt-get and apt-cdrom, _are_ finished, and are so
incredibly good that hardly anyone cares that the front-end isn't
finished.  (I suspect that's the problem "apt" is moving so slowly.)

"apt-get" is a tool for acquiring and managing packages from a variety
of local _or_ remote "sources" (this term being defined below) of
various types.  Like dselect, it invokes dpkg for actual installation.
When you tell it to query a remote (or local) package-archive for what
packages and versions it has available, it caches that information in
two places: /var/state/apt/lists/*Packages and /var/lib/dpkg/available .
The former files are one file per package source, sorted alphabetically,
and the latter are merged into a single file.

One of the really cool things about apt-get is that it resolves
dependencies automatically -- and will offer to retrieve packages you
did _not_ specify, if they're required by the ones you did.  That is why
one of the more bearable ways of using dselect is by specifying apt-get
as its "method".

"apt-cdrom" is a special ability to deal intelligently with removable
media.  When it creates available-package indexes for such media, it
also catalogues them by CD-ROM disk ID in a /var/state/apt/cdroms.list
file.  It likewise tracks them via custom package-source specifiers
in /etc/apt/sources.list (discussed below).  The command "apt-cdrom add"
will scan a CD-ROM disk for package-listings and create matching indexes
or it (which apt-get then knows about).  You should do exactly that
for each of your three Debian CDs.

apt-get alone would not suffice for this task, because it thinks all package
listings retrieved from the same URI are the same source (i.e., it has
no ability to deal with removable media).  There is also (very recently)
"apt-zip" for Iomega ZIP cartridges.

There have been several candidate substitutes for the unfinished "apt"
front-end, such as gnome-apt, Corel and Storm Technologies's proprietary
front-ends, console-apt, and aptitude (ncurses-based).  None have really
caught on, and most are defunct, but some may be worth trying.  (I've
already mentioned tasksel, which picks meta-packages dubbed "tasks" or
"profiles".  At exit, tasksel invokes apt-get, which invokes dpkg.)

to review, the package-handling architecture goes like this:

    gnome-apt     ---------
    aptitude              |    Package selection
    Corel Update          |
    Storm Package Manager or
    dselect*              |
    console-apt   ------- |
       |
       | calls
       v
    apt-get          Dependency-resolution,
       |             package-retrieval
       |
       | calls
       v
     dpkg       Package installation & removal,
                configuration

*dselect _can_ use apt-get as a "method" as indicated here, but by default
does not, bypassing that layer and calling dpkg directly.

(Alternatively, skip the first category, package selection, and
just use apt-get et al. directly from the command line.  Many of
us do this by preference.)

apt-get (apt-cdrom, apt-zip)'s behaviour is controlled by the obscure
apt.conf file that nobody bothers to configure, but more importantly
by /etc/apt/sources.list, which is where it's told where packages
are available from.  Here's the rather messy one from linuxmafia.com:

# Use for a local mirror - remove the ftp1 http lines for the bits
# your mirror contains.
# deb file:/your/mirror/here/debian stable main contrib non-free
# See sources.list(5) for more information, especial
# Remember that you can only use http, ftp or file URIs

deb http://security.debian.org/ stable/updates main contrib non-free
#
## ...which is equivalent to:
#
#deb http://security.debian.org/dists/stable/updates/contrib/binary-i386/ ./
#deb http://security.debian.org/dists/stable/updates/main/binary-i386/ ./
#deb http://security.debian.org/dists/stable/updates/non-free/binary-i386/ ./

# What I used before potato went "stable" and I switched to my local mirror:
#deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian frozen main contrib non-free
#
deb file:///usr/local/ftp/debian stable main contrib non-free
deb http://non-us.debian.org/debian-non-US stable non-US/main non-US/contrib non-US/non-free
deb http://forcix.cx/ debian

Notice the "file:" URI.  I'm telling linuxmafia.com to use its own
public ftp directories as a Debian package source -- which is possible
in its case, because linuxmafia.com happens to be an unofficial full
Debian mirror site.

Here's a sources.list file that will work well for you.
(ftp.esat.net is in Ireland, and I found it from the mirror-site
list at http://www.debian.org.  I've tested the following, to ensure that
it's correct.)

deb ftp://ftp.esat.net/mirrors/ftp.debian.org/debian stable main contrib non-free
deb ftp://ftp.esat.net/pub/linux/debian-non-US stable non-US/main non-US/contrib non-US/non-free
deb http://security.debian.org/ stable/updates main contrib non-free

So, try commenting out any existing lines in your sources.list, add the
above ones, save, and do the magic incantation to refresh the
available-files lists:

   apt-get update

That will refresh /var/state/apt/lists/*Packages and
/var/lib/dpkg/available, with the current package-descriptions from all
sources listed in sources.list.

The syntax requirements for sources.list are a bit peculiar.  The best
write-up I've seen, so far, is at
http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node=sources.list

Here's a possibly even better one:
http://www.ibiblio.org/gferg/ldp/giles/repository/repository-2.html

It's a good idea to run "apt-get update" before using apt-get or other
package-retrieval tools.  If you don't, you may get 404 errors, because
you're trying to get things listed in the local package lists, but no
longer extant at the remote sources (usually because there's a later
version there, instead).

