Debian GNU/Linux Reference Guide
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Debian Reference

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Abstract

This Debian Reference is intended to provide a broad overview of the Debian system as a post-installation user's guide. It covers many aspects of system administration through shell-command examples. Basic tutorials, tips, and other information are provided for topics including fundamental concepts of the Debian system, system installation hints, Debian package management, the Linux kernel under Debian, system tuning, building a gateway, text editors, CVS, programming, and GnuPG for non-developers.

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Copyright Notice

Copyright © 2001–2005 by Osamu Aoki <osamu#at#debian.org>.
Copyright (Chapter 2) © 1996–2001 by Software in the Public Interest.

This document may be used under the terms of the GNU General Public License version 2 or higher.

Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this document provided the copyright notice and this permission notice are preserved on all copies.

Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this document under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided that the entire resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a permission notice identical to this one.

Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this document into another language, under the above conditions for modified versions, except that this permission notice may be included in translations approved by the Free Software Foundation instead of in the original English.

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Contents

• 1 Preface
  • 1.1 Official document
  • 1.2 Document conventions
  • 1.3 Example scripts
  • 1.4 Basic setup
  • 1.5 Basics of the Debian distributions
• 2 Debian fundamentals
  • 2.1 The Debian archives
    • 2.1.1 Directory structures
    • 2.1.2 Debian distributions
    • 2.1.3 The stable distribution
    • 2.1.4 The testing distribution
    • 2.1.5 The unstable distribution
    • 2.1.6 The frozen distribution
    • 2.1.7 Debian distribution codenames
    • 2.1.8 Codenames used in the past
    • 2.1.9 The source for codenames
    • 2.1.10 The pool directory
    • 2.1.11 Historical notes about Sid
    • 2.1.12 Uploaded packages in incoming/
    • 2.1.13 Retrieving an older package
    • 2.1.14 Architecture sections
    • 2.1.15 The source code
  • 2.2 The Debian package management system
    • 2.2.1 Overview of Debian packages
    • 2.2.2 Debian package format
    • 2.2.3 Naming conventions for Debian package filenames
    • 2.2.4 Preservation of local configuration
    • 2.2.5 Debian maintenance scripts
    • 2.2.6 Package priorities
    • 2.2.7 Virtual packages
    • 2.2.8 Package dependencies
    • 2.2.9 The meaning of "Pre-Depends"
    • 2.2.10 Package status
    • 2.2.11 Holding back packages from an upgrade
    • 2.2.12 Source packages
    • 2.2.13 Building binary packages from a source package
    • 2.2.14 Creating new Debian packages
  • 2.3 Upgrading a Debian system
    • 2.3.1 dpkg
    • 2.3.2 APT
    • 2.3.3 dselect
    • 2.3.4 Upgrading a running system
    • 2.3.5 Downloaded and cached .deb archive files
    • 2.3.6 Record-keeping for upgrades
  • 2.4 The Debian boot process
    • 2.4.1 The init program
    • 2.4.2 Runlevels
    • 2.4.3 Customizing runlevels
  • 2.5 Supporting diversity
  • 2.6 Internationalization
  • 2.7 Debian and the kernel
    • 2.7.1 Compiling a kernel from non-Debian source
