yeah there seems to be a cult that believes, superstitiously, that "if it is a block device, you must use dd"
sometimes they extend this to char devices like /dev/zero too, which is perhaps even more irrational

oh. let me try.
doesnt work.

well, not if /dev/hdd and /dev/cdrom aren't the same thing

Congratulations, here's your Useless Use Of dd award! Stick it above the fire with your UUOC award if you like!

Congratulations, here's your Useless Use Of dd award! Stick it above the fire with your UUOC award if you like!

hello?
DAMNYOU

Congratulations, here's your Useless Use Of dd award! Stick it above the fire with your UUOC award if you like!

okay, simonrvn

at least ONE of the bots is paying attention

Yet Another Useless Factoid - feel free to add some if nessecary

necessary

well, thats the other word i (prolly) never learn to spell
the other was "available"

well, at least you can use you['][r[e]] properly

and can count till 10, right?
you*

in five or six languages!
yay lag
hello?

Hi, guerin!

Congratulations, here's your Useless Use Of dd award! Stick it above the fire with your UUOC award if you like!

okay, Guerin

more betterer

The first rule about the cult of the believers of the dd superstition; don't talk about the cult of the believers of the dd superstition

i tried both

wth happened there?

i guess i was lagging

wasnt you, i show only 2 msg's in the same minute frame. must be the bot

huh
oh well

sure you're not thinking of the Troll Club?

possibly, but I can't talk about that either if I am can i?

not if you're in it. if you aren't in it, I suppose the rules don't apply
so if you can't talk about the Troll Club, I suppose it means you're in it, and I should just ban you preemptively

well, 1 msg at 30min and 2 at 31 after, but thats still not 4 in 10 sec or whatever its at
ahh yes, about premptive bans, perhaps now is the time to mention the second rule

What kind of second rule, there is only one

very Stalinist.

if these people stalinists you were prolly in sibira NOW

were refers to the past tense, yet you use the present tense with "NOW"? I'm confused

it's all part of his weapon of brain destruction

clearly
or you mean s/were/would be/?

but in fairness it's not his fault English doesn't have sane tense rules like die Muttersprach

well, i'm no wordsmith myself

can someone that has KDE and or GNOME installed run this command and tell me what it returns #sdl-config –prefix –exec-prefix

what is a good program to help test the security of a debian server, or is it easier to just try and crack it yourself?

nessus

you still awake?

probably not
!tell hcy -about ask

big problems with apt-get dependencies and stuff, around libc6 and my kernel version — could i ask you to take a stab at it?

what version of debian?

it's debian sid and a 2.6.3 kernel
here's what's going on:

hello. say i wanted my computer not to start any net device when it boots up, what things should i do to make this happen?

http://paste.debian.net/34567 http://paste.debian.net/34569 http://paste.debian.net/34570 http://paste.debian.net/34571
http://paste.debian.net/34572

you didn't read it, did you

i did, simonrvn, i did, but this is a problem i was unsuccessfully trying to solve about 4 hours ago with peterS, abrotman, and others, and it's quite longwinded, so i thought in this case better see if anyone here's willing to try rather than just shooting in open air.

comment out the 'auto foo' stuff in /etc/network/interfaces
!foo

and bar, also read RFC3092.

anyway, if anyone could look at those pastes (a few lines up) and help me work this out, i'd REALLY appreciate it

checking..

thanks

is there a way to increase the amount of disk space that can be used for virtual memory? i have 256MB physical mem and a 256MB swap, and i just ran out of memory, i run Debian testing, is there a way i can say "you 250MB more from the disk if you need it?"

swapd, a swap file (swapd will make a swap file automagically if needed)
well what is fixed and what isn't?

cool, thanks

nothing's fixed. it's stuck in a loop like that, with everything giving errors like you see in those pastes

this doesn't seem that difficult to fix TBH

if you know how to do it (and help me do so), i'll be ever so grateful
it's stumped some of the better of you (peterS, abrotman, dondelelcaro )

the error messages would seem t imply that you don't have a 2.6 running when you're doing this

uname -r says it's 2.6.3

with LC_CTYPE=foo.UTF-8, man(1) substitutes single-quote characters with some unicode sequence. bad for pasting. aieee!

http://www.stuff.co.nz/4163531a10.html # muhahaha

any way to inhibit that?

oh crap… that's like ancient history
seems to me that it probably isn't recent enough

yes, well, i'd like to replace it with a current debian kernel. but as you can also see in those pastes, i can't figure out how to do it because apt-get is broken

since when was abrotman one of the better of us?

you'll have to bypass apt and dpkg unfortunately

you up to the challenge too?
ok, how would i do that?

how skilled are you at managing dpkg and such?

i would be, my apt-fu is strong. But I have a paper to write. And anyway, simonrvn's is probably stronger.

not extremely
i seem to recall that dpkg has some kind of –force option

that's not going to help much here

ok, so what do i do?
peterS suggested removing binutils and locales for the time being, but that won't work either — there are around 30 things dependent on them that would need to be removed too

this is going to be long…. ugh. basically what you'd need to do is get a recent kernel installed, with the initrd generated, reboot to that kernel, making sure that it's in your bootloader config, etc. then get the glibc installed

and probably those things have dependencies too

yes

what is your problem?

you missed the paster URLs, sec

ok, how do i do that?

http://paste.debian.net/34567 http://paste.debian.net/34569 http://paste.debian.net/34570 http://paste.debian.net/34571
http://paste.debian.net/34572

thanks

man, they're gonna shoot me for this, as this isn't standard practice

i'm running on low batteries (me, not my computer) — was up 24 hours straight and then slept for 3 hours, i seem to have a fever and feel quite sick. but i'm afraid to shut down my computer or leave this as is without fixing it, afraid that it'll break everything and not be able to start
again, so please, PLEASE help guide me through fixing this

well, i assume you have those binutils, glibc debs downloaded right?
do you have a kernel deb downloaded too?
shit… maybe you should go get some rest first. it'll prevent sleep and illness caused errors

I'm trying to use setkeycodes to set an unknown key. By using showkey in other pc I get that the key (it's an spanish keyboard) is "0×39 0xb9". I know that the unknown key is e033. How do I use setkeys to make this key do what the other key does?

leaving it running won't matter

http://paste.debian.net/34576
i don't have a new kernel deb downloaded, no, please point me to one

the basic operations you'd have to do is if dpkg is refusing to act on any packages, it means that you'll have to extract the kernel deb to a tmp dir, then manually mv the stuff to the right places, and get update-initramfs to generate the initrd for you
the right etch one should suffice

ok….. ?

then edit your bootloader conf (and symlinks) to point to the new kernel and initrd, and reboot…. actually rebooting will depends on whether or not what ls -l /lib/libc* syas right now
the essentials here are your kernel, and your glibc version
we'll take care of the package management afterwards. that's higher level

http://paste.debian.net/34577

hi except timidity there's a less resource-intensive way to play .mid files ? on a old 600mhz 64ram pc?