The following incantation updates all your installed packages to current
available versions.  You should run it on your machine, _especially_
because of that third "source" I gave you, which is the
early-availability security-updates source in the USA:

   apt-get -u dist-upgrade

You can use the form "apt-get install [packagename1] [packagename2" to
install the cited packages plus everything required to meet their
dependencies.  E.g., here's what I get on linuxmafia.com (a server with
no X packages whatsoever), when I tell apt-get that I want to install
the gnome-games package:

uncle-enzo:/etc/apt# apt-get install gnome-games
Reading Package Lists... Done
Building Dependency Tree... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
  esound esound-common gdk-imlib1 gnome-bin gnome-card-games gnome-core
  gnome-games-locale gnome-gataxx gnome-glines gnome-gnibbles gnome-gnobots2
  gnome-gnometris gnome-gnomine gnome-gnotravex gnome-gtali gnome-gturing
  gnome-iagno gnome-libs-data gnome-mahjongg gnome-same-gnome gnome-stones
  gnome-xbill imlib-base libart2 libaudiofile0 libesd0 libgnome32
  libgnomesupport0 libgnomeui32 libgnorba27 libgnorbagtk0 libgtk1.2 libguile6
  liborbit0 libtiff3g libungif3g
The following NEW packages will be installed:
  esound esound-common gdk-imlib1 gnome-bin gnome-card-games gnome-core
  gnome-games gnome-games-locale gnome-gataxx gnome-glines gnome-gnibbles
  gnome-gnobots2 gnome-gnometris gnome-gnomine gnome-gnotravex gnome-gtali
  gnome-gturing gnome-iagno gnome-libs-data gnome-mahjongg gnome-same-gnome
  gnome-stones gnome-xbill imlib-base libart2 libaudiofile0 libesd0 libgnome32
  libgnomesupport0 libgnomeui32 libgnorba27 libgnorbagtk0 libgtk1.2 libguile6
  liborbit0 libtiff3g libungif3g
0 packages upgraded, 37 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 0B/7634kB of archives. After unpacking 15.6MB will be used.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n] n
Abort.
uncle-enzo:/etc/apt#

apt-get is _almost_ but not quite good enough to figure out that I
need all of X, too.  The point I'm trying to drive towards is that you
can take a _very_ minimal Debian system, and build it up to a
full-featured but compact system using no more than about a dozen or so
"apt-get install" commands.

The above explanations are a partial updating of my modestly famous
"Debian Tips" document, at http://linuxmafia.com/debian/tips .
I still recommend you read the latter carefully, but bear in mind that
it was current as of Debian 2.1 "slink", and badly needs updating.

[e-mail ends]




The apt-spy and netselect-apt utilities will both find the fastest
Debian mirror (package-source) and then constructing
/etc/apt/sources.list entries to match, but apt-spy uses the better
algorithm of the two.  (netselect-apt measures only latency, not
throughput.)  Standard, manual method of picking a Debian mirror:
apt-setup utility.




potato/2.2 unofficial installation-floppy images with ReiserFS support
(John H. Robinson, IV):
http://chao.ucsd.edu/debian/boot-floppies/




Jules Bean's FAQ about the "testing" branch, including heuristics for
package acceptance:
http://linuxmafia.com/debian/testingfaq.html


A good example /etc/apt/sources.list file for those running the
"testing" branch is as follows:

deb http://security.debian.org testing/updates main contrib non-free
deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian/ testing main non-free contrib
deb http://non-us.debian.org/debian-non-US testing/non-US main contrib non-free

The second and third are standard entries using the main Debian mirrors.
You may have faster mirrors locally:  Use "netselect" to find the
fastest one.

The first line gives early access to security-update packages from the
Debian Security Team -- generally a very good idea.  There's a drawback:
Unlike in the "testing" branch proper, the security archive sometimes
releases one package needing a security update without simultaneously
updating a package that depends on it.  E.g., the security collection
will update Mozilla to a version that breaks Galeon (which will thus be
removed) or vice-versa.  If this happens, you can inevitably find the
needed new version for the removed package in
ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/pool/ , retrieve it, and install it manually
("dpkg -i foo", where package foo's new version hasn't yet cleared from
unstable into testing).  Mozilla/Galeon is the only problem case I've
seen, but there may be others.


Debian Quick Reference (about 50 pp.) -- excellent general introduction:
http://qref.sourceforge.net/quick/


Main Debian FAQ is here:
http://www.debian.org/doc/FAQ/


Upgrading from Corel Linux OS to Debian:

The discontinued, Debian 2.1/Slink-based Corel Linux OS (CLOS) distribution
included some carelessly incompatible Qt-based packages, including but
not limited to their variant form of KDE 1.1.  CLOS can be upgraded to
current Debian via apt-get, but only after removing the Corel-written
packages.

  # dpkg -l | grep corel

Using the package names thus listed, as the root user, remove them using
apt-get:

  # apt-get remove pkg1 pkg2...

Edit /etc/apt/sources.list to comment out (using "#") the Corel package
sources, and add standard Debian sources, such as (using the "stable"
development branch):

deb http://security.debian.org stable/updates main contrib non-free
deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian/ stable main non-free contrib
deb http://non-us.debian.org/debian-non-US stable/non-US main contrib non-free

Get lists of available packages:

  # apt-get update

Upgrade crucial packages first:

  # apt-get install perl libc6 dpkg apt apt-utils debconf

Now, upgrade the rest of the system:

  # apt-get dist-upgrade

I would also recommend, for all but the most mission-critical
server-role machines, going further and upgrading from Debian-stable
to Debian-testing:  Re-edit the sources.list lines to substitute
"testing" for "stable" on all three lines.  Then, repeat all the
steps listed following those lines, to upgrade from stable to testing.

When done with the upgrades, you can install genuine, current KDE
packages by either installing the big "kde" metapackage:

  # apt-get install kde

...or installing individual KDE packages the same way, by name.





MIXING DEBIAN RELEASES
----------------------

Customising /etc/apt/preferences can let you (among other things)
specify which packages are to be drawn from a specify development branch
using the new (2002-04) concept of "pinning" packages, e.g. getting the
"unstable" branch's version of Mozilla when you're otherwise on the
"testing" branch.  See "man 5 apt_preferences".  If you have a recent
version of apt, and you put the following lines into
/etc/apt/preferences, it will get unstable packages when there is no
testing version.

