CONTENTS

iv

8 Keeping your Debian system up to date

45

8.1

How can I upgrade my Debian 1.3.1 (or earlier) distribution, based on libc5, to

2.0 (or later), based on libc6?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

8.2

How can I keep my Debian system current?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

8.2.1

APT

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

8.2.2

dpkg ftp

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

8.2.3

mirror

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

8.2.4

dpkg mountable

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

8.3

Must I go into single user mode in order to upgrade a package?

. . . . . . . . . . 48

8.4

Do I have to keep all those .deb archive files on my disk?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

8.5

How can I keep a log of the packages I added to the system?

. . . . . . . . . . . . 48

9 Debian and the kernel

49

9.1

Can I install and compile a kernel without some Debian specific tweaking?

. . . 49

9.2

What tools does Debian provide to build custom kernels?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

9.3

How can I make a custom boot floppy?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

9.4

What special provisions does Debian provide to deal with modules?

. . . . . . . 51

9.5

Can I safely de install an old kernel package, and if so, how?

. . . . . . . . . . . . 51

10 Customizing your installation of Debian GNU/Linux

53

10.1 How can I ensure that all programs use the same paper size?

. . . . . . . . . . . . 53

10.2 How can I provide access to hardware peripherals, without compromising se 

curity?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

10.3 How do I load a console font on startup the Debian way?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

10.4 How can I configure an X11 program's application defaults?

. . . . . . . . . . . . 54

10.5 Every distribution seems to have a different boot up method. Tell me about

Debian's.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

10.6 It looks as if Debian does not use

rc.local

to customize the boot process; what

facilities are provided?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

10.7 How does the package management system deal with packages that contain

configuration files for other packages?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

10.8 How do I override a file installed by a package, so that a different version can

be used instead?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

10.9 How can I have my locally built package included in the list of available pack 

ages that the package management system knows about?

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56