Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On 20 Aug 2007, Douglas A. Tutty wrote: On Mon, Aug 20, 2007 at 10:20:51AM +0100, Anthony Campbell wrote: I ditched aptitude a couple of years ago in favour of wajig. I'm willing to believe that most or even all of the problems I had with aptitude were my own fault, but wajig is brilliant IMO and I don't find a need for anything else. But look at all the cruft that drags in. It includes an optional GUI that drags in gnome, for example. Also, it is only a front-end to the regular apt commands so it doesn't get the extra complex dependancy handling of aptitude. Doug. I don't use the GUI, just the CLI. I'm not sure what the extra complex dependency handling is; perhaps it's this that causes a lot of the problems that people complain of. -- Anthony Campbell - [EMAIL PROTECTED] Microsoft-free zone - Using Linux Gnu-Debian http://www.acampbell.org.uk (blog, book reviews, on-line books and sceptical articles) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
Mark Neidorff wrote: Here's an example of what this message is about: I've been reading the debian-user list for a bit, and I've noticed that suggestions given are to use the apt-* suite or aptitude to managing packages. While setting things up (and installing packages) I came across synaptic in the KDE menus. Tried it, and liked using it. So now I'm wondering according to Debian Wisdom (no disrespect intended to anyonne) which is the preferred way of installing software? FWIW, I still use apt-get instead of aptitude on my Sid machine. With recent apt versions in sid, I don't think there is a difference between apt-get and aptitude in terms of how they resolve dependencies (someone please correct me if I am wrong). apt-get also has autoremove option which can automatically removes the unused packages. hth raju -- Kamaraju S Kusumanchi http://www.people.cornell.edu/pages/kk288/ http://malayamaarutham.blogspot.com/ -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, 19 Aug 2007 14:00:22 -0800 Ken Irving [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 03:31:19PM -0500, Mumia W.. wrote: [snip] I only use apt-get when I need to install from the source (which aptitude cannot do). I wonder why that is; the source packages are independent of binary ones. As raju and others have pointed out on the list, aptitude apparently has no equivalent to apt-get's 'source' and 'build-dep' commands. [snip] Ken -- Ken Irving, [EMAIL PROTECTED] Celejar -- mailmin.sourceforge.net - remote access via secure (OpenPGP) email ssuds.sourceforge.net - A Simple Sudoku Solver and Generator -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Tue, Aug 21, 2007 at 10:56:55AM -0400, Kamaraju S Kusumanchi wrote: FWIW, I still use apt-get instead of aptitude on my Sid machine. With recent apt versions in sid, I don't think there is a difference between apt-get and aptitude in terms of how they resolve dependencies (someone please correct me if I am wrong). apt-get also has autoremove option which can automatically removes the unused packages. As far as I recall from the announcement about the autoremove option, it was stated that the developers of apt and aptitude were working together to move the dependency handling in apt. Don't know the status of this though. Regards, Andrei -- If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough. (Albert Einstein) signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On 19 Aug 2007, Ken Irving wrote: On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 03:31:19PM -0500, Mumia W.. wrote: I haven't tried aptitude for some time, and apparently the problem I had with it (where it wanted to remove a lot of stuff) has been fixed. I think that, even before that fix, it would work reasonably (i.e., no surprises) as long as it was used exclusively. I normally use apt-get, and tried aptitude after seeing that it was going to be the default, but have since shied away from it. [snip] I ditched aptitude a couple of years ago in favour of wajig. I'm willing to believe that most or even all of the problems I had with aptitude were my own fault, but wajig is brilliant IMO and I don't find a need for anything else. -- Anthony Campbell - [EMAIL PROTECTED] Microsoft-free zone - Using Linux Gnu-Debian http://www.acampbell.org.uk (blog, book reviews, on-line books and sceptical articles) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, 2007-08-19 at 14:10 -0400, Mark Neidorff wrote: Hi all, Hi you More generally, is there a document/web page that explains what are the preferred packages and what is the Debian Way of doing things. In _my_ opinion: Installing and using a distribution implies using its package manager. Or, if you dont want that, install LFS. Packaging is one of the strength of Linux distributions over than other OS. But that's my personnal opinion. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
Hi Douglas, On 8/19/07, Douglas A. Tutty [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: If you mix with apt-get ... ... This leads to the cruft buildup that aptitude is suposed to help you prevent. I remember a thread some time ago that just pointed out not to mix apt-get with aptitude. The other problem is this. Install package A. Aptitude brings in package B to meet a dependancy. Over time, you get attached to package B in its own right. Later, either package A changes and doesn't need B or you remove A. If you haven't told aptitude that you want to keep B, it will go ahead and remove it too. In interactive mode, you get a detailed preview (with reasons) of what aptitude wants to do. You can then edit that preview to fine-tune it before telling aptitude to go ahead. It really tries to protect you from yourself without preventing you from shooting yourself in the foot if that is really what you want to do. Yeah, I had this once - don't know anymore which package - but from the command line aptitude wanted to remove a lot that I wanted to keep. So I had to enter interactive mode and put that stuff on hold. Greetings, Manon.