--- begin cut here ---
Package: *
Pin: release a=unstable
Pin-Priority: 50
--- end cut here ---

You'll need a line in /etc/apt/sources.list for "unstable", of course:
deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian unstable main contrib non-free

Pinning the priority of unstable to 50 makes it so that these packages
are never automatically selected for upgrade.   However, when you do
specify packages from that source, dependencies are handled correctly.



Robert McQueen <[e-mail]> comments:

Along with the more powerful (and complicated) release-pinning method
featured in a previous release of DWN, apt in woody and sid also
supports a simpler method of achieving the same thing, with the poorly
documented "APT::Default-Release" configuration option.  To do this, add
a line such as:

     APT::Default-Release "testing";

to /etc/apt/apt.conf, and add both testing and unstable lines to
/etc/apt/sources.list.  Then when you upgrade, dist-upgrade, or install,
apt will only consider packages from testing by default.  If you then use
a command like:

     apt-get install <package>/unstable

it will install the package version found in unstable, as well as any
libraries and other dependencies from unstable that are required to
install it.



Jens Hoffrichter <[e-mail]> adds:

This can be done even more comfortably by using apt-get's -t switch,
which will even satisfy dependencies to unstable, which using
packagename/unstable does not do.

The correct (and frequently used by myself ;)) ) syntax would be:

apt-get -t unstable install <package>

Alternatively, an explicit version can be located and installed using
"=" syntax:

apt-get install sox=12.17.4-4



Tutorial about "pinning":
http://jaqque.sbih.org/kplug/apt-pinning.html



Christoph Martin <[e-mail]> adds:

apt-show-versions is a script which eases maintenance of mixed
stable/testing or testing/unstable systems. While beeing able to
update the packages from your *main* distribution with apt-get upgrade
it is quite difficult to do the same for the *not-main*
packages. While you can use the pinning feature of apt if these are
only a few it is quite annoying to put all the package names in
apt/preferences which should be pinned. Like in one of my installation
where I have 247 packages from stable and 229 from testing.

Try

  apt-show-versions | fgrep /testing | wc

to see how many packages you have from testing or

  apt-show-versions -u

to see a list of packages which are upgradeable either to stable or
testing or unstable or

  apt-get install `apt-show-versions -u -b | fgrep unstable`

to upgrade all unstable packages to their newest versions.




Especially on systems that have packages from multiple development
branches, the apt-show-versions tool may be useful:  It shows which
versions of a package are available from each known package source, and
optionally which versions are installed.




Peter Jay Salzman points out an elegant way to determine when a package
on one's system was last upgraded:

Every package upgrade needs to update the changelog file.  simply look
at the modification date for /usr/share/doc/<pkg>/changelog.Debian.gz.




Note that although Debian's apt-get mechanism makes it easy and reliable
to upgrade to a later branch (stable to testing, testing to unstable,
slink to woody, woody to sarge), downgrading can also be done with some
greater degree of difficulty, as described here:
http://www.debianplanet.org/node.php?id=880




RECOVERING FROM LOST FILESYSTEMS:
---------------------------------

1.  I lost /var !

Because any installed Debian package must create a subdirectory under
/usr/share/doc, this suggests a handy way to accurately rebuild the
/var/lib/dpkg/status installed-packages database.  Note that this method
re-fetches and reinstalls all packages:  I know of no way to avoid that
drawback:

#!/bin/sh
# Recovering a Debian system without any backup of /var/lib/dpkg.
# ref: http://www.linuxworld.com/2003/0113.petreley.html

# ----------------------------------------------------------------------
# (C) 2003, Karsten M. Self [e-mail]
# (C) 2003, Osamu Aoki [e-mail] (fixup)
#
# This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
# it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
# the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
# (at your option) any later version.
#
# This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
# but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
# MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
# GNU General Public License for more details.
#
# You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
# along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
# Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307
# USA
# ----------------------------------------------------------------------
# Changes:
#
# KMself: Sun Dec  7 15:40:44 PST 2003
#   Removed bashisms (again).
#   Added /var//cache/apt/archives/partial
# ----------------------------------------------------------------------

export PATH=/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin

# Let's be verbose....
set -v

# Test existence of any subdirs in /var. If they exist, exit, otherwise
# risk destroying an active system. If they don't exist, the remainder
# of this script is safe.

function create_new_dir () {
    if [ ! -f $1 && ! -d $1 ]
    then mkdir $1
    else
    echo "$1 exists, aborting" 1>&2
    exit 1
    fi
}

for d in \
    /var/log
    /var/cache/debconf \
    /var/cache/apt/archives \
    /var/cache/apt/archives/partial \
    /var/lib/dpkg/info \
    /var/lib/dpkg/parts \
    /var/lib/dpkg/alternatives \
    /var/lib/dpkg/methods \
    /var/lib/dpkg/updates
do
    create_new_dir $d
done

# Create a rudimentary status file
cat <<-EOF > /var/lib/dpkg/status
    Package: libc6
    Status: install ok installed
    Version: 2.3.1-9
    EOF

# Update package cache
apt-get update
apt-get dist-upgrade

# Register as installed crucial packages.
dpkg --clear-avail
apt-get update
apt-get dist-upgrade
cd /var/cache/apt/archives
dpkg -i libncurses*
dpkg -i perl-base*
dpkg -i libstdc++*
dpkg -i dselect*
dpkg -i dpkg*

# Reinstall libc to register it.
apt-get install --reinstall libc6

# Reinstall base packages.
apt-get dist-upgrade

# Generate list of installed packages to re-register previously
# installed packages as installed, using /usr/share/doc as a fallback
# package registry.  ref: dpkg -l $( ls /usr/share/doc | grep -v [A-Z] )
# >/dev/null

ls /usr/share/doc |
    grep -v [A-Z] |
    grep -v '^texmf$' |
    grep -v '^debian$' |
    awk '{print $1 " install"}' |
    dpkg --set-selections