2.3.6, ok, that's the old one.

actually, i just realized something. forgive me if this is irrelevant, but i'm trying to save time and energy. i *do* have a few 2.6.8 kernels in my /boot directory, and there are options for booting them in my lilo … these are kernels i've tried compiling myself on a number of occasions,
they work but not as well as the readymade 2.6.3 one someone gave me initially, so i normally don't use them. would it be wise for me to try rebooting into the most
recent of those?
http://paste.debian.net/34578

ok, are they stable enough for you to have networking up, and be up a few hours?

yes, i believe so on both accounts
if i can't come back, i'll get onto knoppix and get back here that way and let you know?

sure

ok *trembling* i'm going to try that now. wish me luck. hopefully i'll be right back

it's not that complicated, we just have to set up the right conditions for this to work properly
good luck

ok thanks, brb

ugh, major surgery
like doing a brain and heart transplant or something

what package do i need to enable temperature monitor for poweredge 840 ?

laptop?

i installed lm_sensors, and openipmi but no success
poweredge is a server.
from dell.

lm-sensors stuff and the right kernel modules. first thing off top of me head

another way is "mbmon"
!info mbmon

ok, i'm back, so far so good

(Hardware monitoring without kernel dependencies (text client)), section admin, is optional. Version: 2.05-5 (sid), Packaged size: 68 kB, Installed size: 148 kB

looks like a successful non-knoppix boot

# uname -r 2.6.18.2

wb
'k

thanks.

that's better than i expected

mbmon — No Hardware Monitor found!! InitMBInfo: Success

now, i can't *stay* with this kernel ’cause it doesn't do everything right… but hopefully from this i'll be able to fix the apt probs and get a good, perfectly running kernel?

yeh

(it's not noticing my firewire disks anymore, for one)

now try installing the stuff

ok, so what should i do now?

we'll worry about that after

ok
so, apt-get -f install ?

yeh

(i don't have my history saved, so i'm working from memory now)

simonrvn, actually sensor command returned voltages but what i really want to know is fan activity and temperature

do you have dselect or aptitude there?

dselect maybe, aptitude - no.
i normally use apt-get

well seems to me that that machine should be able to give you readings if your sensor cables are plugged in (if needed), the kernel modules are there, and the sensor stuff works
'k

i do have dselect

ok, well, let the -f install happen first
brb

yeah, it's going now. so far so good…

ok

seems to have been successful!
i don't know why i didn't think of this a few hours ago… so now what's my next step?

ok, so libc6 binutils and friends are installed?

hi guys, running lenny here, apparently my intel-hda audio codec does not know how to power the amp for the internal speakers on this laptop. does anyone have any patches for the STAC9228 codec? or packages to make this work? the sound card again is an Intel HDA Stac9228

what does "hi" mean in the dpkg -l output?

held, installed

# dpkg -l | grep libc6 // hi libc6 2.6.1-1 GNU C Library: Shared libraries
does that mean it's ok? or do i need to unhold it?

unholding it would be cool, but looks good
btw you can do dpkg -l libc6

heh thanks
ok, i unheld it

you can do dpkg -l libc6 libc6-dev binutils too

doh
ok, http://paste.debian.net/34579

ok, so check your syslog for any weird stuff like PAM throwing GLIBC_PRIVATE errors, if there's none, it looks good, and you get yourself a better kernel

so remind me what the next thing i need to do is. use apt-get to get a newer kernel/
k

nice
yeh, and consider starting to use aptitude or dselect for major upgrades
apt-cache search linux-image and install the appropriate one

i don't see any weird stuff in my syslog

cool

this one? linux-image-2.6.22-1-686

apart sfxload what can be used to upload soundfonts to Sb Live 24 's midi ?

(BTW abrotman et al. would've been able to do this stuff, this was easy peasy stuff)

(it's just going easily because i remembered i have other kernels already)

dunno, check the docs, they probably cover this

hi everyone

well it certainly helps
yeh that one will do

should i remove the etch lines i added to my sources.list file earlier?

no

ok

etch is current stable

so i just apt-get install linux-image-2.6.22-1-686 ?

oh wait

(this is lenny/sid though)

yeh do
but do install that

do remove? or do apt-get ?

remove/change etch lines, but do install the kernel

k

change the etch after the ine kernel install

wait, install kernel first, then remove the etch lines?

wth, what's that 'ine' thing?
yeh, apt-get will whine otherwise

ah, ok
and should i install with -t etch like apt was prompting me to before? or just regular?

er, ok, i managed to confuse myself…

hi! I have several network cards in my computer, how do I choose which one is eth0?

i just installd debian for the first time and im a bit lost i have two questions 1) in fedora there is a sub menu in the k menu that lets you configure the network devices screen etc i cant find any of those apps any idea how to get them (they point to diferent system-config-***)

that's a lenny/sid kernel
it should be already

iirc: this is sid. however, with the 2.6.3 confusion, some part of apt said i'd have to move over to an etch kernel before i could finish installing libc6 . i want an updated sid kernel

configured

so, the plan was to somehow get me an etch kernel working, and then go from there back to a current sid one. is this unnecessary now?

ah ok. hmm, better to change your sources.list first then

ok

yeh i would think so

simonrvn all i hawe there is a menu caled debian wich seams to have all the content of the k menu

yeh
it's debian's menu system

ok, my computer's running "# apt-get install linux-image-2.6.22-1-686" and i'm running to the bathroom, i'll brb
thanks so much, btw

but no system-config-***

np
debian doesn't have system-config* stuff
this isn't fedora

is there another graphical way to configure all that stuf?

dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xorg

i do it via an editor . but yes there is, the kde stuff has some networking conf packages
uh, s/he wants network, not x

oh i see

apt-cache search admin kde

ok thanks

!tell LinkCanabico -about search
bot's telling you of other ways to look for packages

iirc, part of my troubles migrating to 2.6.8 in the past was confusion about how to migrate to udev from whatever its predecessor was called

ok

devfs *shudder*
unlike devfs, udev doesn't need special kernel crap
just hotplug support, which a workstation/desktop with usb/firewire/whatever will have anyway
!tell PalaWan -about root
haven't we done this before?

