Re: Debian/Debian Gnome
On Mon, Nov 03, 2025 at 12:43:11 -0500, Tech_Research wrote:
> What's the difference between Debian & Debian Gnome?
You've probably stumbled across the "Live" images.
Debian has a variety of installation/Live images. The basic installer
image, which you get if you go to the main debian.org web site and click
the gigantic download button, is called "netinst", which stands for
"network installation". Contrary to the name, it doesn't *actually*
need a network connection to install.
The netinst image is small, and contains a rather spartan set of
packages. When you install, you go through a basic hardware detection
and disk formatting process, and then you select from a set of "tasks".
By default, the task for "Desktop Environment" is selected, but you
can change this. Any tasks that are selected for installation will
correspond to a set of packages that will be installed. If those
packages are on the installation medium, then they're installed from
there. Otherwise, the installer will attempt to download them from
the Internet.
The "netinst", being small, will end up downloading a large number of
packages if you select a Desktop Environment, because those packages
do not fit within the installer image.
So, that's the normall installer.
In addition to that installer, there's a set of "Live" images, which
are meant for booting and running a Debian system directly from some
medium, such as a DVD or a USB thumb drive. Each Live image has a
different user interface configured. There's one with GNOME, one with
KDE, one with XFCE, and so on. The environment you get when you boot
the Live image will be what it says on the label.
The Live images have an installer as well, but not it's not the regular
Debian installer. It's an alternative installer, and it works a bit
differently. If you install from a Live image, the resulting system
has some differences, compared to a normal installation. They're pretty
subtle, but every once in a while, someone is surprised by them.
I'm guessing that when you say "Debian GNOME", what you actually have
is a Debian Live image with GNOME configured on it.
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