# Re-register everything.
apt-get dist-upgrade

# At this point, you should be (mostly) cooking on gas.

# EOF


2.  I lost /usr !

While likewise painful, this situation is easier to cure:  Working from
maintenance boot media or single-user mode, make a safety copy of
/var/lib/dpkg/status and other crucial files/trees (e.g., /etc), then
leverage the existence of an accurate /var/lib/dpkg/status database to
generate a one-per-line list of packages to install, parse those lines
to isolate just the package names, and then feed those names to "apt-get
--reinstall install":

  COLUMNS=300 dpkg -l | awk '/^i/ {print $2}' | xargs apt-get --reinstall install

The "COLUMNS=300" environment-modification is to compensate for long
package names, and accomodates names up to 70 characters.  E.g., if you
ever just want a list of installed packages without truncation, do:

COLUMNS=150 dpkg -l 'kernel-*' | awk '$1 ~ /ii/ { print $0 }'




WOODY/3.0 INSTALLATION OPTIONS:
-------------------------------

Current woody/3.0 floppy-images for i386 using 2.4 kernel (includes ext3):
http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/dists/woody/main/disks-i386/current/images-1.44/bf2.4/

woody/3.0 unofficial "netinst" images (about 30 MB):
http://people.debian.org/~ieure/netinst/

netinst includes an "alternate boot image" named bf2.4 to use a 2.4
kernel (and ext3 support), but your motherboard must support the El
Torito "Alternate Boot Image" spec for this to work.  If the netinst CD
boots directly to the syslinux screen, without showing a menu of
boot-image choices, then your motherboard lacks this support.  The
woody/3.0 netinst ISO images provide installation kernels, drivers,
partitioning utilities, and the debootstrap program, which must be able
to retrieve the Debian Base and subsequent packages from the network.


woody/3.0 unofficial full CD images

o  i386 (8 discs):
http://www.debian.org/CD/http-ftp/#testing  (list of mirror sites)
ftp://ftp.fsn.hu/pub/CDROM-Images/debian-unofficial/woody/

o  other architectures (7 discs):
http://cdimage-unofficial.debian.net/ (information pages)

woody/3.0 unofficial rescue & installation CD i386 images with 2.4.17
kernel and ReiserFS (Timo Benk):
http://rescuecd.sourceforge.net/

Experimental Debian-Installer images for unstable branch, i386 and PowerPC:
http://ftp.egr.msu.edu/debian/dists/unstable/main/

woody/3.0 install floppy images with 2.4.x kernels, and support for XFS
and ReiserFS filesystems, software RAID, and LVM (Ionut Georgescu):
http://www.physik.tu-cottbus.de/~george/

woody/3.0 install floppy and netinst-CD images with 2.4.x kernels and
support for XFS and JFS filesystems (Angelo Ovidi):
http://xfdeb.sourceforge.net/

woody/3.0 install floppy images with 2.4.x kernels and support for XFS
filesystems, software RAID, and LVM (Eduard Bloch):
http://people.debian.org/~blade/XFS-Install/

(After installing onto XFS, you may be best advised to replace your XFS
driver and support code from CVS checkout, according to this article:
http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-fs10.html)


Utilities to manage IBM's JFS filesystem are available in woody/3.0 or
sid/unstable, as package "jfsutils".  Documentation on JFS is available here:
http://oss.software.ibm.com/jfs/

This technique that I used for migrating a system to XFS before there
were such things as XFS-supporting Debian installation floppies could be
used as a general guide with any target filesystem type, in a pinch:
http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/linux-info/xfs-conversion


Progeny Graphical Installer can be used to do graphical (X11) or console
installs of woody/3.0 (on i386 and ia64) :  http://hackers.progeny.com/pgi/
Woody/3.0 i386 installation ISO based on PGI is here:
http://archive.progeny.com/progeny/pgi/

To clarify, PGI can be used, among other things, to construct
installable woody/3.0 CD images whose installer program is PGI.
Progeny 1.0 itself used PGI, and is a perfectly fine way to install
Debian woody/3.0 for i386:
ftp://ftp.progeny.com/progeny/debian/iso/Progeny1.0/
(But don't forget to re-point /etc/apt/sources.list at Debian proper,
since the Progeny Debian-variant distribution is dormant.)


Installing Debian from within a chroot jail on an already-running Linux
system: http://kmself.home.netcom.com/Linux/FAQs/DebianChrootInstall.html


Notes on Debian installation for PPC:
http://fungus.ucdavis.edu/~dylan/


FAI (Fully Automated Install) is a tool for stamping out Debian
machines, e.g., for a cluster:
http://www.informatik.uni-koeln.de/fai/

The Autoinstall tool creates floppy images that can install Debian
systems without any user interaction:
http://packages.debian.org/unstable/admin/autoinstall-i386.html



The first time you install a 2.4.x kernel on a Debian system that has
never had one before, you'll see the following sort of caution:

   You are attempting to install an initrd kernel image (version 2.4.19-686)
   This will not work unless you have configured your boot loader to use
   initrd. (An initrd image is a kernel image that expects to use an
   INITial Ram Disk to mount a minimal root file system into RAM and use
   that for booting).
   As a reminder, in order to configure lilo, you need to
   add an 'initrd=/initrd.img' to the image=/vmlinuz
   stanza of your /etc/lilo.conf
   I repeat, You need to configure your boot loader. If you have already done
   so, and you wish to get rid of this message, please put
     `do_initrd = Yes'
   in /etc/kernel-img.conf. Note that this is optional, but if you do not,
   you'll continue to see this message whenever you install a kernel
   image using initrd.
   Do you want to stop now? [Y/n]

What this means is that key hardware drivers are in an initial RAMdisk
that lilo must be made aware that it must provide to the booting kernel,
otherwise booting will not succeed.  You can do this _before_ installing
such a kernel, if you like.  E.g., modify the "vmlinuz" stanza near the
bottom of /etc/lilo.conf from:

   image=/boot/vmlinuz
           label=linux
           read-only

to

   image=/boot/vmlinuz
           label=linux
           initrd=/initrd.img
           read-only

After installing the kernel, if you want to ensure that everything is
OK, then do "/sbin/lilo -v" as the root user, before rebooting.  If
there are no complaints about inability to find files referenced in
lilo.conf, you should be safe to reboot.