ok apt-get exited successfully. it's not telling me what i need to do next — i need to edit my lilo.conf file and then run lilo, right?

yeh

i have it extracted and in /usr/java but i cant seem to find instructions on how to link the intall to firefox and setup the plugin?

and what do i want to point it to? something in /boot/ …

yeh; the initrd and the vmlinuz (assuming this is x86)

there's a initrd symlink and a vmlinuz symlink
it is x86, yes

don't forget to add an initrd= line pointing to the symlink
or the actual one

one more question i downloaded the 3 dvd's until now all i have instaled via kpakage was on the first dvd. what are the other ones for? i know i sound silly

all of debian etch

i probably want to make a symlink to /boot/(stuff) in / , that's how my other lilo stuff seems to be configured. yes?

not recommended you install everything either, you can't anyway. there's intentioanlly conflicting packages
yeh, just so it goes like initrd=/initrd.img
intentionally*

ok i was just wondering i have a preaty good idea of what im going to install

right

eventually you'll need to get rid of those dvd lines to get the security updates for stable
you can keep them, but they'll get superceded by the updates
left
:P

simonrvn:

i just felt a litelbit silly downloading 9+ GB and only neading the first disk
even for blender

for a basic install you don't even need that

is it possible to install a debian stock kernel image that doesn't need to use initrd? i read if you have certain drivers compiled into your kernel (such as your disk controller) then you didn't need initrd?

then it wouldn't be a stock

it's what now for etch, 500, 750 MB, for base, x, vim, mc, less, and a couple of other goodies?
what jetscreamer said

heh, i guess there is no super debian kernel image package which has every driver already compiled in?

other than that, yes

is it my imagination or is debian 10X faster then fedora

ok

just do it yourself

roll your own. debian kernels are meant to support as much as possible, and you can't build one with everything in it, it'd be too big, so you need an initrd

i made my own kernel package once, i spend 3+ hours going through every config question yet i answered something wrong because the kernel wouldn't boot, when i used the stock image no problem, someday i must find out what i did wrong

dunno i haven't played with fedora

yeah i just need to figure out what i did wrong if i want to build my own again, i don't look forward to going through all those questions again eek

ok, updated lilo.conf, ran lilo. it's recommending i run lilo -p — should i?

questions?"
!kp mantra

[kp mantra] make-kpkg clean && VER=$(date +'%Y%m%d') && NAMEEXT="-$(hostname)-$(dpkg-architecture -qDEB_HOST_ARCH)" && make-kpkg –revision=$VER –append-to-version=-$NAMEEXT –rootcmd fakeroot clean && make-kpkg –revision=$VER –append-to-version=$NAMEEXT
–rootcmd fakeroot kernel_image modules_image . Add –initrd before kernel_image if you need an initrd.

the kernel config

don't make oldconfig

Hello, is it possible to use a 2.4 kernel with the current unstable?

what's that do?

make menu config

no
woops

err

i had no config , i was starting from scratch so i did 'make config'

no

Warning: '/etc/lilo.conf' more recent than '/etc/lilo.conf.shs'. Running 'lilo -p' is recommended.

eeeehhhnnnnt!

jetscreamer; heh

it uses the running kernel config
as in /boot/config/$(uname -r)
magic

simonrvn, when was that change, it was long time ago? is it caused by libc?

shall i leave it alone, and attempt to boot into it?

just take out what you know you don't need at first
and compile in what you know you need
leave the iffy stuff

ah yes but my running kernel config is using a stock config so to really tweak my kernel for performance i'd still have to go back through the config and see what i could turn off

refine more later
i think i just said that

might as well do it

i typed before i read your latest reply

just run the stock then

various things

i will try it soon as i get my new machine, it will be fun and is good to know

that, and other stuff

ok, done, thanks. i'll reboot into it now and see how it works

gl

or is there anything else i should be doing first?

naw

k, here goes

BTW i run testing and a few weeks ago when doing an regular 'apt-get upgrade' ( i do a few each week) it forced me to purge my 2.4.27 kernel image which i was using as a backup kernel in my LILO setup and it made me remove modutils too IIRC, why did it make me do this? i really liked having that
backup kernel in case something went wrong with my 2.6.18 kernel setup

you install another one
keep the current one as backup
er, i mean keep that other one as backup

it blew it away it's gone now
i didn't know how to stop dpkg from removing it

you missed the part about me saying "you install another one"

i'm just trying to understand why it made me remove it and in the future how i could prevent that

!tell zu22 -about hold

oh yeah mean from this point on yeah
but same thing may happen in the future, why did it make me remove it? i'm curious

because it's pretty much unsupported now

thanks for the hold info

np

ah ok
btw the entry on hold cuts off suddenly at "…currentyly (or tri)"
err "..currently (or tri" that is

try doing 'hold' in the /query window with dpkg

k

sometimes it's too long for a tell command

join /intel
pardon
(blush)

no thanks
s'ok

haha

hm, seems it cuts off there too

i have a console only irc client (epic4), only one window , i did /query dpkg then i sent "hold" but it still cuts if off
heh what you said
maybe someone send incomplete information to the blootbot on that entry

using irssi here. probably needs a slight mod

ah

no, it'll cut off because of some oddness between inpt and output lengths
input

ah

hi, how could i do bridge between two lan network cards eth1 and eth2

Moin!

bridging that's how . i haven't done such a thing, ask in #iptables, they'll know

it didn't work… froze. i copied down the errors and will paste them to the paster, 1sec

also check lartc.org, they have stuff on that
ouch :/

http://paste.debian.net/34580

how do I make sure netfilter messages don't appear on stdout? it's killing my uml vm's

AAACK

is that an abbreviation for something, or just a generic scream?

stdout? do you mean stderr, or console messages?
bill the cat coughing up a hairball

sorry, yeah. they appear on the console
I'm using a default syslog.conf at the moment

i do sysctl -w kernel.printk = 3 4 1 7

does anyone here use bitlbee?

you can set that in /etc/sysctl.conf, then run sysctl -p

what should i do?

what are the 3 4 1 7?

when i start up amsn it prints tons of verbose messages to the gnome-terminal i started it from, how can i suppress or redirect these messages into /dev/null?

hmm, unsure… i'd try using initramfs-tools instead of yaird (part personal preference, and part debugging)
the 3 sets the logging level threshold and the other set some other stuff, it's in the sysctl.txt in the kernel source docs

i don't know what either of those are… so tell me what to do and how?