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
Hi Mumia, On 8/19/07, Mumia W.. [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: * However, I never do anything at the command line that hasn't been verified as safe. I always use the curses interface to find out what is going to happen before I enter a command at the command line. Well, that's a valuable advise that I'll keep in mind. Greetings, Manon.
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Aug 19, 2007, at 1:08 PM, Douglas A. Tutty wrote: There were frequent posts to the list like Aptitude wants to remove 150 packages!!!. They were using the CLI and didn't get the detailed explanation from aptitude that they would from the curses interface. Dumb question: Is there a way to back out of an aptitude transaction, if you get some hairy list of dependencies you don't want to deal with? I've gone through all the menus and if it's there, I'm looking past it. I've successfully done it by manually adjusting each item in the list, but that's a serious pain. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Mon, Aug 20, 2007 at 10:40:43AM -0700, David Brodbeck wrote: On Aug 19, 2007, at 1:08 PM, Douglas A. Tutty wrote: There were frequent posts to the list like Aptitude wants to remove 150 packages!!!. They were using the CLI and didn't get the detailed explanation from aptitude that they would from the curses interface. Dumb question: Is there a way to back out of an aptitude transaction, if you get some hairy list of dependencies you don't want to deal with? I've gone through all the menus and if it's there, I'm looking past it. I've successfully done it by manually adjusting each item in the list, but that's a serious pain. There's Undo (Ctrl-U) before pressing g and Cancel Pending Actions (in menu Actions) that can be used after the first g. Is this what you need? Regards, Andrei -- If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough. (Albert Einstein) signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 03:31:19PM -0500, Mumia W.. wrote: I'm also curious about what problems other people are having with aptitude. aptitude is slow on simple searches (so I use apt-cache for those), but the patterns are much more powerful. -- * However, I never do anything at the command line that hasn't been verified as safe. I always use the curses interface to find out what is going to happen before I enter a command at the command line. Do you mean you back out and start again using the commandline. But you are just a 'g' away from happiness! :) Did you try the -s (simulate) option? Regards, Andrei -- If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough. (Albert Einstein) signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Aug 20, 2007, at 12:05 PM, Andrei Popescu wrote: There's Undo (Ctrl-U) before pressing g and Cancel Pending Actions (in menu Actions) that can be used after the first g. Is this what you need? It seems like I tried 'Cancel Pending Actions' once and it didn't seem to do anything, but maybe I'm remembering wrong. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
Mark Neidorff wrote: Hi all, Recently I've set up a Debian Etch box which I'm nearly ready to bring up full time (currently using a different distribution...been a linux user for over 10 years). Here's an example of what this message is about: I've been reading the debian-user list for a bit, and I've noticed that suggestions given are to use the apt-* suite or aptitude to managing packages. While setting things up (and installing packages) I came across synaptic in the KDE menus. Tried it, and liked using it. So now I'm wondering according to Debian Wisdom (no disrespect intended to anyonne) which is the preferred way of installing software? More generally, is there a document/web page that explains what are the preferred packages and what is the Debian Way of doing things. I use synaptic almost all the time on Sid. It's a desktop machine, so I have a desktop, and most of the time it's OK. Yes, for the same reason explained elsewhere, sometimes it wants to remove half the machine, but it's easy enough to find the culprit and leave it for a while. A few days later, all will be well. Sometimes, even updating blocks of things in a particular order sorts that out. But every now and then, being Sid, it needs the Big Hammer. Something gets stuck, even apt-get won't fix it, and some brutal surgery with dpkg --force-xxx on the CLI is necessary. Don't forget dpkg. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Mon, Aug 20, 2007 at 10:20:51AM +0100, Anthony Campbell wrote: I ditched aptitude a couple of years ago in favour of wajig. I'm willing to believe that most or even all of the problems I had with aptitude were my own fault, but wajig is brilliant IMO and I don't find a need for anything else. But look at all the cruft that drags in. It includes an optional GUI that drags in gnome, for example. Also, it is only a front-end to the regular apt commands so it doesn't get the extra complex dependancy handling of aptitude. Doug. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Mon, Aug 20, 2007 at 01:04:15PM +0200, Mihamina (R12y) Rakotomandimby wrote: In _my_ opinion: Installing and using a distribution implies using its package manager. Or, if you dont want that, install LFS. Packaging is one of the strength of Linux distributions over than other OS. But that's my personnal opinion. The BSDs have pkg_add et. al. that fuction like apt-get et.al. I haven't seen anything like aptitude's interactive. Of course the details differ, but they do have commands that will either download and install a pre-compiled binary (some call it a package, others a port) or will download the sources, compile it, and install it with just the one command. Doug. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Source of Debian wisdom