    • 2.7.2 Tools to build custom kernels
    • 2.7.3 Alternative boot loaders
    • 2.7.4 Custom boot floppies
    • 2.7.5 Special provisions for dealing with modules
    • 2.7.6 De-installing an old kernel package
• 3 Debian System installation hints
  • 3.1 General Linux system installation hints
    • 3.1.1 Hardware compatibility basics
    • 3.1.2 Determining a PC's hardware and chip set
    • 3.1.3 Determining a PC's hardware via Debian
    • 3.1.4 Determining a PC's hardware via other OSs
    • 3.1.5 A Lilo myth
    • 3.1.6 GRUB
    • 3.1.7 Choice of boot floppies
    • 3.1.8 Installation
    • 3.1.9 Hosts and IP to use for LAN
    • 3.1.10 User accounts
    • 3.1.11 Creating filesystems
    • 3.1.12 DRAM memory guidelines
    • 3.1.13 Swap space
  • 3.2 Bash configuration
  • 3.3 Mouse configuration
    • 3.3.1 PS/2 mice
    • 3.3.2 USB mice
    • 3.3.3 Touchpad
  • 3.4 NFS configuration
  • 3.5 Samba configuration
  • 3.6 Printer configuration
    • 3.6.1 lpr/lpd
    • 3.6.2 CUPS™
  • 3.7 CRON for desktop PC
  • 3.8 Other host installation hints
    • 3.8.1 Install a few more packages after initial install
    • 3.8.2 Modules
    • 3.8.3 CD-RW basic setup
    • 3.8.4 Large memory and auto power-off
    • 3.8.5 Strange access problems with some websites
    • 3.8.6 Dialup PPP configuration
    • 3.8.7 Other configuration files to tweak in /etc/
• 4 Debian tutorials
  • 4.1 Getting started
    • 4.1.1 Login to a shell prompt as root
    • 4.1.2 Set up minimal newbie environment
    • 4.1.3 Add a user account
    • 4.1.4 Switch between virtual console
    • 4.1.5 How to shut down
    • 4.1.6 Play time
  • 4.2 Midnight Commander (MC)
    • 4.2.1 Enhance MC
    • 4.2.2 Start MC
    • 4.2.3 File manager in MC
    • 4.2.4 Command-line tricks in MC
    • 4.2.5 Editor in MC
    • 4.2.6 Viewer in MC
    • 4.2.7 Auto-start features of MC
    • 4.2.8 FTP virtual filesystem of MC
  • 4.3 Unix-like work environment
    • 4.3.1 Special key strokes
    • 4.3.2 Basic Unix commands
    • 4.3.3 The command execution
    • 4.3.4 Simple command
    • 4.3.5 Command execution and environment variable
    • 4.3.6 Command search path
    • 4.3.7 Command line options
    • 4.3.8 Shell wildcards
    • 4.3.9 Return value of the command
    • 4.3.10 Typical command sequences
    • 4.3.11 Command alias
  • 4.4 Unix-like text processing
    • 4.4.1 Regular expressions
    • 4.4.2 Replacement expressions
  • 4.5 Unix-like filesystem
    • 4.5.1 Unix file basics
    • 4.5.2 The filesystem concept in Debian
    • 4.5.3 File and directory access permissions
    • 4.5.4 Timestamps
    • 4.5.5 Links
    • 4.5.6 Named pipes (FIFOs)
    • 4.5.7 Sockets
    • 4.5.8 Device files
    • 4.5.9 /proc filesystem
  • 4.6 X Window System
    • 4.6.1 Start the X Window System
    • 4.6.2 Menu in the X Window System
    • 4.6.3 Keyboard sequence for the X Window System
  • 4.7 Further study
• 5 Upgrading a distribution to stable, testing, or unstable
  • 5.1 Upgrading from Potato to Woody
  • 5.2 Preparing for upgrade
  • 5.3 Upgrading
    • 5.3.1 Using dselect
    • 5.3.2 Using apt-get
• 6 Debian package management
  • 6.1 Introduction
    • 6.1.1 Main package management tools
    • 6.1.2 Convenience tools
  • 6.2 Beginning Debian package management
    • 6.2.1 Set up APT
    • 6.2.2 Installing tasks
    • 6.2.3 aptitude
    • 6.2.4 dselect
    • 6.2.5 Tracking a distribution using APT
    • 6.2.6 aptitude, apt-get and apt-cache commands
  • 6.3 Debian survival commands
    • 6.3.1 Check bugs in Debian and seek help