yaird built that initrd

ah great

whats the command to see all the irc pos
whats the command to see all the irc ops

the initrds get built by a couple of tools now, those 2 being the predominant ones

just type /names and look

ok, so what do i do?

install initramfs-tools
make sure your symlinks are ok too

/boot/initrd.img-2.6.22-1-686

/boot/vmlinuz-2.6.22-1-686

these are in / , and my lilo.conf points to them

good idea to have those names more generic, easier to maintain the bootloader conf
but that looks good

does anyone know any app that can find and replace in a document to a specific folder ?

image=/vmlinuz-2.6.22-1-686 // label=Linux.new.deb // read-only // initrd=/initrd.img-2.6.22-1-686 // bypass

a who whatsis?

huh ?

i don't understand what you mean by 'in a document to a specific folder'

i'm apt-getting initramfs-tools …

/msg dpkg search

nothing seems wrong with my lilo.conf as i showed it to you, correct?

like find and replace the word "moo" with the word "foo" in all the files from the folder xyz

looks ok

did you run lilo so it applied your new changes?

he did

yes

ok

Intel Corporation Unknown device 294c (rev 02)). i'm on my knees begging thanks
i'm willing to mow people's gardens for help

first, stand up

haha
ok king arthur

i can't search it cause this is just a function of a text editor …

o_O

sed?

there's tools gui and text that can do wat you asked for

i christen thee sir zoggy of unknown-ethernet-controller

!be a sed barbie

that's what i'm asking .. which one ?

use sed

realtek cards can be found for cheaper than a pizza,

sed is the easiest

yeah, what he sed

some would argue the pizza is a better nic, but if you ask me they're cheap and work

*groan*

sorry, not feeling well…

for some definitions of work ;p

anyway, initrdtools is installed now. so what do i do now?

it's ok

hi

it should have generated some initrds for your kernels

can someone help me installing debian etch (netinst) with sata drives and SIS 968 chipset

check the symlinks again, fix conf if needed

hdd not recognised

the problem with this motherboard is it only has one pci slot (the rest are pci-e) and i need that slot for the ISDN pci card
otherwise, i would have snapped one up

oh

i haven't run it, just apt-get installed it. where would these initrds be? i don't see them

Hello, what package do I have to remove if I want to uninstall KDE completely?
(Sarge)

maybe buy a pci backplane thing that gives you many more pci slots

on install they would've been generated (normally)

look at whats in kdebase and remove something that sounds important in there

the kdelibs
!remove kde

extra, extra, read all about it, remove kde is aptitude purge kdelibs-data kdelibs4c2a

i dont see any new ones either in /boot or /

can't you get pci-e network cards?

that's a pretty good idea

Thank you.

apparently they're not available in south africa as yet
or so i've been told

ok, so do update-initramfs -k all -v

that's what the internets are for

all the suppliers say those pci-e slots are for graphics controllers…. interesting that motherboard manufactures would be driven to include 1xagp as well as 2 other slots for graphics controllers

what a load of rubbish

you've been lied to

pci-e is a general replacement for pci

i agree, but my worry was this: when i searched for cards, more intel cards came up…. so, what if i order that card and see that it doesn't work

for sure

it says "nothing to do, exiting"

so are you basically saying there's no chance of getting the onboard controller working?

you know how pci-e slots have different lengths..well can you put a 1x long card in a 16 slot?

-v as you guessed is verbose
ok

yep

try egghead.com or tigerdirect.com

and i had to add -c or -u too, neither worked though

probably because yaird built them
meh
ok, that idea didn't pan out

they are like thumbs length, so no other card would fit, i don't think
sorry for sounding like a moron

happens to everyone, no worries

well, a 1x long card could fit in a 16x long slot length wise, is what i'm meaning
bwell, a 1x long card could fit in a 16x long slot length wise, is what i'm meaning/b

makes sense: i even tried searching for a pci-e to pci adapter
no luck

next suggestion?

perhaps a pci backplane might do the trick

nobody can help me with my sata SIS968 and etch netinst problem ? :'(

thinking

so there's no way to download the latest intel modules and recompile them?

k, thanks

i've tried intel's site, but found nothing useful

hmmm, there's no pkg "kdelibs4c2a". And when I select "kdelibs-data" for uninstalling in aptitude I get 210 packages marked as BROKEN. What could be wrong here?

it's probably an old factoid that needs updating (which i'll do). the broken packages are the ones dependent on that, probably all kde ones. remove them

manually?!? I thought there was one pkg all other depend on and would be removed automatically …

actually it's still good… dpkg -l 'kdelibs*' should give you the relevant one
no, hit _ in aptitude or dselect, or use apt-get to do it

Ok, thanks.

hmm wait a minute, in some later versions, and recent ones, the hard drive load order got flipped a couple of times, you'll need to check fstab

ok
http://paste.debian.net/34581 (looks ok to me)

Hi, is there anything better than rsync or scp for downloading ~4GB via ssh/sftp? I always get disconnects from my cable provider and have to start from scratch. I'd like something like HTTP-Continue via sftp

rsync doesn't start from scratch. it will sync whatever hasn't been downloaded

it's one file.

ah

it's possible to rsync part of a file

when the machine is booting from the 2.6.22 one, the order will be flipped

in which case, won't wget do it?

if the file is only growing, yes

for me? No - I don't have a http server on the other end.

hmm ok

if pieces will change somewhere in the file, wget won't see that

wget over ssh?

wget -c

so what would i do about that?

bye

wget -c will work fine if data is only added to the end of the file

yeah - I was hoping there's some diff-rsync or so… I'll split the file into chunks and then rsync them.

Of course, the other end (the http server) would need to support partial requests

wam normal rsync will do that with the right options

Kevin`: ok, thanks - I'll have a look at man.

what i do is change fstab before i boot. but you'll need to figure out which one is your system disk

publish the sucker to a torrent tracker!

er, reboot even

my client would love me for that

butif i do that, if it doent work, i wont be able to get back into this old working kernel, no?

well, encrypted first, of course

nice idea - I'll consider

hcy if your using grub, you can

Kevin`: lilo

assuming you keep the file

he's not, still using lilo

with lilo you'd have to add an entry for the old kernel

how?

..add an entry, for the old kernel, to /etc/lilo.conf

Kevin`: uh, that won't matter regardless, the disk order changes when he boots to the .22 kernel

Kevin`: i dont understand

it's because Kevin` missed something

k

simonrvn he can change root= on the command line, and init=/bin/sh would ignore fstab effectively.

yes

easy enough to get it working

AH, .22 does libata eh.