# apt-cache search <search term>

lists you all available packages that fit somehow the search term
(search term can be the program name, parts of that name, a description ...)

If you want more info on a package:

# apt-cache show <package name>

(auto-apt and apt-file are also useful for finding what package provides
a given file.)

after that, you only need to install the usual way:

# apt-get install <package name>



dpkg-reconfigure packagename   will re-do the package's configuration
step.



To put a package on hold (without having to use dselect):
# echo "packagename hold" | dpkg --set-selections


Want to try your hand at making .deb archives from plain source
tarballs?  Install the debhelper package.  It has tools to guide you
through the process.



The deborphan utility returns a list of libs on your system that are no
longer being used by any packages.   The debfoster utility is a somewhat
more systematic and comprehensive utility, that identifies and removes
packages no longer needed.



Need to reconfigure your system?  Run "base-config".  This re-runs the
latter part of the installer program.



CPAN access in Debian:  Use the dh-make-perl utility:
Go to CPAN and figure out what you want.  Then, as root, do:
# "dh-make-perl --cpan <Module> --build --install"



Writing out your current installed packages:

     # dpkg --get-selections >selections.txt

And get their current versions:

     # COLUMNS=150 dpkg -l > packages.txt

To reconstruct the system, install the Debian Base System, then:

     # dpkg --set-selections <selections.txt
     # apt-get -u dist-upgrade

Relevant to that, quoting from a Slashdot post:

> Then I figured out the painless way to install debian: go through the
> installation and install the bare minimum that you absolutely need (this
> means no X!). Then once you've got that running, which is quick and
> easy, use apt for everything else you use. This has the side benefit
> that there's no wasted space on your drive.

Yes! That is the way to do it. dselect is not required for anything.
Bypass it (in favor of apt) and your life will be much easier. If you're
a current Debian user, it's even better: just run "dpkg --get-selections
| awk '{ print $1 }' >package.list" to save your current list of
packages. Then on the new system, "apt-get install $(cat package.list)"
to have [most] of your previous software installed automatically. (There
will be some hangups. Use the "--no-act" option and edit your package
list accordingly. This is no big deal.)




Or just:
dpkg -get-selections > file; then later
dpkg --set-selections < file && apt-get dselect-upgrade



If you're going to build software from source code, make sure you
install the "build-essential" package.

Then:

     # apt-get build-dep package

...will ensure that you've satisfied the package's build dependencies.

     # apt-get source package

...retrieve the package's source tree, and unpacks it into the current
directory.

cd into the tree, and make any desired source changes.  The ./debian
directory contains package metadata / build instructions.  While in the
source tree, executing

     # dpkg-buildpackage

...compiles the package, and places a .deb file in the parent directory,
which you can then install with dkpg -i (using fake root or logged in
as the root user).

E.g.,

     # dpkg-buildpackage -us -uc
     ("-us" means unsigned source.  "-uc" means unsigned changes.)

(Alternatively, cd into the source directory, and do "debian/rules
binary" using fakeroot or logged in as the root user.)


The apt-build utility can help this process:

Description: Frontend to apt to build, optimize and install packages
  This is an apt-get front-end for compiling software optimized
  for your architecture by creating a local repository with built packages.
  It can manage system upgrade too.


The pentium-builder package will let you set system-wide options so that
all compiles from source will be optimised for your CPU architecture.
(Despite the name, it can optimise for Athlon, etc.)


The apt-src package is a much cleaner, newer, and more comprehensive
alternative to dpkg-buildpackage, "for downloading, installing,
upgrading, and tracking Debian source packages".  The manpage gives
some good examples of usage:

      To install the source to pine to /usr/src, build it, and install the
       resulting debs:

         apt-src install --location=/usr/src -i pine

       To track changes to said installed pine source package, and install
       debs whenever a new version comes out:

         apt-src install -i pine

       To install a local copy of package foo, which you are going to apply a
       local patch to:

         apt-src install foo
         cd foo-version
         patch <~/my-foo-patch
         apt-src build --installdebs foo

       To upgrade your local copy of foo, bringing your patch forward, and
       building and installing new debs:

         apt-src install -i foo

       To import the source tree in /usr/src/linux, which you unpacked from a
       ftp.kernel.org tarball (or from the kernel-source package) into
       apt-src, so it knows about it:

         apt-src import kernel --location=/usr/src/linux --version=2.4.18

       [...]

Quoting author Joey Hess:

"'apt-src install' source gives you a source-version tree in the [current
directory].  Modify to suit, and 'apt-src build' source. If a new version
comes along, 'apt-src upgrade' source to upgrade the tree, patching your
local changes forward.  Pass in --installdebs to any of these commands
to make it build and install a .deb."



An example of building from source using OpenLDAP (using debuild instead
of dpkg-buildpackage, and pointing out that you can make local changes
to the Debianised source package immediately prior to building the
binary package):

# apt-get source slapd
...
# cd openldap2-2.1.23
...modify debian/rules, debian/changlog, source code...
# debuild -uc -us -rfakeroot
# dpkg --install ../slapd_2.1.23-blah.deb





To compile kernels and auto-generate .deb packages, install and use the
kernel-package package (which provides the make-kpkg utility).