    • 6.3.2 APT upgrade troubleshooting
    • 6.3.3 Rescue using dpkg
    • 6.3.4 Recover package selection data
    • 6.3.5 Rescue system after crashing /var
    • 6.3.6 Install a package into an unbootable system
    • 6.3.7 What to do if the dpkg command is broken
  • 6.4 Debian nirvana commands
    • 6.4.1 Information on a file
    • 6.4.2 Information on a package
    • 6.4.3 Unattended installation with APT
    • 6.4.4 Reconfigure installed packages
    • 6.4.5 Remove and purge packages
    • 6.4.6 Holding older packages
    • 6.4.7 Mixed stable/testing/unstable system
    • 6.4.8 Prune cached package files
    • 6.4.9 Record/copy system configuration
    • 6.4.10 Port a package to the stable system
    • 6.4.11 Local package archive
    • 6.4.12 Convert or install an alien binary package
    • 6.4.13 Automatically install command
    • 6.4.14 Verify installed package files
    • 6.4.15 Optimized sources.list
  • 6.5 Other Debian peculiarities
    • 6.5.1 The dpkg-divert command
    • 6.5.2 The equivs package
    • 6.5.3 Alternative commands
    • 6.5.4 Runlevel usage
    • 6.5.5 Disabled daemon services
• 7 The Linux kernel under Debian
  • 7.1 Kernel recompile
    • 7.1.1 Debian standard method
    • 7.1.2 Classic method
    • 7.1.3 Kernel headers
  • 7.2 The modularized 2.4 kernel
    • 7.2.1 PCMCIA
    • 7.2.2 SCSI
    • 7.2.3 Network function
    • 7.2.4 EXT3 filesystem ( > 2.4.17)
    • 7.2.5 Realtek RTL-8139 support in 2.4
    • 7.2.6 Parallel port support
  • 7.3 Tuning the kernel through the proc filesystem
    • 7.3.1 Too many open files
    • 7.3.2 Disk flush intervals
    • 7.3.3 Sluggish old low memory machines
  • 7.4 The 2.6 kernel with udev
• 8 Debian tips
  • 8.1 Booting the system
    • 8.1.1 "I forgot the root password!" (1)
    • 8.1.2 "I forgot the root password!" (2)
    • 8.1.3 Cannot boot the system
    • 8.1.4 "Let me disable X on boot!"
    • 8.1.5 Other boot tricks with the boot prompt
    • 8.1.6 Setting GRUB boot parameters
  • 8.2 Recording activities
    • 8.2.1 Recording shell activities
    • 8.2.2 Recording X activities
  • 8.3 Copy and archive a whole subdirectory
    • 8.3.1 Basic commands for copying a whole subdirectory
    • 8.3.2 cp
    • 8.3.3 tar
    • 8.3.4 pax
    • 8.3.5 cpio
    • 8.3.6 afio
  • 8.4 Differential backup and data synchronization
    • 8.4.1 Differential backup with rdiff
    • 8.4.2 Daily backup with pdumpfs
    • 8.4.3 Regular differential backup with RCS
  • 8.5 System freeze recovery
    • 8.5.1 Kill a process
    • 8.5.2 Alt-SysRq
  • 8.6 Nifty little commands to remember
    • 8.6.1 Pager
    • 8.6.2 Free memory
    • 8.6.3 Set time (BIOS)
    • 8.6.4 Set time (NTP)
    • 8.6.5 How to control console features such as the screensaver
    • 8.6.6 Search administrative database
    • 8.6.7 Disable sound (beep)
    • 8.6.8 Error messages on the console screen
    • 8.6.9 Set console to the correct type
    • 8.6.10 Get the console back to a sane state
    • 8.6.11 Convert a text file from DOS to Unix style
    • 8.6.12 Convert a text file with recode
    • 8.6.13 Regular-expression substitution
    • 8.6.14 Edit a file in place using a script
    • 8.6.15 Extract differences and merge updates for source files
    • 8.6.16 Convert a large file into small files
    • 8.6.17 Extract data from text file table
    • 8.6.18 Script snippets for piping commands
    • 8.6.19 Script snippets for looping over each file
    • 8.6.20 Perl short script madness
    • 8.6.21 Get text or a mailing list archive from a web page
