Howdy all,

My ISP downloaded for me that latest versions of Woody & Sarge. My ISP is pro Linux & FreeBSD. I do an install using Sarge onto a machine. I notice tons of software being updated and installed without me asking for any of it. Programs like ftp and other crap. If I want that installed, I will do it myself.

My questions are these. How do I see what all packages are in stalled when this is finished? In FreeBSD I use the command "pkg_version -v"

If I start apt-get remove ftp for example, will I start goofing up everything? When I first starting using Woody, it only installed a very base system and I installed what I thought I wanted. I do not understand what I did to make this happen. This happened when it asked me what kind of machine I was going to use the computer for. I choose to manually select what I wanted and I get tons of crap that I do not know what all it is.

Sorry for the rant. Hopefully someone can correct me on what I am seeing then I will sit quitely in my corner and fix my goof.

try out apt... it is very good. give apt-get remove ftp a whirl, you should get prompted, unless it only removes that package...

it'll try and resolve the dependencies, and remove any packages that require ftp. it'll prompt before attempting that kind of change, though.

also try apt-get install synaptic

then run synaptic (is GUI) -- good package manager based on apt.

never used debian long enough to give you a console alternative, though...

aptitude

Dear gorilla!

In Debian "apt-get" is probably the best way of checking your packages.
If GUI is what you like then it'll be "Synaptic", not "Simantec"

if you use the debian-installer from here you get a much smaller download and all the power

the point where you chose to manually select packages kicks off what i think is called dselect and by default has a ton of software selected. when i get to this point i do not select anything and just continue. then i can add what ever i want when i want

but yeah, what others have said here are good tools to use to see what is installed and remove it. if you use KDE kpackage is a very nice tool as well

Say, jsmarshal, always wanted to ask SID user how Debian-Sid behaves?

If you just want a quick list of what's installed, you can run the following command:
dpkg --get-selections > packages.txt
That will dump a list of installed packages to a text file for you.

In addition to 'apt', you can take much advantages using the "dselect" command line tool.
Just tape "dselect" as root.
a. First select Update so that Debian prompts the mirror server to know which are the latest releases available.
b. Then choose "Select". Use "/" to find a package, tape "+" to install it and "-" to remove it. dselect will manage all dependencies for you.
c. Go to Install and Configure, and that's it !

Synaptic is the GUI equivalent for dselect.

Hope this helps.

dselect will give you a scrollable view. i would start out with that. once you really get your feet wet i would look into apt based commands. good luck!

Debian installation with the net-installer-rc2
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...hreadid=261506

no problems so far, but then i dont use my box as a web server or anything like that, more of just a desktop. i will be expanding it to use as a firewall/router for my home network soon though but i dont have any problems or crashes. using 2.6.9-1-686 kernel.