Debian is a community driven GNU/Linux distribution first announced 1993. It is well known for its package management system APT and large number of packages. Many other distributions are influenced or originate from it, like Ubuntu or Knoppix.
17
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How do I run 32-bit programs on a 64-bit Ubuntu?
I have a 64-bit (amd64 a.k.a. x86_64) Debian or Ubuntu installation. I need to run 32-bit (i386/i686) programs occasionally, or to compile programs for a 32-bit system. How can I do this with a ...
7
votes
4answers
3k views
What should I do before dual-booting Windows 7 and Debian on EFI?
I'm about to purchase an Asus motherboard with EFI firmware and wanted to prepare myself for installing Windows and Debian once the hardware arrives. I was hoping that someone who has gone down this ...
7
votes
4answers
9k views
How to make a machine accessible from the LAN using its hostname
Here are details of the machine I want to access using its hostname:
$ hostname
hostname
$ cat /etc/hosts
127.0.0.1 localhost
127.0.1.1 hostname.company.local hostname
It's a default Debian 6 ...
11
votes
3answers
4k views
How to find out which (not installed) package a file belongs to?
On Debian systems (and derivatives):
$ dpkg --search /bin/ls
coreutils: /bin/ls
That is, the file /bin/ls belongs to the Debian package named coreutils.
But this only works if the package is ...
6
votes
2answers
19k views
Can I resize the root partition without uninstalling and reinstalling Linux (or losing data)?
I have started using a machine that has both Debian and Windows 7 installed. However, after installing some programs I started getting a message that there is not enough space. I knew that the system ...
4
votes
3answers
2k views
Automount USB drives with no GUI requirement (halevt replacement)
For minimal installations of Debian, I have been using halevt to enable automounting of USB drives. Halevt is reliable and requires no configuration aside from installing the package. Now, halevt has ...
70
votes
8answers
19k views
What is the real difference between “apt-get” and “aptitude”? (How about “wajig”?)
I know that both apt-get and aptitude are command line package management interfaces on Debian derived Linux, with different options, but I'm still somewhat confused. Under the hood, aren't they ...
8
votes
2answers
2k views
Debian based system, only one gui program, nothing else
I would like to make a debian system where you can only open one GUI program at boot, no other graphical interface, no minimize, or any X apart from that program, is there a way to do it on debian if ...
5
votes
3answers
286 views
Access to original contents of mount point
On my headless NAS I have sdf1 (a flash-card) mounted as / while /home is mounted from lv00 (an LVM volume backed by a software RAID). To be able to access the machine when the RAID fails, I have a ...
25
votes
5answers
10k views
Convince apt-get *not* to use IPv6 method
The ISP I work at is setting up an internal IPv6 network in preparation for eventually connecting to the IPv6 internet. As a result, several of the servers in this network now try to connect to ...
23
votes
1answer
6k views
What is $debian_chroot in .bashrc?
What is the debian_chroot variable in my bashrc file? and what is it doing here?
PS1='${debian_chroot:+($debian_chroot)}\u@\h:\w\$ '
5
votes
5answers
4k views
How to create a DEB file manually?
I want to create a DEB file manually. I would like to just provide a folder which contains data to install, and a script to be executed after installation.
Is this possible?
3
votes
2answers
6k views
Get newest gcc for debian?
I can't build my apps on gcc since I use various c++0x features. I'm on Debian 6 (Lenny) and after upgrade/updating I have gcc version 4.4.5-8. I'm unsure which version is required but mingw 4.6.2 ...
11
votes
6answers
2k views
Is there a difference of stability between Linux distros?
I've using Debian since 2010 for some home purposes and it has been stable. Is Debian still a good option if I need a server for heavy network, cpu, disk and memory usage?
Last month I listened to ...
6
votes
3answers
5k views
Installing a .deb package in home directory
Is it possible to install a .deb package completely under my home directory at debian?
4
votes
3answers
2k views
apt-get - autoremove wants to uninstall Gnome
As empathy 2.30 in Debian Wheezy didn't meet all my preferences I tried out empathy 3.1 from experimental, using the command:
apt-get -t experimental install empathy
I had to find out, this version ...
4
votes
3answers
2k views
Why is the US international keyboard layout on Debian different?