*i* can do that, dunno what hcy's skill level is

set up fstab and root to use UUID or LABEL.

that would be a lot better

well, he doesn't know how to add something to lilo.conf

i can run with root=/dev/hda3 or whatever
is that what i want to try? hda3 instead of hda4?

in the new kernel it might be sda*

more like hda or hdb, depending
or even sda, yeh

What you want is to switch over to use UUIDs and not device names, which will make the whole problem go away.

for sure

cafuego bah, too much work

he's got a 2.6.18.2 there

practically, what should i do to get this working?

Kevin`: maybe you know: Will -P be enough or do I have to use –append too?

best way is using the UUID stuff

ok, how?

Did you build that .22 kernel or is it a prebuilt one?

wam I don't remember, I don't have rsync installed currently

ok, thanks

debian one

it's a prebuilt debian one

Ok, for all your Linux partitions, you'll need to find the UUID.
You can use the `tune2fs' utility for that on ext2/ext3.

and that's done how?
k

as root, 'tune2fs -l /dev/hdaX'

IMO you should use grub, it makes recovery if you mess up a good deal easier.
uIMO you should use grub, it makes recovery if you mess up a good deal easier./u

it will list a field called "Filesystem UUID"

takes

Thanks everyone - rsync -avzP does what I need

wewt

ok this is really weird, simonrvn and cafuego:
http://paste.debian.net/34583

Is hda4 an extended partition?

tune2fs thinks it's hda3, mount thinks it's hda4

uuid looks to be there
hcy what's on hda3 and hda4

hda: hda1 hda2 hda3 hda4 hda5 hda6
"mount" mounts hda4 as my root partition

Ok, hda4 is an extended patition, which contains hda5 and hda6.
Can you pastebin the output of 'fdisk -l /dev/hda' as well?

ok

hcy cat /proc/mounts. might give different (more accurate) data

http://paste.debian.net/34584
a href="http://paste.debian.net/34584"http://paste.debian.net/34584/a

cat /proc/partitions

and you have a hdb or sda as well?

is it possible debian etch crap firefox/iceweasel doesn't honor /etc/mailcap ?

proc/mounts : http://paste.debian.net/34585
sda would be my external stuff (zip disks, firewire harddrives, usb stick)

hey

i have users in my neck complaining pdfs are opened with xpdf instead of the crap adobe acrobat bullshit reader?
i have users in my neck complaining pdfs are opened with xpdf instead of the crap adobe acrobat bullshit reader?

hdc is the cdrom

lie and tell them xpdf is a lightweight version of acrobat

and you booted with root=/dev/hda3 ?

/proc/partitions http://paste.debian.net/34586

they are not stupid

On 2.6.22 that would become /dev/sda3

if they weren't stupid they wouldn't be complaining

but i already told them that mozilla software is the worst ever!

no, i'm still in the old kernel, which i booted from fstab, no root= argument

does anyone knows a good site for spyware/adware/malware articles for a O.S. high school work?

the problem really isn't the user nor the pdf, but the mozilla bad quality software
if i could i'd give them internet explorer or safari

i normally have sda1 sda2… sdb1… sdc1… sdd1 and so on, depending on what's plugged in

I think fstab, mtab, or both, is currently confused

sounds like it

i myself use links2 -g of course, and that's only matter of time until we get a GNUstep WebBrowser.app

You're running 2.6.18 at the moment, right?

yes

What you have in /etc/fstab for / is soemthing like "/dev/hda3 / ext3 defaults,errors=remount-ro 1 2"

/dev/hda4 / ext3 errors=remount-ro 0 1

can you paste the contents of /proc/cmdline ?

BOOT_IMAGE=Linux2.6.18me ro root=303

aha

oh

303 is /dev/hda3
not hda4
So your fstab is incorrect
Fix that up forst

but it mounts. ok, i'll change it to hda3

hello

ok, changed fstab. now?

good morning, hash dweebians

It's not mounted from fstab, it's mounted from the root= parameters, which is blkdev(3,3), which translates to /dev/hda3.
you mistyped your nick

k, so now what?

i would like to know what are the diferences between debian amd64 and 32 bits (proformances, …)

Now we need to add a line in fstab for the UUID

k, what would that line look like?

"UUID=14c2c7ed-f2c9-4021-97a3-445404723f06 / ext3 errors=remount-ro 0 1"
Do *not* delet the current line.

thanks — just under /dev/hda3 ?

Make a copy, and comment out the original.
yup

k, then?

That UUID is the one listed in 'tune2fs -l' to it uniquely identified hda3, your root partition, no matter if it's hda3 or sda3. The uuid will always be the same.
Can you pastebin your lilo.conf?

that's really cool
ok
http://paste.debian.net/34587

nobody ?

That's fstab, looks fine.
lilo.conf next?

oh, lilo, misread. sorry. tired and sick
one sec
http://paste.debian.net/34588

I've edited it and added a "Linux.new.uuid" stanza
You'll want to add that to your lilo.conf

where is the edited one?

sam id
same id, just refresh the page

you wrecked it!

hi, I have an acer aspire 4710z laptop on which i have installed etch. Everything is working fine except that the earphone jack doesnt work. Is there any configurations that i need to do to make it work?

er… sorry

alsamixer ?

i don't see it

line 160

DustyBin, alsamixer only shows Master and PCM

ah found it. had to click the link at the top left

It's identical to Linux.new.deb, exept it has a "root=UUID=14c2c7ed-f2c9-4021-97a3-445404723f06" line added.
When done, run 'lilo -v' as root.

there has been a similar problem when installing fedora linux on a macbook / pro, you might want to look on linux-howtos on those

Syntax error at or above line 324 in file '/etc/lilo.conf'

324!?
The patsed one is only 192 lines

read the sound part of this: http://wiki.debian.org/MacBook

yeah it put empty # lines between every other 2 lines for some reason, when i copied and pasted from there

Don't replace the entire lilo.conf, just add in the litte section i did.

DustyBin, thanks …

fixed that, Syntax error at or above line 163 in file '/etc/lilo.conf'

Ok, change that line to root="UUID=14c2c7ed-f2c9-4021-97a3-445404723f06"

when mirroring a server with Rsync, is it best to boot the server hosting in single-user mode, then Rsync it?

The lack of quotes is probably confusing lilo

Fatal: Illegal 'root=' specification: UUID=14c2c7ed-f2c9-4021-97a3-445404723f06

!^&%$%^!$#^%&$!^%%^&$^!&~%^

(i put in the quotes)

Does lilo not support UUID!?

you want two ='s, right?

