[PLUG] Is Debian that hard to work with, or am I that dumb?

Jeff Schwaber freyley at gmx.net
Wed Mar 24 19:01:02 UTC 2004


On Wed, 2004-03-24 at 18:04, Paul Johnson wrote:

> > However, the last two times I went to install Debian, I gave up in
> > frustration and broke out the RedHat ISOs after a couple days of misery.
> 
> Well, there's your first mistake.

And this, not to put too fine a point on it, is what gives Debian a bad
name.

*sigh*

Debian isn't particularly easy to install. And configuring X can be a
pain in the ass. There are tools and tricks to make it easier, but if
you don't know about them, they're kinda hard to try. And debian zealots
don't make anything easier.

Just a few notes for anyone else looking to install debian:

1) lspci is your friend. A handy Knoppix cd is also your friend. With
the exception if ISA and older hardware, where you Just Have To Know It,
the two of these can report your hardware very well. Booting Knoppix,
hitting ctrl-alt-f1, and typing lsmod is extremely handy for finding out
what modules to load to get hardware working. 

2) And Knoppix's XFConfig-4 file, while slightly less bleeding-edge than
you might want optimally, works fairly well for configuring X. 
It's good, if possible, to get debian and X to work together as friends.
dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86 (assuming it's installed) will attempt
to reconfigure the xserver. Read the XF86Config-4 file and you'll know
what to put in the boxes, making upgrades a tad easier.

3) apt-get only works if your sources are right. Check out
/etc/apt/sources.list and look on the web on your other computer, or
with a knoppix cd, to find usable sources.list files. Here's mine:

deb http://debian.oregonstate.edu/debian/ testing contrib non-free main
deb http://debian.oregonstate.edu/debian/ unstable contrib non-free main
deb http://ftp-mirror.internap.com/pub/debian/ testing contrib non-free
main
deb http://ftp-mirror.internap.com/pub/debian/ unstable contrib non-free
main
deb http://non-us.debian.org/debian-non-US testing/non-US contrib
non-free main
deb http://non-us.debian.org/debian-non-US unstable/non-US contrib
non-free main 

4) ignore the zealots. Debian is wonderful in some ways, and the
community can be incredibly helpful and friendly. Sadly, some people
take love of debian too far.

Jeff





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