     $ cd /directory/where/you/unpacked/a/kernel/tarball
     $ make config | make menuconfig | make xconfig | make oldconfig
     $ make-kpkg clean
     $ make-kpkg --initrd --revision=custom.1.0 kernel_image
     # (as root, or using fakeroot)  dpkg -i ../kernel-image-X.XXX_1.0_.deb

Kirk Strauser has a more-detailed explanation here:
http://subwiki.honeypot.net/cgi-bin/view/Main/DebianKernelBuilding



Details of how to keep /usr mounted read-only and still let apt work
correctly without manual intervention:
http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2001/debian-devel-200111/msg00212.html




Debian-NetBSD is a port of the Debian architecture to the NetBSD kernel:
http://www.debian.org/ports/netbsd/
http://debian-bsd.sourceforge.net/


Debian tools for OpenBSD:
http://lists.debian.org/debian-devel/2002/debian-devel-200204/msg01114.html
http://non-us.debian.org/~andreas/obsd/


Debian GNU/FreeBSD:
http://lists.debian.org/debian-bsd/2002/debian-bsd-200204/msg00021.html


# KDE v. 3.1 .deb packages for i386 will probably gradually appear in
# official package maintainer's (Chris "calc" Cheney's) pre-release collection.
deb http://people.debian.org/~ccheney/kde-3.1.1-1/ ./


"WhizNDR"(of the #debian-kde IRC channel on irc.openprojects.net) at
Genius Systems offers what appears to be an almost complete (no KOffice)
KDE3 set for i386 and PPC, here:
http://kde3.geniussystems.net/
Instructions are here:
http://calc.cx/kde.txt
Lists of unofficial apt sources:
http://mypage.bluewin.ch/kde3-debian/
http://www.doc.ic.ac.uk/~pc99/debian/kde3.html

KOffice 3.x and a number of other KDE3 apps are available in unofficial
packages (Ben Burton's) for i386 only, here:
http://people.debian.org/~bab/kde3/

Daniel Stone will eventually offer his here:
ftp://ftp.cs.umn.edu/pub/debian-misc/daniels/

KDE 3.1 packages from the KDE Project for i386 and PPC are here:
deb http://download.us.kde.org/pub/kde/stable/latest/Debian/ stable main

KDE 3.1 packages compiled with the old gcc 2.95 (the "Karolina" rendition), i386
deb http://wh9.tu-dresden.de/kde3/karolina ./

KDE 3.1 packages compiled with the old gcc 2.95 (the "Karolina" rendition), PPC
deb http://bulmalug.net/~gallir/debian/kde31-powerpc/ ./

KDE 3.1 RC5 for i386:
deb http://shakti.ath.cx/debian/kde3.1 ./

KDE 3.1 for i386, PPC:
deb http://ktown.kde.org/~nolden/kde stable main



XFree86 4.2.x preliminary .deb packages are available here (Branden Robinson
and others):
http://people.debian.org/~branden/
http://people.debian.org/~branden/sid/
http://people.brainfood.com/~doogie/x4.2/mirror
deb http://people.debian.org/~blade/woody/i386/ ./

XFree 4.2 packages for PPC and i386 with DRI support:
deb http://people.debian.org/~daenzer/dri-trunk/ ./
deb http://people.debian.org/~daenzer/dri-mach64/ ./

XFree86 4.2.1:
deb http://people.fsn.hu/~pasztor/debian woody xfree
deb http://people.debian.org/~frankie/debian woody/x421/

XFree86 4.2.99.3 packages for i386:
deb http://people.debian.org/~acid unstable xfree86

XFree86 4.3 for i386, PPC:
deb http://xf86-debs.mirror.positive-internet.com/current/sid/$(ARCH) ./

XFree86 4.3 for i386:
deb http://people.debian.org/~mmagallo/packages/xfree86/i386/ ./
(Maintainer Daniel Stone pleads with people to not use these packages
republished by Marcelo Magallon, and use the Experimental branch
packages instead, if they need early access to 4.3.)

XFree86 4.3.0-0pre1v4 ("experimental" branch) for all architectures:
deb http://http.us.debian.org/debian/project/experimental main
...and this in /etc/apt/preferences:
  Package: *
  Pin: release a=experimental
  Priority: 1001
(Warning:  This may pull in other packages from the "experimental"
branch, which might have adverse consequences.)

Sane, XSane scanner packages for i386 and hppa:
deb http://people.debian.org/~aurel32/SANE stable main



OpenOffice.org .deb packages (unofficial) are here:
http://www.linux-debian.de/openoffice/
Use one of these /etc/apt/sources.list lines:
   deb ftp://ftp.vpn-junkies.de/openoffice unstable main contrib
   deb http://www.mx1.ru/~chris/openoffice unstable main contrib
   deb http://apt-proxy.sourceforge.net/openoffice unstable main contrib
Matching source packages are here:
   deb-src ftp://ftp.vpn-junkies.de/openoffice unstable main contrib
   deb-src http://www.mx1.ru/~chris/openoffice unstable main contrib
   deb-src http://apt-proxy.sourceforge.net/openoffice unstable main contrib
The package name is "openoffice.org", not "openoffice".
Note also that the package maintainer reorganises the directory tree
occasionally, and sometimes omits the Packages[.gz] file that makes
a directory apt-gettable.   (But you can still retrieve the directory's
.deb files manually and "dpkg -i" install them.)   You'll need an
openoffice.org .deb file and a compatible libstlport4.5 .deb file.
Mini-HOWTO is here:
http://lists.debian.org/debian-openoffice/2001/debian-openoffice-200110/msg00014.html
General instructions are here:
http://www.linux-debian.de/openoffice/install_build_howto.html

OpenOffice.org, WineX-light, WINE, fonts, Windows CODECs, Window Maker
themes, Nvidia drivers/kernels, BitTorrent, ffmpeg, nuppel video tools,
lmsensors, nvrec, xv, YEPP:
deb http://www.esat.kuleuven.ac.be/~mleeman/debian unstable/


PureFTPd for i386:
deb http://pureftpd.sourceforge.net/debian/woody/ ./

pine, pico, pilot, & pine-tech-notes for i386:
deb http://src.braincells.com/debian sid/

pine, pico, pilot, & pine-tech-notes, flashplayer-mozilla,
flashplugin-nonfree, openoffice.org for i386:
deb http://kambing.vlsm.org/DLL/debian-local/dists/stable/lokal/binary-i386/