Yup

probably doesn't
(which would really suck)

THat would mean you need to install grub.

oy

*or* pick you will run either 2.6.18 *or* 2.6.22 and stick with sda3 or hda3…

i'll run 2.6.22 when it works
i have to go lie down for a bit. i guess i'll try getting grub when i come back. just apt-get install grub and apt-get remove lilo?

Remove my entry from lilo.conf (or change root=UUID=… to root=/dev/sda3)
No, it's probably not that easy.

oy

Don't forget to change the comment in fstab, comment ut he UUID line and re-enable the /dev/hda3 one.
…. that way, your system will boot 2.6.18 and work OK.

ok

hi all insmod command is not working in debian sid it is giving segmentation fault what i have to do to work out ?

amol check dmesg for the error given

Answer question 1. "Why am I running Sid?"

segmentation fault

ok, did that… going to rest for a bit. thanks for everything so far, i really appreciate it

why are you using insmod instead of modprobe, and where did you get the module
amol the error from the kernel. in dmesg.

"I am running isnmod by hand, why am I doing that and not modprobe?"
Np. get well soon

thanks cafuego
i'll be back

kevin:i tried for hello world program which i kept on desktop

amol and?

you're loading hello world into the kernel?

cafuego perfectly possible if the hello world program is a kernel module in the proper format

Kevin`: Yes… but I don't think people who call insmod should be writing kernel modules

did u germans hear about that new law that passed where almost anything (nmap) can be classified as a "hacker tool" and you'd be held criminally liable? how lame

if i am keeping in /lib/module/2.6.21/kernel/driver/misc then after rebooting it is working but why not for insmod?

cafuego well, you don't want to put the test module into the modrope dependency stuff
amol check the error in dmesg

Kevin`: … but you'd know that, being a dev.

well, what is amol?
http://www.faqs.org/docs/kernel/x145.html

Hello vfolks

i'm real damnit

ohnos, i'm a virtual person

I went in the setup and haven't chosen the package list during the questions asked. I have dvd1 for debian 4 where I started the setup from. Will it install debian from dvd1 or will I need the other 2 dvds to complete the install?

the law passed in germany

dvd1 will do

actually that hello world module seems to be missing a few of the "proper" things a module should have

I'm installing debian in vmware on win2k3, to get a feel of both vmware (virtualization) and debian

kevin:dmesg not showing any message
related to insmod

amol strace insmod then
Haris what did you choose from the list

Kevin`: What list?

kevin:for modprobe it is giving error as FATAL: Module ./objects/my_char.ko not found.

Haris the list of standard system types you just mentioned?

stanard system types?

state your question again

It started from language, setting up lan card, then partitions and then just started the base install
I didn't the main installer menu this time

you definitely won't need any of the other cds for a base install

get plenty of rest and fluids dude

I recommand 'standard system', though

didn't get+ the

you'll probably be installing a bunch of stuff right away if you didn't select that
no biggie though

kevin:is there any prob with module-init-tools? so insmod is not working?

amol maybe. find out
i've never had an inexplicable problem with insmod

kevin:for stable version i also not but this new sid version i am getting segmentation fault

Haris btw, in my opinion, a light linux system would make a better host for virtualization then server 2003, for production. (for testing, use whatever you want, as it doesn't matter)
amol debug it and find out what's wrong

could someone with a jfs partition that was created within the last 6 months tell me what version jfs_tune -l /dev/thatpartition spits out? it should be next to "JFS version:" not the program version

kevin:can you tell me about real time Linux on debian?

if I ask dpkg about compiz I'm told to use aiglx, but how do I setup / use AIGLX

mp4creator seems to have gone AWOL from mpeg4ip-utils - anyone know what that is about?

amol I haven't used any true real-time linux extensions
amol if I ever make a linux-powered RC car again (and do it right), i'll tell you how it goes

i just checked the source for jfs_tune, and the comments say it won't display the UUID if the version is 1, and my jfs partitions were created like last year, and with version 1
effing PITA

amol last time I used a userspace program to do all the control work, which gave a response time of about 1/60 second. which was enough to work, but far from ideal or what the system was capable of

kevin:what is mean linux-powered Rc

radio controlled

glue an embedded linux host computer to the base of a radio controlled car (with wifi), add a simple robotic control system, and a laptop with wifi and a joystick

can i debootstrap a debian system using the packages cache on an already installed system?

What is an 'infobox' in Linux? I found differing uses of this term but no definition.

kevin:how uyou achieved?

amol it worked ok, but doing PWM with a 1/60 second response time made it choppy
next time, proper motor controller and a servo for steering
previous one was a two-track car
like a tank
awol anyway, that's the sum of my experience with applications for real time linux

found a link to AIGLX + COMPIZ at the bottom at wiki.debian.org/Compiz

if you have the entirety of the installation debs there you could. but something tells me you don't

I have whatever's there after using the netinst livecd
so I guess some files are on the CD?

the cd will have it

kevin:how to find out which type of schedular is running in debian?
task schedular i/o schedular?

ok, cool

wtf

Kevin`: you have a website?

Kevin`: i think debhelper might be lagging
Kevin`: happened to someone else earlier

zu22 http://kwzs.be - sorta

Kevin`: cool

zu22 I put random files up there, but I don't maintain a link database or a homepage

is there a nice app to reliably show what procs are eating up the cpu? often i see xload showing 90% cpu consumption and system very sluggish but when i look in 'top' or 'ps' i don't see it under CPU

zu22, maybe it's iowait?

i've never known top to be unreliable in that regart
regard

hmm
i better investigate further, collect more data to be sure

zu22, top is nice

Where's the site tha tells you what hardware you have based on lspci -n output?

ok

http://kmuto.jp/debian/hcl/index.cgi

thanks

if your wondering about your wireless driver, look for the ethernet lines

we found that last night, intel 4965

eww
much fucking around with that one

im following some 'ubuntu' instructions to get my tv card working in debian, does debian support a /etc/modprobe.d/options file? my options file doesnt exist

shouldn't be too horrible from what I've read

So how do I make it work?

not if your comfortable compiling a kernel, no

Do you also like ritual disembowling with a blunt spoon?
I think they've got it down to a single module these days.

no

for ipw3945, nor 4965
s/nor/not

http://intellinuxwireless.org/?p=iwlwifi&n=howto-iwlwifi

I installed the deb pf iwlwifi
So how do I make it work?

unless you are using a 22 kernel, you need to patch the stack in
i subscribe to the list