Hi all, Recently I've set up a Debian Etch box which I'm nearly ready to bring up full time (currently using a different distribution...been a linux user for over 10 years). Here's an example of what this message is about: I've been reading the debian-user list for a bit, and I've noticed that suggestions given are to use the apt-* suite or aptitude to managing packages. While setting things up (and installing packages) I came across synaptic in the KDE menus. Tried it, and liked using it. So now I'm wondering according to Debian Wisdom (no disrespect intended to anyonne) which is the preferred way of installing software? More generally, is there a document/web page that explains what are the preferred packages and what is the Debian Way of doing things. Thanks, Mark -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, 19 Aug 2007 14:10:27 -0400 Mark Neidorff [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hi all, Recently I've set up a Debian Etch box which I'm nearly ready to bring up full time (currently using a different distribution...been a linux user for over 10 years). Here's an example of what this message is about: I've been reading the debian-user list for a bit, and I've noticed that suggestions given are to use the apt-* suite or aptitude to managing packages. While setting things up (and installing packages) I came across synaptic in the KDE menus. Tried it, and liked using it. So now I'm wondering according to Debian Wisdom (no disrespect intended to anyonne) which is the preferred way of installing software? More generally, is there a document/web page that explains what are the preferred packages and what is the Debian Way of doing things. Also for me seems that the best fast-configured packages are with apt/synaptic but (yeah!) for me the best aproach to install my most-used packages are from source, compiled for my processor and run smooth than the normal precompiled packages -olr -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, 19 Aug 2007 14:10:27 -0400 Mark Neidorff [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hi all, Recently I've set up a Debian Etch box which I'm nearly ready to bring up full time (currently using a different distribution...been a linux user for over 10 years). Here's an example of what this message is about: I've been reading the debian-user list for a bit, and I've noticed that suggestions given are to use the apt-* suite or aptitude to managing packages. While setting things up (and installing packages) I came across synaptic in the KDE menus. Tried it, and liked using it. So now I'm wondering according to Debian Wisdom (no disrespect intended to anyonne) which is the preferred way of installing software? More generally, is there a document/web page that explains what are the preferred packages and what is the Debian Way of doing things. Thanks, Mark I use Synaptic for all the updates except kernels, X, libc and other similar stuff. It is only a frontend for the apt package managent system anyway. -- Szia: Nyizsa. -- Find out how you can get spam free email. http://www.bluebottle.com/tag/3 -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, 19 Aug 2007 14:10:27 -0400 Mark Neidorff [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Hello Mark, More generally, is there a document/web page that explains what are the preferred packages and what is the Debian Way of doing things. One of the reasons that the apt-* suite is recommended is that, should the X windowing system get trashed, you can (re-)install software, should it prove necessary. Synaptic is fine (it's just a GUI for command line tools), but does require that you can log in to a DE of some sort. -- Regards _ / ) The blindingly obvious is / _)radnever immediately apparent The public wants what the public gets Going Underground - The Jam signature.asc Description: PGP signature
