Chapter 11. Getting support for Debian GNU/Linux

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11.3 Is there a quick way to search for information on Debian

GNU/Linux?

There is a variety of search engines that serve documentation related to Debian:

  Debian WWW search site (

http://search.debian.org/

).

  Google Groups (

http://groups.google.com/

): a search engine for newsgroups.

For example, to find out what experiences people have had with finding drivers

for Promise controllers under Debian, try searching on the phrase

Promise Linux

driver

. This will show you all the postings that contain these strings, i.e. those where

people discussed these topics. If you add

Debian

to those search strings, you'll also get

the postings specifically related to Debian.

  Any of the common web spidering engines, such as AltaVista (

http://www.

altavista.com/

) or Google (

http://www.google.com/

), as long as you use the

right search terms.

For example, searching on the string  cgi perl  gives a more detailed explanation of this

package than the brief description field in its control file.

11.4 Are there logs of known bugs?

The Debian GNU/Linux distribution has a bug tracking system (BTS) which files details of

bugs reported by users and developers. Each bug is given a number, and is kept on file until it

is marked as having been dealt with.

Copies of this information are available at

http://www.debian.org/Bugs/

.

A mail server provides access to the bug tracking system database via e mail. In order to get

the instructions, send an e mail to request@bugs.debian.org with  help  in the body.

11.5 How do I report a bug in Debian?

If you have found a bug in Debian, please read the instructions for reporting a bug in Debian.

These instructions can be obtained in one of several ways:

  By anonymous FTP. Debian mirror sites contain the instructions in the file

doc/bug reporting.txt

.

  From the WWW. A copy of the instructions is shown at

http://www.debian.org/

Bugs/Reporting

.

  On any Debian system with the

doc debian

package installed. The instructions are in

the file

/usr/doc/debian/bug reporting.txt

.