Opera Web browser:
deb http://deb.opera.com/opera stable non-free
deb http://deb.opera.com/opera testing non-free
deb http://deb.opera.com/opera unstable non-free
deb http://deb.opera.com/opera-beta stable non-free
deb http://deb.opera.com/opera-beta testing non-free
deb http://deb.opera.com/opera-beta unstable non-free

pine, pico, pilot, & pine-tech-notes
deb http://src.braincells.com/debian woody/


SpamAssassin for i386:
deb http://people.debian.org/~duncf/debian/ unstable main




Early-release Mozilla and Nautilus packages are sometimes offered by the
package-maintainer ("Kitame") here:  http://people.debian.org/~kitame/mozilla/


Mozilla 1.1 "Phoenix" lightweight browser unofficial packages are here:
deb http://lesbos.esat.kuleuven.ac.be/~mleeman/debian unstable/
  or
deb http://people.debian.org/~otavio woody mozilla
  or
deb http://people.debian.org/~eric/debian/i386 ./

Mozilla 1.1 and Galeon backport:
deb http://people.fsn.hu/~pasztor/debian woody mozilla

Mozilla 1.2.1 for i386:
deb http://people.debian.org/~frankie/debian/woody/kalem/ ./

Mozilla 1.3 backport to woody
deb http://debian.relativ.org/ ./




If you get "Dynamic MMap ran out of room", add this to
/etc/apt/apt.conf:  "APT::Cache-Limit 10000000;"



Mplayer and libaviplay-codecs unofficial packages here:
http://mplayer.nmeos.net/
http://www.mplayer.fr.st/
http://marillat.free.fr
deb http://marillat.free.fr/ unstable main

Xine and vlc-css unofficial packages for 3.0/woody i386 (and source) are here:
http://www.samfundet.no/~tfheen/debian/dists/woody/css/

divx4linux, gpg-idea, lame, transcode, xv, win32-codecs, gpsdrive
deb ftp://ftp.mowgli.ch/pub/debian sid unofficial
deb ftp://ftp.mowgli.ch/pub/debian sarge unofficial

Macromedia Flash Player 6 for x86 Linux (includes support for
Flash-format Sorenson video):
http://sluglug.ucsc.edu/macromedia/site_ucsc.html
http://ruslug.rutgers.edu/macromedia/site_ru.html
http://macromedia.mplug.org/site_uh.html

flashplayer-mozilla, acroread-plugin, acroread, xmms plugins, avidemux,
etc. for i386, sparc, hppa:
deb http://jeroen.coekaerts.be/debian/ unstable main contrib non-free


Filmgimp for i386:
deb http://www.cse.unsw.edu.au/~alau/debian/ ./

Cinelarra (formerly broadcast2000) for i386, PPC:
deb http://userpages.umbc.edu/~fu1/debian unstable main

openh323 tools, Sylpheed-claws, ohphone, openmcu for i386:
deb http://tranq.dorms.spbu.ru/debian-local ./



Jamie Strandboge's unofficial GNOME2.2 backport to i386 are here:
deb http://ftp.acc.umu.se/mirror/mirrors.evilgeniuses.org.uk/debian/backports/woody/gnome2.2/ ./
deb http://mirror.raw.no/gnome2.2/ ./

Instructions for building GNOME 2.2 on Debian:
http://www.linuxcompatible.org/story.php?id=17145

Gustavo Noronha Silva's unofficial GNOME2 packages for i386 are here:
deb http://gluck.debian.org/~kov/debian woody gnome2
(Above is not apt-gettable for lack of a Packages[.gz] file, 2003-01-04.)
deb http://people.debian.org/~kov/debian woody gnome2

Ross Burton's way of installing GNOME2:
http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/burtonini/computing/gnome2-build.html

GNOME2 sylpheed, pan, gthumb, gftp package for i386:
deb http://www.tu-harburg.de/~vkv/debian ./



WINE for i386:
deb http://people.debian.org/~andreas/debian wine main


# Blackdown Java J2r1.3
deb ftp://ftp.tux.org/pub/java/debian testing non-free
deb ftp://ftp.tux.org/pub/java/debian unstable non-free

# Blackdown Java j2re1.4, j2sdk1.4, j2re1.3, j2sdk1.3, jre1.1, jdk1.1.
# Packaged for i386, PPC, and SPARC.
deb ftp://metalab.unc.edu/pub/linux/devel/lang/java/blackdown.org/debian unstable main non-free

# Blackdown Java j2r1.4.1
deb http://jopa.studentenweb.org/debian ./


Debian Java FAQ:
http://www.au.debian.org/doc/manuals/debian-java-faq/




To find all packages that depend on a given package:
Read the "Reverse Depends" output from "apt-cache showpkg <packagename>".




APT-GET TROUBLESHOOTING
-----------------------

     # apt-get upgrade -f         # continue upgrade even after error
         or
     # apt-get dist-upgrade -f    # continue dist-upgrade even after error

...will fix many problems by running apt-get in "fix" mode.

To configure all not-yet-configured packages:

      # dpkg --configure -a

To RE-configure all installed packages

      # dpkg-reconfigure --all  # reconfigure all packages

To RE-configure specific installed packages:

      # dpkg-reconfigure --priority=medium package [...]

This will often fix a problematic dependency:

       # apt-get install -f package # override broken dependencies

If apt-get or dpkg is choking on something concerning an already
installed package (e.g., the new package you want to install would
replace a file the existing package has already provided), sometimes
the easiest fix is to edit the installed-packages database,
/var/lib/dpkg/status , directly.  (It's an ASCII file.)

Make a safety copy of the file, then open /var/lib/dpkg/status in a text
editor.  Search forward to find the paragraph concerning the package,
which will begine with the line "Package: packagename".  Delete all
lines of the section concerning that specific package, and save.  Now,
resume package operations.