Edit: I realized that the "problem" was not only in Ubuntu but in Debian itself and Ubuntu just inherited it, so I had this migrated from Ask Ubuntu
I have been using Linux on and off for 10 years, ...
3
votes
1answer
376 views
listing packages in Debian, a la `dpkg -l`, but including the package origin/source
I want to list all packages of the form
$ dpkg -l libav\*
but in addition to this output, I would like the origin/source (I'm not sure of the preferred term) of each package. If the package doesn't ...
2
votes
3answers
6k views
Automounting USB sticks on Debian
I'm running Debian Squeeze on a plug computer (so SSH only, no GUI) and what I'm trying to do is get it so that when a USB stick is plugged in, it gets automatically mounted.
What I've done is ...
10
votes
3answers
538 views
Why is there a separate package repository for Debian security updates?
Why don't they upload packages to the normal package repository? Is this a general convention (IE, do other distros separate the repositories also)?
9
votes
2answers
951 views
31 Debian CDs — Why? and which do I need for a vanilla desktop install?
I've been using Linux (Ubuntu) for a couple of months now, and I want to try Debian to see how different it is.
Well, I've already found a couple of differences..
The first one that Debian-Live ...
8
votes
2answers
4k views
Why is Debian not creating the 'wheel' group by default?
It appears to be Unix tradition that a wheel group is created automatically, but Debian (and children, naturally) doesn't do so. Is there a rationale somewhere? Where else have you seen this tradition ...
2
votes
0answers
150 views
How can I mount a dm_crypt device during boot, it fails all the time
EDIT: Problem solved, i updated from Debian 6.0.6 to 7.0.0, everything works now!
I have a complex problem at booting. Basically, I have a debian apache box, as a music server in my home network. The ...
2
votes
2answers
2k views
not able to create xorg.conf file
I want to change my colour depth. I posted this, and got the following answer:
Create an xorg.conf file by running Xorg -configure. Then edit the Depth entry in the Display subsection of the ...
2
votes
0answers
227 views
Debian 6: media keys in gnome-settings-daemon don't work
I am running a minimal Debian 6 x86_64 setup with pulseaudio, alsa and gnome-settings-daemon. Whenever I press a media key, gnome-settings-daemon spits the following out to stderr:
** ...
2
votes
2answers
1k views
Setup WLAN interface on Debian
I am trying to configure wlan on my dockstar. I installed wireless-tools, zd1211-firmware and wpasupplicant.
My /etc/network/interfaces file looks like this:
auto lo eth0
iface lo inet loopback
...
1
vote
0answers
243 views
Make and apt-get Have Stopped Working
So I downloaded the non-free broadcom driver(b44) for my debian install, however when I try to make it I get the following error:
make
make -C /lib/modules/2.6.32-5-amd64/build ...
0
votes
1answer
135 views
Recover ext3 files from hard disk with bad sector [duplicate]
Possible Duplicate:
Recover formatted ext3 partition
I have a folder of about 5GB that suddenly disappeared. When I checked its hard disk, I found out it has bad sector for about 2-3MB on ...
16
votes
7answers
9k views
Differences between Debian and Ubuntu
I'm getting sick of Ubuntu's seemingly random changes. I'm thinking of switching to Debian permanently. Does anyone know if there's a list of changes between the two distros somewhere? I want to know ...
7
votes
1answer
931 views
How to make dpkg faster?
Package (un)installation on a Debian system is horribly slow, partly because it works with a whole bunch of (small) files. Short of getting a faster storage, how do I speed it up? I'm thinking maybe ...
8
votes
3answers
2k views
Simplest way of forwarding all mail from server? [duplicate]
Possible Duplicate:
Lightweight outgoing SMTP server
I am looking for a minimal mail solution (MTA) for a headless server which generate e-mails for local users and and fully qualified ...
6
votes
3answers
1k views
How to see package version without install?
I want to see the version of a package before I install it. How can I do this?
6
votes
2answers
4k views
How to check on which drives grub2 has actually installed an MBR?
I'm on a Debian/Squeeze system (with a history going back to at least Woody) which was upgraded to grub2 as part of the Squeeze upgrade. All works well, but I'm about to mess with the disk ...
4
votes
2answers
2k views
How do I start Xvfb on startup on Debian?
I’ve got a Debian web server that I’m using for occasional screen-scraping via Selenum and Python.