I'm using a 22

Hi, how to use kde menu in fluxbox?

ahhh I'd not found anything about needing .22…. it just says you need mac80211 which has been around for a while now.

what deb are you talking about?

all be it in a bit of a messy state

yes, and to compile host it, you need to patch the kernel and rebuild, cant be built as modules, but its in the 22 kernel now

can you give us a url to the howto?

http://packages.debian.org/unstable/misc/firmware-iwlwifi

thats firmware
not module source

that's only the firmware, you also need the module from that website

Okay

try building the latest stable, but i dont know how it will go with the 22 kernel.
they release iwl versions with matching mac80211 versions
so you may need to try an older one, or just get wireless-dev kernel source

do you know if the iwl module is heading towards being packaged for debian? or will it just go into mainline?

its in wireless-dev, waiting to go into main

nice.

the devs bitched about endianity issues, and lots of other shit, they are working on it now

lkml devs?

yeah

sounds like par for the course

morton and koah and the like
make some patches then

Is http://intellinuxwireless.org/iwlwifi/downloads/iwlwifi-1.0.0-1.tgz what I'm supposed to download?

Hi there Iceweasel 2.0.0.5-0etch1+lenny1 on Debian Lenny (testing). When I try to open http://www.hattrick.org it just segfaults without other messages. Tried debugging mode (with -gdb installed) and got "Cannot find user-level thread for LWP 5625: generic
error" and "Cannot fetch general-purpose registers for thread -1234224240: generic error". What could be wrong?

DA-Laptop: that's the snapshot of the module that they recommend you use, yes

k

-0etch1 works fine for me on that site. Where's that package from?

security.d.o.; worked fine till yesterday.

x-dev ?

ahh I didn't have lenny/updates in my sources.list so I didn't see it.
hmmm… so lenny/updates is lagging etch/updates on an iceweasel security fix. Interesting.

security team don't support testing, do they?

well, they sort of do

they do yeah

they released a 2.0.0.5 for iceweasel, for example

since what release have the security team supported testing?
lenny?

just before etch, I think. or maybe sarge

uhm, like April 2006 I'd say, but I'd have to peruse debian-d-a archives

ahh. alright.

http://www.debian.org/security/faq#testing

what file should i edit to change permanently the hostname?

/etc/hostname
speaking of security updates, there's a pile of kde updates in etch today but there is no DSA for them that I can find. Anyone know what they're for?

themill, it stays the same on system next boot

?

heh, where did he pick internode up from?
oops

themill, not http://lists.debian.org/debian-security-announce/debian-security-announce-2007/msg00117.html ?

Ok, how so I compile this iwlwifi thing?
No configure files or anything

thanks. How silly of me to look in the list of DSAs: http://www.debian.org/security/#DSAS

xorg-x11-dev ? been through packages.debian, unsure of correct choice

depends what specific files you are looking for, but xorg-dev will pick up all x11 -dev packages.

k, installing Xen and the xen README asks for " Development install of x11 (e.g. xorg-x11-dev)"

hellows, anyone using the relakks.com service here ?

Xen from debian source?

no, xen source

No, I prefer TOR
Primarily cause it's not centralized, as well as free of charge

you could look at the debian build-deps for some hints too

i'm running on amd64, xen support is a bit fragmented

can anyone help with aptoncd

k, thanks

DA-Laptop: hmyeah, … makes sense, but the money is not an issue, and tor speed is too low, interesting concept though

I guess. But from what I understand, Relakks is a mere VPN provider
Whereas TOR is actually intended to anonymize

DA-Laptop: yes it is, …. true, the people at Relakks rely on sweden's reasonable strong privacy law,… but I have the impression that their network is the wild west
DA-Laptop: they have rediculous response times for the moment, ..; I guess they are suffering some sort of DOS attack

how do i backup all the packages that i have installed on my system

what do you mean?

file ?

parth_ I don't know if this is something you can use, .. but I clone systems i'm happy with,…. so I can just put the clone back on the machine in case of emergency: http://www.feyrer.de/g4u/

actually i use aptoncd
n ow i made backup long ago
i made some updates later
now those updates arent there in the cache
so i cannot use aptoncd
to make a backup

hi all, how's called the package for alsa headers?

hi, i have system withou GUI, i try to burn cd with cdrecord but i blew 2 now, so im seeking for help before i run out of cds

http://aptoncd.sourceforge.net

its called wodim now in stable, btw. what do you mean blew? they burnt but you can't mount?

can i just retrieve the packages that i have installed on the system using apt

they'll be in apts cache in /var

ah libasound-dev…not easy name

if you did an apt-get clean or autoclean then apt's cache will have been emptied.

[/var/cache/apt/archives]

.1.1-21, and packages with version 7.x like numbers are for example xserver-xorg … which one should I downgrade (the info was from /msg dpkg

pudding up to secsize (by 1458 bytes)
there was many this messages

well, thats a warning. did the cd work?

0×3 medium error, deffered error. segment 0
etc

you should be able to provoke apt-get or aptitude to reinstall the packages but download only to repopulate your apt cache

a write error occured

actually, synaptic would allow you to easily view all packages, select all, reintall all, download only, if that's the sort of thing you need.

i use command # cdrecord dev=/dev/hdb -data *

for enabling ident to work I forwarded port 113 to my LAN box, but it doesnt seem to work?

ok

no cd is not working i cant mount it

so all the installed packages will be downloaded

i try on second laptop with windows and it didnt recognize cd two
says its empty

is that wat you are trying to say

hello all, i have recently installed debian etch by first just choosing the standard system and when the system was up with "aptitude" i installed kde and the rest
but the sound doesn't work

/msg dpkg sound

you could dpkg -l and iterate over the output with aptitude download, too

through modconf, i have checked the sound driver and it says A97 is installed

yes, that sounds like what you are trying to do

if I find out that some part is not installed then what command can i use for sound controling? sndconfig doesn't work

i think im doing something wrong with composing this command well right?

wat if some packages are present in cache
will they also be downloaded
or only those which arent there in the cache will be downloaded

only cache misses should be downloaded, I think

ok thanks a lot themill

Is this a way of taking updates from one machine (say, at work) to another machine that is offline (say, at home)?

yup
i use aptoncd

nice. we had a couple of questions about that the other day but noone had any ideas about how to do it sensibly.
unice. we had a couple of questions about that the other day but noone had any ideas about how to do it sensibly./u
oops

which creates a repository based on the packages in the cache

yes, I saw that…. integrating nicely with apt-cdrom.

now when u install kubuntu from the single cd

install what??????

kubuntu…

it seems as if my volume control changes against a log function

or any debian based distro

that's better

it suddenly gets very loud at the 90% top side.

debian based is still OT

do i have to create the image with files first… before burning it?

hi there

i mean iso image hosting file which contains in this case my photos?

aptoncd is a generic apt/apt-cdrom tool which is in debian though

normally thats what people do, create iso, burn iso

i need to know from you guys if it is easy to use Debian,i am thinking to install it on my laptop,

it sure is for me

I never create the iso first.