This is an example of an apt-get error caused by a file conflict, and
how to resolve it:

   Unpacking replacement kdebase-libs ...
   dpkg: error processing
   /var/cache/apt/archives/kdebase-libs_4%3a2.2.2-14_i386.deb (--unpack):
    trying to overwrite `/usr/share/applnk/Settings/Sound/arts.desktop',
   which is also in package kdebase
   dpkg-deb: subprocess paste killed by signal (Broken pipe)
   Errors were encountered while processing:
    /var/cache/apt/archives/kdebase-libs_4%3a2.2.2-14_i386.deb
   E: Sub-process /usr/bin/dpkg returned an error code (1)

This happens because somebody made a bonehead packaging error, or a
graceless transition of including a file in one package rather than the
other.  The fix is as follows:

(1) Note down the names of the two packages that are both trying to
claim ownership of the same file.  In this case, package kdebase-libs
is trying to update a file previously installed by package kdebase.

(2) Stop and think for a moment about what's probably happening:  A
reasonable guess is that "arts.desktop" has simply been moved to
kdebase-libs, and your package database is being mulish because it
doesn't know this is OK.

(3) Do a "--force-overwrite" install of the new package, thus:

   # dpkg -i --force-overwrite kdebase-libs_4%3a2.2.2-14_i386.deb

(4) Recall and resubmit your apt-get command that choked, now that
there's no remaining conflict.


On very rare occasions, apt-get might refuse to do anything because
some particular named package is in some broken state it can't deal with.
[Need an example error message, but don't have one yet.]

In such cases, you can make good use of the fact that Debian uses a plain
ASCII file (/var/lib/dpkg/status) for its package database, to excise
the problem directly:  Make a backup copy of /var/lib/dpkg/status,
first.  (I've never needed this, but it seems such an easy precaution,
why not?)  Now, open /var/lib/dpkg/status in your favourite text editor.
Search for "Package: <packagename>", which will bring up a series of
non-blank lines comprising the package's status entry.  Remove
everything up to the first blank line.  Save.

Now, the package's files, themselves, are still installed, but the
Debian package records have selective amnesia:  The system believes that
package to be not installed.  Therefore, apt-get will cease stumbling on
the defective package entry:  You can now do other apt-get operations,
and reinstall the problem package (overwriting its installed files) at
any future occasion, at your leisure.


If you wish to fix errors in a package's installation scripts, they're
in /var/lib/dpkg/info as packagename.postinst, packagename.preinst,
packagename.prerm, and/or packagename.postrm.  Debug the error, edit the
script, and then re-run dpkg -i packagename.  (This approach is greatly
to be preferred over using --force-something options or editing the
package database directly.)




Package Signing:

In woody/3.0 or later, install debsig-verify, debsigs, and debian-keyring.
Thereafter, dpkg (1.9.21 or later) checks if debsig-verify is installed
and if so checks the signatures of packages you want to install. If a
package's signature is invalid, the package won't get installed.

See this thread:
http://lists.debian.org/debian-security/2002/debian-security-200207/msg00130.html

Optionally, one can use Fruhwirth Clemens's secpack to auto-apply
security updates:  http://therapy.endorphin.org/secpack/
The issue of _meaningful_ package signing is complex, and I've attempted
to detail it here:
http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/linux-info/debian-package-signing




Hardware-recognition (and related) packages:

discover
  Hardware identification system (thank you, Progeny Systems, Inc.),
  for various PCI, PCMCIA, and USB devices.
kudzu, kudzu-vesa
  Hardware-probing tool (thank you, Red Hat Software, Inc.) intended to
  be run at boot time.  Requires hwdata package.  kudzu-vesa is the
  VBE/DDC stuff for autodetecting monitor characteristics.
mdetect
  Mouse device autodetection tool.  If present, it will be used to aid
  XFree86 configuration tools.
read-edid
  Hardware information-gathering tool for VESA PnP monitors.  If
  present, it will be used to aid XFree86 configuration tools.
sndconfig
  Sound configuration (thank you, Red Hat Software, Inc.), using isapnp
  detection.  Requires kernel with OSS sound modules.  Uses kudzu, aumix,
  and sox.
hotplug
  USB/PCI device hotplugging support, and network autoconfig.
nictools-nopci
  Diagnostic and setup tools for many non-PCI ethernet cards
nictools-pci
  Diagnostic and setup tools for many PCI ethernet cards.
mii-diag
  "A little tool to manipulate network cards" (examines and sets the MII
  registers of network cards).
printtool
  Autodetection of printers and PPD support, via an enhanced version of
  Red Hat Software's Tk-based printtool.  Requires the pconf-detect
  command-line utility for detecting parallel-port, USB, and
  network-connected printers (which can be installed separately as
  package pconf-detect).

Don't forget that lspci and pnpdump will list installed PCI and ISApnp
devices, respectively.

Excellent article on ALSA sound setup in Debian:
http://www.linuxorbit.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=Sections&file=index&req=viewarticle&artid=541

Having problems getting your USB mouse working on Debian?  See Ramesh
Panuganty's Debian tips:  http://panuganty.tripod.com/debiantips/ , and
select "mouse" in upper-right selection menu.


Localisation:  System-wide, do:
   # dpkg-reconfigure locales
You'll be asked (1) which locales (country/language combinations) to
generate, and (2) which of those to set as default.
If you use mutt as your MUA, you can put lines like this in ~/.muttrc :
   set charset =      "iso-8859-15"
   set send_charset = "us-ascii:iso-8859-1:iso-8859-15:utf-8"



Other things needed:
- Packages in incoming
- proposed-updates
- early access to security updates
- coherent explanation of /etc/apt/sources.list
- recovery from apt-get/dpkg problems
- diversions
- update-alternatives
- auto-apt
- apt-proxy and apt-cacher
- equivs
- apt-src