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 02:10:27PM -0400, Mark Neidorff wrote: Here's an example of what this message is about: I've been reading the debian-user list for a bit, and I've noticed that suggestions given are to use the apt-* suite or aptitude to managing packages. While setting things up (and installing packages) I came across synaptic in the KDE menus. Tried it, and liked using it. So now I'm wondering according to Debian Wisdom (no disrespect intended to anyonne) which is the preferred way of installing software? More generally, is there a document/web page that explains what are the preferred packages and what is the Debian Way of doing things. The release notes state that aptitude is the preferred package management tool since it takes care of automatically installed pacakges (those installed only to meet dependancies) and removes them when nothing else needs them. You can over-ride Automatic by marking them as manual. Note that many of the horror stories about aptitude involved people using it as a CLI replacement for apt-get instead of using its curses interface. For reading: Release notes, debian policy (not all, unless you're making packages), the fhs that comes with the policy debian-reference (a bit dated but still a must-read). aptitude-doc All but the release notes are available as debian packages. As for 'preferred' packages, its all up to you. However, some packages are marked as 'base', 'required', 'important', 'standard', etc. Ensure that you have all the base and required ones. You can search with aptitude. The other advice is to go slow. Once you have your base system functional, just add one function at a time. E.g. get X working as you want, and then add a browser as a separate project. Doug. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 02:10:27PM -0400, Mark Neidorff wrote: Hi all, Recently I've set up a Debian Etch box which I'm nearly ready to bring up full time (currently using a different distribution...been a linux user for over 10 years). Here's an example of what this message is about: I've been reading the debian-user list for a bit, and I've noticed that suggestions given are to use the apt-* suite or aptitude to managing packages. While setting things up (and installing packages) I came across synaptic in the KDE menus. Tried it, and liked using it. So now I'm wondering according to Debian Wisdom (no disrespect intended to anyonne) which is the preferred way of installing software? More generally, is there a document/web page that explains what are the preferred packages and what is the Debian Way of doing things. aptitude is the recommended APT frontend. And I think the document you are looking for is the Debian Reference (package debian-reference). Otherwise it is difficult to say there is one Debian Way (tm), as there are more ways to achieve the same task. My own policy has been to use the defaults as much as possible and find ways to make my customizations not interfere with the normal upgrade process. Regards, Andrei -- If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough. (Albert Einstein) signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
Hi Douglas, On 8/19/07, Douglas A. Tutty [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Note that many of the horror stories about aptitude involved people using it as a CLI replacement for apt-get instead of using its curses interface. Are you saying I should NOT use aptitude as a replacement for apt-get, like this: aptitude install new-package ? I've been using aptitude like this all the time ever since I installed etch with no problems whatsoever. What's the problem of doing so and not using it's user interface? Manon.
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 09:25:15PM +0200, Manon Metten wrote: Hi Douglas, On 8/19/07, Douglas A. Tutty [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Note that many of the horror stories about aptitude involved people using it as a CLI replacement for apt-get instead of using its curses interface. I was present also in interactive mode. Are you saying I should NOT use aptitude as a replacement for apt-get, like this: aptitude install new-package ? I've been using aptitude like this all the time ever since I installed etch with no problems whatsoever. What's the problem of doing so and not using it's user interface? There was indeed a bug in aptitude BEFORE release of etch, where it would consider packages installed by apt-get as automatically installed, instead of manually. This was fixed a long ago. Regards, Andrei -- If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough. (Albert Einstein) signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 02:35:18PM -0400, Douglas A. Tutty wrote: The release notes state that aptitude is the preferred package management tool since it takes care of automatically installed pacakges Nitpick: aptitude is recommended because it handles complex dependencies better. The automatic removal of packages is just a bonus. Regards, Andrei -- If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough. (Albert Einstein) signature.asc Description: Digital signature