I decided to try debian 2 months ago

even with ordinary files?

how about codecs,flash-player and dvd playback?

the experience is better than any distro I have tried
works

or what about

depends on your linux knowledge, you need some idea about things

i have some

yeah you will need to be able to read.

not even first in the sense of mkisofs|wodim?

i have had used ubuntu,*bsd and fedora
for about 6 months

then you will be ok if you accept defaults

i know how to use some command line too

I guess that's true, but I don't separately create the image and then burn it unless I have huge files or lots and lots of small files in which case it seems more polite for the old hardware to do it in two stages.

the debian installer is pretty good, you should be fine, i wanted a base install and accidentally ended up with a working gnome desktop, haha

compiling fglrx kernel-module gives this error?? FATAL: modpost: GPL-incompatible module fglrx.ko uses GPL-only symbol

!tell JarJarBinks about fglrx 2.6.21

lol thanks themill

not unlucky - just stupid for using fglrx

I think that's my own business..

i hope it works then,i have been having some problems to install distro's on this laptop,specially KDE's.

indeed it is; as are my own views on it.

either use a newer or older kernel, recompile 2.6.21 without PARAVIRT or hack at the fglrx source to pretend that it's actually GPL licenced.

thanks

im yet to solve that problem

or not use fglrx and/or hassle ati/amd to release their fscking driver as free software

those options are in the long-term the only pragmatic way forward

the problem is fixed in 2.6.22

does anyone know a text-based program that does side by side diff?

using any out-of-tree driver is problematic. It gets broken in most kernel releases although usually not that badly.

like diff between two files, the old file on the left, the right file on the right (in an mc like interface), when you scroll down in one, it scrolls down with both screens

sdiff

vimdiff

thank you

(or kdiff3 if you want a gui, but it sounds like you don't)

does tar store your username or uid?

uid

wow, vimdiff is uber!

excellent.

how do I switch between them?
in case I want to edit?

wait…you sure, why is there a –numeric-owner option?

I thought I was sure….

hmm

concocts
what you said is … something else

so how does anybody use compiz now — It's officially part of debian, I was (1 hour ago) running lenny with a stock 2.6.18 kernel, to install fglrx I needed kernel headers, which I couldn't grab for 2.6.18 with my current sources, so I updated to 2.6.21 and got the headers too. now I had an
system just upgraded, and it happens that I can't run xorg 7.2 but must downgrade to 7.1… _and_ I now find out I must also downgrade the kernel

sounds like you're making chicken soup or something
welcome to Testing. Enjoy your stay.

Guerin:

be happy you don't run unstable

hehe, I used to… this is my fooling arround partition of my laptop
I got a stable debian on the other half

i still use unstable, but it's because I'm stupid and reckless

I would however like to impress all the windows ppl, when I present my master thesis in 14 days

hah.

so combiz would be fun

I'm working on a research proposal for mine now. But it doesn't involve any nifty graphics.

Ok! its asking for me for software selection

my bad… it does store usernames unless you ask it nicely not to.

I select desktop apps, web, dns, file, mail, sql servers, standard system - Is this possible from dvd1?

you know, i made a .tar, moved it to another computer…sunos tar tvf said 1000/1000, gtar tvf said my username [which has a completely different, not 1000, uid on that machine] so i think its both

JarJarBinks indeed !

Haris, I'm not sure there is a definitive guide to what you can install from each piece of installation media

most of it should be on dvd 1.

could compile it yourself.. there's a script that does all the work and builds packages for debian

!cd contents

To find out what is on what cd, download the .jigdo template, and zless fooimage.jigdo. In the [Parts] section you will see the list of packages that are contained in the cd. searchable index of the cds: http://www.debian.org/CD/jigdo-cd/#search ; If that one is down, use this listing of sarge packages ordered by CD: http://haydn.debian.org/~ftlerror-guest/list.txt, or http://people.debian.org/~fenio/jigdo-search.php

‘ those will tell you for sure

That seems to be for CDs

neat, meant to see if i could spot my username in a .tar, went less .tar and it printed out the contents

though, hm, it looks like sarge
the jigdo method will work for anything.

You're right if I specify the –numeric-owner flag when inspecting a tarball then it shows uids, otherwise the usernames.

thanks I'll reboot in the stable debian and search for the script

git://anongit.opencompositing.org/users/3v1n0/compiz-fusion-debian-builder

ahh thanks

hah and they think i'm a hardcore bub-n-bros player: http://tukijaverkosto.org/photography/nerds/ropecon2007/friday/DSC_7238.html

but if you make the tarball with –numeric-owner then usernames are not stored, only uids.

for enabling ident to work I forwarded port 113 to my LAN box, but it doesnt seem to work?

so does debian uses the same programs as ubuntu or debian based distro
?

if there is a yes no answer to that, the answer is no

debian has more software than ubuntu. and newer too, most of the time

it has more developers
debian

and doesn't use proprietary stuff

yes they do

in main

proprietary stuff are unpuzzled and used
even in main, proprietary standards are implemented in a free way

like fglrx???

you mean stuff without source
no but that's binary only without source

to make it clear to me: fglrx is not proprietary?

yes it is

ok

but proprietary doesn't mean it can't be in debian
fglrx is not in debian because we don't have its source

so to be in debian the source should be available

and even if you have the source, the license can say you may not distribute it

"free"

not only the source, but also a license saying you can change and distribute it freely
bnot only the source, but also a license saying you can change and distribute it freely/b

and again correct me if I'm wrong, ubuntu ppl doesn't care about that
?

they do, but they also include a few stuff that's not free. and i'm not sure if it's really on the cds
or if users run some tool that downloads and installs it

I believe the ubuntu disc I booted used fglrx by "default"
it is some time ago, so I may be mistaken

it does include some non-free stuff, both nvidia-glx* and fglrx

the point was, that BadRobot doesn't have to fiddle as much with drivers for hardware… most things are configured without the user explicitly telling it to be
okay, think I got it

that's really nice for newbies, but it gets in the way for oldbies. unless the oldbie is feeling lazy that day ;P