    • 8.6.22 Pretty print a web page
    • 8.6.23 Pretty print a manual page
    • 8.6.24 Merge two PostScript or PDF files
    • 8.6.25 Time a command
    • 8.6.26 nice command
    • 8.6.27 Schedule activity (cron, at)
    • 8.6.28 Console switching with screen
    • 8.6.29 Network testing basics
    • 8.6.30 Flush mail from local spool
    • 8.6.31 Remove frozen mail from local spool
    • 8.6.32 Redeliver mbox contents
    • 8.6.33 Clear file contents
    • 8.6.34 Dummy files
    • 8.6.35 chroot
    • 8.6.36 How to check hard links
    • 8.6.37 mount hard disk image file
    • 8.6.38 Samba
    • 8.6.39 Utilities for foreign filesystems
  • 8.7 Typical mistakes to be noted
    • 8.7.1 rm -rf .*
    • 8.7.2 rm /etc/passwd
• 9 Tuning a Debian system
  • 9.1 System initialization
    • 9.1.1 Customizing init scripts
    • 9.1.2 Customizing system logging
    • 9.1.3 Optimizing hardware
  • 9.2 Restricting access
    • 9.2.1 Restricting logins with PAM
    • 9.2.2 "Why GNU su does not support the wheel group"
    • 9.2.3 Purposes of standard groups
    • 9.2.4 Working more safely – sudo
    • 9.2.5 Restricting access to services
    • 9.2.6 Centralizing authentication – LDAP
  • 9.3 CD writers
    • 9.3.1 Introduction
    • 9.3.2 Approach 1: modules + lilo
    • 9.3.3 Approach 2: recompile the kernel
    • 9.3.4 Post-configuration steps
    • 9.3.5 CD-image file (bootable)
    • 9.3.6 Write to the CD-writer (R, RW):
    • 9.3.7 Make an image file of a CD
    • 9.3.8 Debian CD images
    • 9.3.9 Back up the system to CD-R
    • 9.3.10 Copy a music CD to CD-R
    • 9.3.11 Writing DVD-R, DVD-RW, and DVD+RW
  • 9.4 X
    • 9.4.1 X packages
    • 9.4.2 Hardware detection for X
    • 9.4.3 The X server
    • 9.4.4 X clients
    • 9.4.5 X sessions
    • 9.4.6 Using X over TCP/IP
    • 9.4.7 Connecting to a remote X server – xhost
    • 9.4.8 Connecting to a remote X server – ssh
    • 9.4.9 The X terminal emulator – xterm
    • 9.4.10 X resources
    • 9.4.11 Keymaps and pointer button mappings in X
    • 9.4.12 Getting root in X
    • 9.4.13 TrueType fonts in X
    • 9.4.14 Web browsers in X
    • 9.4.15 Mail Clients (MUAs) in X
  • 9.5 SSH
    • 9.5.1 Basics of SSH
    • 9.5.2 Port forwarding for SMTP/POP3 tunneling
    • 9.5.3 Connecting with fewer passwords – RSA
    • 9.5.4 Dealing with alien SSH clients
    • 9.5.5 Setting up ssh-agent
    • 9.5.6 Troubleshooting SSH
  • 9.6 Mail
    • 9.6.1 Mail transport agents (MTAs)
    • 9.6.2 Fetching mail – Fetchmail
    • 9.6.3 Processing mail – Procmail
    • 9.6.4 Processing spam with crm114
    • 9.6.5 Reading mail – Mutt
  • 9.7 Localization (l10n)
    • 9.7.1 Basics of localization
    • 9.7.2 Locales
    • 9.7.3 Introduction to locales
    • 9.7.4 Activating locale support
    • 9.7.5 Activating a particular locale
    • 9.7.6 ISO 8601 date format locale
    • 9.7.7 Example for the US (ISO-8859-1)
    • 9.7.8 Example for France with Euro sign (ISO-8859-15)
    • 9.7.9 Example for a multilingual X window system
    • 9.7.10 Alternative X input methods
    • 9.7.11 X terminal emulators
    • 9.7.12 UTF-8 support for the X terminal emulator
    • 9.7.13 Example for UTF-8 in a framebuffer console
    • 9.7.14 Beyond locales
  • 9.8 Multilingualization (m17n)
• 10 Network configuration
  • 10.1 Basics of IP networking
  • 10.2 Low level network configuration
    • 10.2.1 Low level network configuration – ifconfig and route
    • 10.2.2 Low level network configuration – ip
    • 10.2.3 Configuring a Wi-Fi interface
    • 10.2.4 Configuring a PPP interface