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 09:25:15PM +0200, Manon Metten wrote: On 8/19/07, Douglas A. Tutty [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Note that many of the horror stories about aptitude involved people using it as a CLI replacement for apt-get instead of using its curses interface. Are you saying I should NOT use aptitude as a replacement for apt-get, like this: aptitude install new-package ? I've been using aptitude like this all the time ever since I installed etch with no problems whatsoever. What's the problem of doing so and not using it's user interface? There's nothing wrong with it. However, the first time you use aptitude, everything will be marked as manually installed. When you tell it to install things, it will bring in what is needed to meet dependencies. Whether or not it considers 'recommends' as dependencies is selectable from the interactive menu (or a config file in /etc). Two common problems: If you mix with apt-get, apt-get will work but all packages will be marked as manually installed in aptitude (actually, the won't be marked as Automatically installed). This leads to the cruft buildup that aptitude is suposed to help you prevent. The other problem is this. Install package A. Aptitude brings in package B to meet a dependancy. Over time, you get attached to package B in its own right. Later, either package A changes and doesn't need B or you remove A. If you haven't told aptitude that you want to keep B, it will go ahead and remove it too. In interactive mode, you get a detailed preview (with reasons) of what aptitude wants to do. You can then edit that preview to fine-tune it before telling aptitude to go ahead. It really tries to protect you from yourself without preventing you from shooting yourself in the foot if that is really what you want to do. When running stable, the problems don't show up too frequently. However, when Etch was testing, many people were using aptitude for the first time coincident with shifting package dependancies. There were frequent posts to the list like Aptitude wants to remove 150 packages!!!. They were using the CLI and didn't get the detailed explanation from aptitude that they would from the curses interface. Doug. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
Mark Neidorff wrote: So now I'm wondering according to Debian Wisdom (no disrespect intended to anyonne) which is the preferred way of installing software? The one your comfortable with. aptitude is recommended mainly because it is a best of breed of the CLI package tools. The key is CLI. While GUI tools work fine Debian often takes the view of what works everywhere, local and remote, since people often use Debian for more than the desktop. More generally, is there a document/web page that explains what are the preferred packages and what is the Debian Way of doing things. I'm not sure if there is. I kind of picked it up along the way. My first little bit after running Slackware was fun. :) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On 08/19/2007 02:25 PM, Manon Metten wrote: Hi Douglas, On 8/19/07, Douglas A. Tutty [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Note that many of the horror stories about aptitude involved people using it as a CLI replacement for apt-get instead of using its curses interface. Are you saying I should NOT use aptitude as a replacement for apt-get, like this: aptitude install new-package ? I've been using aptitude like this all the time ever since I installed etch with no problems whatsoever. What's the problem of doing so and not using it's user interface? Manon. I almost exclusively use aptitude under Sarge. Both the curses and command line interfaces work perfectly, and I've never had or heard of a horror story involving aptitude*. And aptitude is clearly the most advanced interface to the packaging system. I only use apt-get when I need to install from the source (which aptitude cannot do). I'm also curious about what problems other people are having with aptitude. -- * However, I never do anything at the command line that hasn't been verified as safe. I always use the curses interface to find out what is going to happen before I enter a command at the command line. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 03:31:19PM -0500, Mumia W.. wrote: On 08/19/2007 02:25 PM, Manon Metten wrote: Hi Douglas, On 8/19/07, Douglas A. Tutty [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: Note that many of the horror stories about aptitude involved people using it as a CLI replacement for apt-get instead of using its curses interface. Are you saying I should NOT use aptitude as a replacement for apt-get, like this: aptitude install new-package ? I've been using aptitude like this all the time ever since I installed etch with no problems whatsoever. What's the problem of doing so and not using it's user interface? Manon. I almost exclusively use aptitude under Sarge. Both the curses and command line interfaces work perfectly, and I've never had or heard of a horror story involving aptitude*. And aptitude is clearly the most advanced interface to the packaging system. I only use apt-get when I need to install from the source (which aptitude cannot do). I wonder why that is; the source packages are independent of binary ones. I'm also curious about what problems other people are having with aptitude. I haven't tried aptitude for some time, and apparently the problem I had with it (where it wanted to remove a lot of stuff) has been fixed. I think that, even before that fix, it would work reasonably (i.e., no surprises) as long as it was used exclusively. I normally use apt-get, and tried aptitude after seeing that it was going to be the default, but have since shied away from it. * However, I