Re: To the Debian Project, IMHO

["Craig H. Block" <craig.block@mindspring.com>]

<snip>

>         When trying to install debian, I am simply overwhelmed by the number
>         of packages I have to deal with... 

<snip>

I have a solution for that problem using a setup script as follows.  I
simply copy this script and a selections file into ~/deb21 after
bypassing dselect during initial install.  The selections file
(dpkg-selections) can be generated from an existing install with dpkg
--get-selections.  A person could design a custom interactive interface
to generate the selections file and avoid dselect's selector
altogether.  This script is a good example of dselect's and dpkg's power
and flexibility.

#! /bin/bash

grep -q "/dev/hdc /cdrom" /etc/mtab
if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then
   mount /dev/hdc /cdrom
   if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then exit; fi
fi
grep 2/4 /cdrom/.disk/info
if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then echo "Wrong CD"; umount /dev/hdc; exit; fi 
umount /dev/hdc
if [ ! -f /var/lib/dpkg/methods/multicd/shvar.multi_cd ]; then 
   dselect access
fi
if [ ! -f /var/lib/dpkg/methods/multicd/available ]; then dselect
update; fi
dpkg --set-selections < ~/deb21/dpkg-selections 
if [ $? -ne 0 ]; then echo "Could not set selections"; exit; fi
dselect install
dselect config
dselect remove