  • 10.3 Naming the computer
    • 10.3.1 Hostname
    • 10.3.2 Mailname
  • 10.4 Domain Name Service (DNS)
    • 10.4.1 The resolver
    • 10.4.2 Managing nameserver information – resolvconf
    • 10.4.3 Caching looked-up names – nscd, dnsmasq, pdnsd, bind9
    • 10.4.4 Providing Domain Name Service – bind
  • 10.5 Configuring network interfaces using DHCP
  • 10.6 High level network configuration in Debian
    • 10.6.1 High level network configuration using ifupdown
    • 10.6.2 High level network configuration using ifupdown logical interface definitions
    • 10.6.3 Automatic network configuration using ifupdown
    • 10.6.4 Automatic network configuration using laptop-net
    • 10.6.5 Automatic network configuration using network-manager
  • 10.7 Dealing with inconsistent naming of interfaces by the kernel
  • 10.8 Triggering network configuration
    • 10.8.1 Triggering network configuration at boot time
    • 10.8.2 Triggering network configuration – hotplug
    • 10.8.3 Triggering network configuration – ifplugd
    • 10.8.4 Triggering network configuration – waproamd
    • 10.8.5 Network configuration and PCMCIA
  • 10.9 Multi-stage mapping
  • 10.10 Network service configuration
  • 10.11 Network troubleshooting
  • 10.12 Building a gateway router
    • 10.12.1 Netfilter configuration
    • 10.12.2 Manage multiple net connections
• 11 Editors
  • 11.1 Popular editors
  • 11.2 Rescue editors
  • 11.3 Emacs and Vim
    • 11.3.1 Vim hints
    • 11.3.2 Emacs hints
    • 11.3.3 Starting the editor
    • 11.3.4 Editor command summary (Emacs, Vim)
    • 11.3.5 Vim configuration
    • 11.3.6 Ctags
    • 11.3.7 Convert a syntax-highlighted screen to HTML source
    • 11.3.8 Split screen with vim
• 12 Version Control Systems
  • 12.1 Concurrent Versions System (CVS)
    • 12.1.1 Installing a CVS server
    • 12.1.2 CVS session examples
    • 12.1.3 Troubleshooting CVS
    • 12.1.4 CVS commands
  • 12.2 Subversion
    • 12.2.1 Installing a Subversion server
    • 12.2.2 Moving a CVS repository to Subversion
    • 12.2.3 Subversion usage examples
• 13 Programming
  • 13.1 Where to start
  • 13.2 Shell
    • 13.2.1 Bash – GNU standard interactive shell
    • 13.2.2 POSIX shells
    • 13.2.3 Shell parameters
    • 13.2.4 Shell redirection
    • 13.2.5 Shell conditionals
    • 13.2.6 Command-line processing
  • 13.3 Awk
  • 13.4 Perl
  • 13.5 Python
  • 13.6 Make
  • 13.7 C
    • 13.7.1 Simple C program (gcc)
    • 13.7.2 Debugging
    • 13.7.3 Flex – a better Lex
    • 13.7.4 Bison – a better Yacc
    • 13.7.5 Autoconf
  • 13.8 Web
  • 13.9 Document preparation
    • 13.9.1 roff typesetting
    • 13.9.2 SGML
    • 13.9.3 TeX/LaTeX
    • 13.9.4 Literate Programming
  • 13.10 Packaging
    • 13.10.1 Packaging a single binary
    • 13.10.2 Packaging with tools
• 14 GnuPG
  • 14.1 Installing GnuPG
  • 14.2 Using GnuPG
  • 14.3 Managing GnuPG
  • 14.4 Using GnuPG with applications
    • 14.4.1 Using GnuPG with Mutt
    • 14.4.2 Using GnuPG with Vim
• 15 Support for Debian
  • 15.1 References
  • 15.2 Finding the meaning of a word
  • 15.3 Finding the popularity of a Debian package
  • 15.4 The Debian bug tracking system
  • 15.5 Mailing lists
  • 15.6 Internet Relay Chat (IRC)
  • 15.7 Search engines
  • 15.8 Websites
• A Appendix
  • A.1 Authors
  • A.2 Warranties
  • A.3 Feedback
  • A.4 Document format
  • A.5 The Debian maze
  • A.6 The Debian quotes

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Debian GNU/Linux Reference Guide
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