never do anything at the command line that hasn't been verified as safe. I always use the curses interface to find out what is going to happen before I enter a command at the command line. I'm pretty sure that aptitude will provide a detailed list of packages that it intends to remove, and unless you use the -y or --yes option (assuming there is one), it was and is safe to at least try it out on the command line. Not sure I can explain why, but I prefer the command line interface over an environment that you get into and navigate and control from within (and sometimes may have trouble finding a way out of...). I do use and have learned vi/vim, so I'm not unwilling to do this kind of thing, but plan to stick with apt-get on the command line until there's some compelling reason to do so. I also tried wajig, which is a wrapper around apt-get and some other commands, but find that I prefer using the real thing directly. Ken -- Ken Irving, [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
Mark Neidorff [EMAIL PROTECTED]: Recently I've set up a Debian Etch box which I'm nearly ready to bring up full time (currently using a different distribution...been a linux user for over 10 years). Fourteen here. :-) Here's an example of what this message is about: I've been reading the debian-user list for a bit, and I've noticed that suggestions given are to use the apt-* suite or aptitude to managing packages. While setting things up (and installing packages) I came across synaptic in the KDE menus. Tried it, and liked using it. So now I'm wondering according to Debian Wisdom (no disrespect intended to anyone) which is the preferred way of installing software? All of them work; dselect, apt-get, aptitude, and synaptic. I prefer not to use something which expects X to be there (synaptic) and dselect is just pretty damned old and has a difficult interface (but if you're willing to spend the time to learn it, it works). apt-get and aptitude, at the command line, are very similar. aptitude provides a ((n)curses) GUI-ish interface if you want that. aptitude logs what it does and (arguably) handles dependencies better. More generally, is there a document/web page that explains what are the preferred packages and what is the Debian Way of doing things. For current stable/Etch, aptitude is recommended, but many still stick with apt-get. The biggest problem I've noticed is aptitude remove blah where blah is some KDE or Gnome app, tends to want to blow away *everything* that's even remotely related to KDE or Gnome. I use neither KDE or Gnome, so that's not a problem here. There are tricks you can use to avoid this sort of thing, but I've not bothered to learn what they are. Perhaps others can help. I'd go with aptitude (or perhaps apt-get), but you probably need to pore over the documentation before deciding. -- Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced. (*)http://blinkynet.net/comp/uip5.html Linux Counter #80292 - -http://www.faqs.org/rfcs/rfc1855.htmlPlease, don't Cc: me. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 22:06:29 +, s. keeling wrote: [...] For current stable/Etch, aptitude is recommended, but many still stick with apt-get. The biggest problem I've noticed is aptitude remove blah where blah is some KDE or Gnome app, tends to want to blow away *everything* that's even remotely related to KDE or Gnome. I use neither KDE or Gnome, so that's not a problem here. There are tricks you can use to avoid this sort of thing, but I've not bothered to learn what they are. Perhaps others can help. The problem is this: If you install the kde (or gnome) metapackage with aptitude then all the other KDE (Gnome) packages are marked as automatically installed because they were pulled in to satisfy the dependencies of the metapackage. (That is in fact the very purpose of these metapackages: To save you the trouble of installing all the parts of KDE/Gnome manually. With aptitude, this also gives you an easy way to remove all of KDE/Gnome again: Just remove the top-level metapackage and all the automatically installed dependencies will be uninstalled, too.) Now, as long as you keep the whole set of packages, everything is fine. However, as soon as you remove one component you will get a domino effect: Let's say you want to remove knewsticker. This means that the kdenetwork metapackage has to be removed, too, because it depends on knewsticker. Unfortunately this kills the kde metapackage (since it depends on kdenetwork) and the whole house of cards collapses. With the kde package scheduled for removal, all its automatically installed dependencies are unused (as fas as aptitude knows) and therefore aptitude will try to remove them all at the next opportunity. This gets you into the dreaded 288 packages will be removed, do you want to continue? situation. The first thing to do in such a case is to run aptitude keep-all (or use Actions - Cancel pending actions in interactive mode) to make aptitude forget all scheduled actions. (Watch out, if you used hold to block buggy packages then this information will be erased, too, I think.) Then you have to figure out what is going on. The output of aptitude