Installing GUI on Debian 6.03 KDE from a CDR

[Mae Huckett]

I borrowed a Debian 6.03 disc from one of my friend. I want to to install it on my computer but the problem am facing is that the installer won’t start at all. Whenever I try to install, it just install the basic command line. I don’t get the GUI there. As this is my first attempt for installing debian or linux, i dont have much idea about the same. I don’t know what I need now to install the GUI. Do anyone know how to install the KDE from the disc? Please help

[Rawana]

Before installing the GUI on Debian, you have to make sure that the Apt configured correctly. Now you can install it directly from the packages off of the cd or straight from the net but use the internet connection only if it is fast enough. After this, next installation step is for the X-window system. Use "apt-get install x-window-system" in order to install the whole thing you need. Final step is about installing a window manager or desktop environment. Gnome or KDE is a beginner choice but you can try some other also which are very light only if you want them.

Once completed, reboot the system and you will see a graphical login. If you don’t get it and if you still see a command prompt for login, just "startx" which will automatically brings up the GUI window. You don’t have to worry about since you are clearly installing it from the CD. You will most of the basic packages from the CD, you should only use “apt” command to configure them. If there is a fast internet connection, then the installation and update will be more powerful.

[Upendra]

I know about the Debian graphics installer, usually the regular CD images contain an option to boot into graphical installer using installgui command. Other than this there is also a small iso image file which is about 10MB will allow you to boot the graphical installer. It usually used in terms of testing/debugging.

You can also find this image under netboot/gtk/mini.iso

[Go!pee]

So far I have seen many posts regarding the same query where user is asking about how to install GUI on Debian or how to get the Debian GUI. The fact is, you have to install x-window-system-core,kde,gnome first. In order to install KDE in debian:

• Type the following command on the prompt: #apt-get install x-window-system-core kde
• To install KDM which will provide you a KDE-style login screen, type: #apt-get install kdm
• To start KDE, type: #startkde
• To tart X-Server: #startx
• To start KDE each time, edit startup files. If you use KDM or XDM for a log in screen, edit .xsession, otherwise edit .xinitrc or .Xclients.

[LavinaD]

Debain installation is achieved by installing packages one by one. Every package is installed or executed with the apt-get command. This command will be capable to find all dependencies automatically.

• To find gnome package, type “apt-cache search gnome”.
• Then install all packages, type: apt-get install [PACKAGENAME]

[PACKAGENAME] indicates the name of the package. However if you want to install more than one package at a time, you should separate the package name by adding space between them. For example: apt-get install package1 package 2 pachkage3. Make sure that you are firing the commands as a root user. So you have to be logged in as a root user and switch to root using command "su". In your case the complete installation procedure is as follows:
First of all update the machine using following 2 commands:

apt-get update
apt-get dist-upgrade

Then go to the GUI installation –

apt-get install gdm gnome x-window-system-core

if it does not work, you have to manually get the X (graphical) server configuration utility:

dpkg-reconfigure xserver-xfree86

[Izna]

I don’t know why you are struggling so much to install GUI on Debian using CDr. Debootstrap is a official utility for the Debian installer in order to install a Debian base system. It actually works on the basis of wget and ar but sometimes it only depends on the /bin/sh and basic Unix/Linux tools. It is briefly explained on the official website. Install wget and ar and download/ install debootstrap. You can manually install it by extracting the .deb into:

# mkdir work
# cd work

You can find the debootstrap binary in the Debian archive. Copy the package to the work folder and extract files.

# ar -x debootstrap_0.X.X_all.deb
# cd /
# zcat /full-path-to-work/work/data.tar.gz | tar xv

Run debootstrap