[plug] Newbie Install of Debain "woody"

[Craig Foster]

>From a RHCE who worked in a Debian shop... 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: plug-bounces at plug.linux.org.au 
> [mailto:plug-bounces at plug.linux.org.au] On Behalf Of Arie Hol
> Sent: Thursday, 22 July 2004 9:56 PM
> To: plug at plug.linux.org.au
> Subject: [plug] Newbie Install of Debain "woody"
> 
> 
> 
> After the attending the installfest as an observer, I got 
> brave and decided to try and install Debian 'woody' and say 
> goodbye to RH 7.3.

Fair enough... :)
 
> I installed Debian from the DVD that came with the June 
> edition  of APC magazine.
> 
> The PC I installed on had no DVD drive, so I copied the whole 
> shebang onto a 6 Gb partition on the HDD, over a 10 Mbit/s 
> network (oooooooh sooooooooo sloooooooooooow !!!!!!!!!!!!!), 
> but I succeeded.

Never underestimate, whether it's ADSL overnight or a PLUG workshop in
minutes, installing an "old" woody 3.2 and using "apt-get dist-upgrade"

> I then made up a set of installation boot disks according to 
> the instructions in the APC magazine.
> 
> Everything went well - and I now have a base installation of 
> Debian 'woody' which multiboots with
> Win98 using lilo. 
> 
> The machine is stable, and runs quite well (so far)
> 
> Problem 1
> --------------
> For installing software I could not get dselect to accept any 
> of the paths to the partition/directories where all the 
> Package.gz and *.deb files are located.
> 
> In fstab I have :
> 
> /dev/hda12		/mnt/setup   	vfat    defaults	
> 	0	0
> 
> So the path required for dselect should be (I hope) :
> 
> 	/mnt/setup/pool/main/l/less/less_374-4_i386.deb
> 
> But dselect spits the dummy - I moves on to tasksel (?????)

Forget dselect if you're approaching this as a newbie!!!
Ask yourself what you want to do with your machine and run tasksel, or
apt-cache search / apt-get install.

> Problem 2
> ---------------
> 
> I could not figure out how to use tasksel - so I gave up and 
> went straight to dpkg using :
> 
> 	dpkg --install /mnt/setup/pool/main/l/less/less_374-4_i386.deb
> 
> And it worked - now all I have to do is figure which software 
> to install out 8,250 .deb files stored on /setup.
> 
> I suppose I should start with the 'X Windows system' ----
> 
> Can somebody tell me what I should and should not install - 
> and is there a correct sequence (  I suppose this raises many 
> questions about what the system will be used for etc.etc....) 
> just  basic system at the moment - will expand as my skill 
> level grows and my dependancy on M$oft recedes.

Think of something application wise. Eg Gnumeric.
Apt-get install gnumeric and watch all the requirements
download/copy/install automatically.
 
> Problem 3
> --------------
> Cannot get network card to work - the nic is an ethernet 
> express (eepro.o is the required module and worked OK for RH 
> 7.3 ) insmod will install the module (using autodetect=1) and 
> I can ping
> 127.0.0.1 no problems, but 'Network Unreachable' on all other 
> IP's on my network.
> 
> The module will not install at system boot - dmesg shows :
> 
> eepro_init_module: Probe is very dangerous in ISA boards!  
> eepro_init_module: Please add "autodetect=1" to force probe
> 
> Where do I add the '"autodetect=1" to have it work from boot up.
> 
> I have been trying the advice given to Jon Miller on the list 
> over the last few days - but no luck.
> 
> I have been reading the Debian FAQ and relevant How-To's - 
> but no luck.
> 
> Tire lots of things - but no luck.

Urgh! The old eepro100 vs e100 debate :P Try e100 as a module and see how
that goes...
 
> Problem X
> ---------------
> I will probably start a flame war because of my choice of 
> Debian over Gentoo, Suse, Mandrake etc, etc.....
> 
> I like them all - but the ones I have tried would not 
> install/configure correctly on this particular PC -  AMD 
> K6-2/450 - 128 Mb RAM - 20Gb HDD - Matrox G400 (but detected 
> as a G200).
> 
> I like so much about Debian and its supporting philosophies - 
> and since doing the base install I now have a better 
> understanding/appreciation of how Linux addresses hardware - 
> a factor which is hidden from most people when installing RH, 
> Mandrake and Suse etc.... due to their really great installers

Umm I use apt for RedHat (fedoralegacy.org and FreshRPMS)...
You can also use the sarge beta installer as referenced on this list
previously. It uses Anaconda (yes the RedHat text installer), so it's a
<sarcasm>little more intuitive</sarcasm>
 
> TIA.
> All and any advice will greatly appreciated.

I can understand what you're going through. I used to be RedHat only, until
I did a stint at a business that pretty much only did Debian. I suppose the
most important thing I learnt it to ignore dselect during installation and
rely on the magic of apt.

Regards,

CraigF.