not an auspicious start

LoLth

Hi,

I have decided to have a crack at installing and playing with Debian however things do not bode well considering I have stumbled at teh very first hurdle...

I am downloading from

http://ftp.esat.net/pub/linux/debian-cd/

where it has the option of an R1 and an R2 iso image... into the i386 directory and both R1 and R2 offer 7 iso images and an update image all with the same modification date (except the update which has a later date)...

I really doubt I have to d'load all 14 iso's and create 14 cds to install. So which one (s) do I download? One from column R1 and one from Column R2 + the updates? Or just one from R2 + update?

help!

Typedef

If you have bandwidth download the minimum and apt-get over your network.

Else get R2 since it's newer, shinier and makes better coffee!

LoLth

Just one ISO form R2 + the update or the whole 7?

Typedef

The only one's you probably need are the first 3

http://ftp.esat.net/pub/linux/debian-cd/3.0_r2/i386/debian-30r2-i386-binary-1.iso
http://ftp.esat.net/pub/linux/debian-cd/3.0_r2/i386/debian-30r2-i386-binary-2.iso
http://ftp.esat.net/pub/linux/debian-cd/3.0_r2/i386/debian-30r2-i386-binary-3.iso

The Debian chaps request you use http://www.debian.org/CD/jigdo-cd/ instead to get Debian, so as not to waste bandwidth.

Dare I say RTFM

From the FAQ on the Debian site.

Which of the numerous CD images should I download? Do I need all of them?

No, you only need the CD images for your computer's architecture. The architecture is the type of hardware your computer uses. By far the most popular one is the Intel architecture, so most people will only want to get the images for "i386".

Furthermore, in most cases it is not necessary to download all of the images for your architecture. The packages on the CDs are sorted by popularity: CD 1 contains the installation system and the most popular packages. CD 2 contains slightly less popular ones, CD 3 even less popular ones, etc. You will probably not need CD 3 and higher unless you have very special requirements. (And in case you happen to need a package later on which is not on one of the CDs you downloaded, you can always install that package directly from the Internet.)

Finally, for each architecture there are two versions of the first CD, the normal and the non-US version. You only need one of these! See below for details.

Zaltais

If you've a Broadband internet connection you can download the minimal installation CD iso from here if you want to stick with the 'stable' branch (i.e. server) or if its for your a desktop / fiddling with use the 'testing' image from here

When you've burnt the ISO and completed the initial install, as root run 'apt-get update' and then 'apt-get upgrade'

When that's done install whatever packages you want with 'apt-get install <package-name>'

apt will resolve all dependencies automagically

LoLth

me hangs head in shame... off to RTFM

thanks for that. I read the FAQ but must have skipped that part.

I tried that jigdo thing but it would run on my PC in work (windows 2000 - and yes, suprisingly I did download the windows version!).

me off to suck up the work server bandwidth Muhahahahahaaaaa!.

oscarBravo

Originally posted by Zaltais
When you've burnt the ISO and completed the initial install, as root run 'apt-get update' and then 'apt-get upgrade'

'apt-get dist-upgrade' is a better idea - it handles dependencies more intelligently.

Zaltais

Originally posted by oscarBravo
'apt-get dist-upgrade' is a better idea - it handles dependencies more intelligently.

Apologies for taking this slightly off topic....

I was under the impression that 'apt-get dist-upgrade' was for doing a branch upgrade or to resolve dependency problems when upgrading to a new version of gcc or libc or something.

So for just a 'normal' (i.e. security fix -> patch etc) just run 'apt-get upgrade' then to move to a different branch (e.g. stable to testing) do an apt-get upgrade, update /etc/sources.list to point to the testing repositories, 'apt-get update' to update the package lists, then 'apt-get dist-upgrade' to run the actual 'full' upgrade. Somewhat equivilent to going from RH8 to RH9, or FC1

Or am I looking at it the wrong way?

oscarBravo

From 'man apt-get':

upgrade
upgrade is used to install the newest versions of all packages currently installed on the system from the sources enumerated in /etc/apt/sources.list. Packages currently installed with new versions available are retrieved and upgraded; under no circumstances are currently installed packages removed, or packages not already installed retrieved and installed. New versions of currently installed packages that cannot be upgraded without changing the install status of another package will be left at their current version. An update must be performed first so that apt-get knows that new versions of packages are available.

[...]

dist-upgrade
dist-upgrade, in addition to performing the function of upgrade, also intelligently handles changing dependencies with new versions of packages; apt-get has a "smart" conflict resolution system, and it will attempt to upgrade the most important packages at the expense of less important ones if necessary. The /etc/apt/sources.list file contains a list of locations from which to retrieve desired package files. See also apt_preferences(5) for a mechanism for overriding the general settings for individual packages.

My experience has been that sometimes new versions of packages require entirely new packages to be installed - 'dist-upgrade' will handle this for you, whereas 'upgrade' won't.

My gut feeling is that 'upgrade' is for those people who tend to stick with the stable distribution, and want tight control over what packages are installed. If you're a bleeding-edge monkey like me, you probably want 'dist-upgrade'.