I use Xvfb as a virtual X server for Firefox to run on when being controlled by Selenium. Given that ...
2
votes
0answers
287 views
How do I set up the SELinux sandbox in Debian?
I've installed SELinux in Debian sid in order to use the sandbox that locks down apps to a restricted enviroment, but I can't get it to work. If I try to use the sandbox command in permissive mode ...
7
votes
4answers
1k views
What directories do I need to back up?
What are the directories one should back up, in order to have a backup of all user-generated files?
From a vanilla debian install, I can do enough apt to get the packages that I want. So if I don't ...
3
votes
1answer
2k views
rpc.statd running on system not using NFS
I have a Debian machine that gets warnings (via the Tiger automatic auditor) that rcp.statd is listening on such-and-such socket. Googling shows rpc.statd is a daemon used by NFS. As far as I know, ...
3
votes
2answers
877 views
How to install kvm in Debian (Lenny) over powerpc
I am emulating powerpc using qemu-system-ppc on top of x86, and running debian-lenny-ppc with it. I want to install kvm inside that debian. I have learned that the kvm and qemu-kvm packages are not ...
13
votes
3answers
817 views
Bash scripting and large files (bug): input with the read builtin from a redirection gives unexpected result
I have a strange issue with large files and bash. This is the context:
I have a large file: 75G and 400,000,000+ lines (it is a log file, my bad, I let it grow).
The first 10 chars of each line is ...
13
votes
2answers
5k views
Upstart on Debian?
I created an upstart script in Ubuntu, thinking it would be the same for Debian. But Debian doesnt have a /etc/init folder that Ubuntu has. I went to the upstart download page and seeing that they ...
12
votes
4answers
564 views
TCP dies on a Linux laptop
Once in several days I have the following problem. My laptop (Debian testing)
suddenly becomes unable to work with TCP connections to the internet.
The following things continue working fine:
UDP ...
10
votes
3answers
2k views
Why does the 'bin' user need a login shell?
During an audit of /var/log/auth.log on one of my public webservers, I found this:
Jan 10 03:38:11 Bucksnort sshd[3571]: pam_unix(sshd:auth): authentication failure;
logname= uid=0 euid=0 ...
6
votes
2answers
2k views
I can't delete a file that I have write permissions for as a group member
$ touch testfile
$ chmod g+w testfile
$ sudo adduser user2 user1
$ stat -c'%a %A' testfile
664 -rw-rw-r--
$ su user2
Password:
$ groups
user2 user1
$ rm testfile
rm: cannot remove `testfile': ...
5
votes
3answers
2k views
Postfix doesn't send mail, complaining about “Host or domain name not found”
I followed these instructions in order to send mail and here's the Postfix log:
Sep 26 00:46:24 tshepang postfix/smtpd[5728]: 8EE2464931: client=localhost[127.0.0.1]
Sep 26 00:47:44 tshepang ...
5
votes
2answers
493 views
Finding an earlier version to downgrade to
On my Debian server, I upgraded the SQLite package to version 3.7.7 but discovered that it contains a critical bug that breaks several things including my Subversion repository. So, I would like to ...
4
votes
2answers
2k views
Debian: very low resolution and an “unknown monitor” problem
Edit: I have installed CrunchBang (or #!, a Debian-based distro), and that seems to have solved all of my resolution problems.
I've just installed Debian after using Linux Mint for a few months.
...
4
votes
1answer
206 views
pm-utils: No network in suspend scripts?
I'd like to put a script in /etc/pm/suspend.d/ that needs network access (for a very short time) before allowing the system to suspend. However, even with scripts named "001_something" in ...
4
votes
5answers
964 views
How to clean up unnecessary files
Please suggest me any particular unnecessary file that I can clean to back everything to normal condition(temporarily). (i.e. any log or archieve or anything ). My var/log has only 40MB and Home ...
4
votes
4answers
2k views
Debian Squeeze: Left mouse click stops working
After starting a new session in my Debian Squeeze (6.0.4, always updated) running in a VM (VMWare Workstation) there comes the point in time where the left mouse click stops working, so that I cannot ...
4
votes
1answer
1k views
How to launch an application with default “terminal emulator” on Ubuntu?
I wanted to execute some command in terminal emulator, like Konsole, but I need to make this cross-desktop.
Is there some command like xdg-open, but for getting the default terminal emulator?
I'm ...
