I am setting up a lightweight server for minecraft using Debian Testing and when I use "apt-get install openbox" or "aptitude install openbox" I am met with 731MB of dependencies. I knew this wasn't right but I tried installing it anyway and it installed Gnome 3.8 with openbox replacing the default wm.

My questions are: Is this some kind of dependency glitch with the package? Is it repeatable on your system? If this is not a bug, but done explicitly, how do I get around this and/or what are alternatives to openbox?

I am not using Testing, but this thread might be of interest to you, even though it pertains to Sid: http://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.p...&hilit=openbox

Yup, there has been a lot of chatter about this on the CrunchBang forums (take a visit there, if you haven't already, lots of good openbox info ). I haven't tried it personally, but the solution I've seen mentioned is to install without the "recommends."

The bottom line is that, if you are going to use a "Testing" distro, you must be prepared to read the forums and bug reports, and prepare yourself for the occasional bug/wrinkle/inconvenience.

See: http://crunchbang.org/forums/viewtopic.php?id=30928

And: http://crunchbang.org/forums/viewtopic.php?id=30691

Thank you all for the information, it seems to be doing this for the openjdk-7-jre package as well. Can you recommend newsletters/forums/etc I should lurk for information of this type (other than this one, of course).

Hi,

is apt configured to automatically install recommended and/or suggested packages? If so you can disable this behaviour by adding the following lines to your /etc/apt/apt.conf
Evo2.

This is ALWAYS a good idea. The recomended packages and suggested packages will be listed under the headings "Recomended Packages" and Suggested Packages. You, therefore, have the option of installing them manually if you think you need them.

In your current situation, if you do not want to reinstall then leave apt configured as is, run;
This will not get rid of all of it but will get rid of most of it. You can pull up Synaptic and dig through it for other unneeded packages after that.

Then add the prohibition of recommends and suggested package.

Or reinstall and make sure that the prohibition is in place before you add anything too the base install.

My question is; did you install using the Debian testing image? Debian testing images all use the Debian testing installer. I suggest, and I think most folks here would do the same, if you want to actually run Jessie or Sid, get the Wheezy netinstall image. Install it with nothing but the base install. Do a version upgrade of it to Jessie and then complete your install manually.

Make sure you configure apt the way you want it before doing version upgrades from the Wheezy base.

When doing your version upgrade and start to add the rest of the install, READ what is going to be installed. I know, it is not the most exciting reading but you can save yourself some future work by doing so.

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Hi,
I Concur. When wanting to run unstable (or testing), start with a minimal stable install, then upgrade to unstable (or testing).

Evo2.

There is no apt.conf that came with the system I installed but I will add one and what Evo2 and widget recommended to prevent the behavior. And yes I did use a Testing iso. The Testing isos I have used have been hit or miss working so I will use the technique you talked about in the future, but I will hopefully not need another reinstall as the command "apt-get install --no-install-recommends" worked for the packages that were affected.

The bigger question I have is why is gnome-openbox-session a recommended dependency that will be downloaded using the default config?

I would like to know that too.

I am using Sid so can't speak, now, of testing, to lazy to look it up right now, will check when I get on one of my testing installs tomorrow, but in the Sid repos both openbox gnome and kde session packages are suggests rather than recommends.

By that I would think that if you got openbox-gnome-session installed you should have gotten the kde version too. Now that would be a pretty big install if it installed all of gnome and kde with your openbox install.

apt.conf is a file that just needs the correct text in it. You can simply use any text editor and create the file. If you write down the text so you remember it (which I don't right now) you can use nano from the tty promt to do this before installing anything.

I must say that I have installs of Debian that I installed openbox on using the netinstall image. I have never gotten any gnome packages that I did not ask for.