Re: Help with Installation...

["Eric G . Miller" <egm2@jps.net>]

On Sat, Sep 02, 2000 at 04:05:48PM -0700, Gutierrez Family wrote:
> Thank you for responding !!
> 
> Quick answers and a few more questions...
> 
> 1) I installed Debian 2.2 off a 3-CD set.  I booted the CD directly after
> power up.  It is supposed to be the "official CD" set, which I bought from
> "Discount Linux CDs" (it's mentioned on the Debian.org website).  And to
> answer your other question, the installation DID ask me to change CDs two
> separate times.  One (I believe) was just to see which packages were on all
> three CDs, the second time was when it was actually installing the necessary
> files on my hard drive (here it asked me for CDs #1 and #2, it never asked
> me for #3).

I think #3 is packages in source form.  I dunno for sure.

> 2) I could swear that I went through the X configuration during the install.
> I remember answering questions about the mouse, sync ranges, resolutions,
> color, etc.  I will take your advice and reconfigure X using "xf86setup", I
> have all the data I need.  I'll let you know the results...

Sounds like you did then.  Did you say yes when xf86config prompted you
to save the configuration file?  Maybe you didn't get something right? X
is a real pain in the <expletive> to install/configure.  It's getting
better with 4.0 (but that's not widely supported yet).

> 3) You mention running dselect to fix the "broken" packages...  I'm new to
> Debian and the entire concept of dpkg/dselect/apg-get, etc.  I have only a
> general understanding.  My first question would be, how do I know which
> packages were the broken ones???  I tried keeping a log of those messages,
> but soon realized that the scrolling was faster than I could write.

dpkg -- The general package management tool (all others use it)

apt  -- Advanced Package Tool (makes a nice front-end to dpkg,
especially when updating packages for security fixes, for instance)

dselect -- The older package management interface (can use apt or dpkg).
It's still pretty useful for scrolling through packages and descriptions
you might want to install.

To find out the packages that are slated for installation, but aren't
all the way properly installed, you can try this little one-liner.

$ dpkg -l \* | grep '^i[^i]'
                      ^  ^
		      |   \_ [not] Installed [state]
		       \_ Install [desired state]

Sorry that's a bit obtuse, but it should work.

-- 
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