remove knewsticker gives you a pretty good hint: -- [...] The following packages have unmet dependencies: kdenetwork: Depends: knewsticker (= 4:3.5.7-4) but it is not installable Resolving dependencies... The following actions will resolve these dependencies: Remove the following packages: kde kdenetwork Score is 188 Accept this solution? [Y/n/q/?] q Abandoning all efforts to resolve these dependencies. Abort. -- (Note: If you abort aptitude like this then you do not even have to use the keep-all/cancel pending actions step.) Now you have to tell aptitude that the dependencies of the kde and kdenetwork metapackages should be regarded as manually installed: aptitude unmarkauto '~R^kde$' aptitude unmarkauto '~R^kdenetwork$' After that you can remove knewsticker and keep the rest of the system in place. The (empty) kdenetwork and kde metapackages still have to go, of course, so you will miss the convenience that they offer. You have to decide for yourself if being able to remove some component(s) is worth that. The whole thing should work the same for other metapackages (gnome, xorg, etc.) Just walk down the chain of dependencies with unmarkauto until you are able to perform your intended action without causing collateral damage. For more complicated cases it can be helpful to use aptitude in interactive mode because that gives you a quick way to follow chains of dependencies, in both forward and reverse direction. -- Regards,| http://users.icfo.es/Florian.Kulzer Florian | -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On Mon, Aug 20, 2007 at 01:30:28AM +0200, Florian Kulzer wrote: On Sun, Aug 19, 2007 at 22:06:29 +, s. keeling wrote: The problem is this: If you install the kde (or gnome) metapackage with aptitude then all the other KDE (Gnome) packages are marked as automatically installed because they were pulled in to satisfy the dependencies of the metapackage. (That is in fact the very purpose of these metapackages: To save you the trouble of installing all the parts of KDE/Gnome manually. With aptitude, this also gives you an easy way to remove all of KDE/Gnome again: Just remove the top-level metapackage and all the automatically installed dependencies will be uninstalled, too.) Now, as long as you keep the whole set of packages, everything is fine. However, as soon as you remove one component you will get a domino effect: Let's say you want to remove knewsticker. This means that the kdenetwork metapackage has to be removed, too, because it depends on knewsticker. Unfortunately this kills the kde metapackage (since it depends on kdenetwork) and the whole house of cards collapses. With the kde package scheduled for removal, all its automatically installed dependencies are unused (as fas as aptitude knows) and therefore aptitude will try to remove them all at the next opportunity. This gets you into the dreaded 288 packages will be removed, do you want to continue? situation. The first thing to do in such a case is to run aptitude keep-all (or use Actions - Cancel pending actions in interactive mode) Or, if you've been using interactive all along, after the first 'g'o and you get the surprising list, hit q to go back to the main screen, go to the kde meta-package, go down the list of its dependancies and mark each of them as manually installed, except those that you don't want (or at least don't think you want). Now mark the kde meta-package for removal. Now tell aptitude to 'g'o, and it should only want to remove the meta-package and anything else that you didn't select for manual install. Tell it to 'g'o ahead. As for removing knewsticker, if the KDE meta-package depends on it, aptiude should show some packages broken (see the second line of the screen). It doesn't go about resoving the breakage untill you tell it to 'g'o the first time. You can scroll to the first broken package with 'b' and it will tell you why that package is broken. The point is that all this takes place within the interactive screen. You can exit at any time and it will remember where you left off if you need time to think/sleep. Doug. -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: Source of Debian wisdom
On 08/19/2007 05:00 PM, Ken Irving wrote: [...] I haven't tried aptitude for some time, and apparently the problem I had with it (where it wanted to remove a lot of stuff) has been fixed. I think that, even before that fix, it would work reasonably (i.e., no surprises) as long as it was used exclusively. [...] And I think that's why I haven't had any problems with it. I forgot to mention that I also usually start aptitude as a normal user, and I carefully select and deselect packages--examining what aptitude will do and why--before I consider installing. This allows me to back out of any changes without any danger of modifying the system until I'm ready. In many cases, aptitude says to me the equivalent of sorry bub, you'll have to compile from the source if you don't want to break your system. I've learned (from reading of other people's bad experiences) to take that advice :-) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of unsubscribe. Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
