Contents
List of Figures
List of Tables
 Acknowledgments
 Preface
I  Guide
1 Introduction
 1.1 What Is Debian?
  1.1.1 Who Creates Debian?
 1.2 A Multiuser, Multitasking Operating System
 1.3 What Is Free Software?
 1.4 About This Book
  1.4.1 How to Read This Book
  1.4.2 Conventions
2 Getting Started
 2.1 Supported Hardware
  2.1.1 Memory and Disk Space Requirements
 2.2 Before You Start
  2.2.1 Information You Will Need
 2.3 Partitioning Your Hard Drive
  2.3.1 Background
  2.3.2 Planning Use of the System
  2.3.3 PC Disk Limitations
  2.3.4 Device Names in Linux
  2.3.5 Recommended Partitioning Scheme
  2.3.6 Partitioning Prior to Installation
  2.3.7 Debian Installation Steps
 2.4 Choosing Your Installation Media
  2.4.1 Installing from a CD-ROM
  2.4.2 Booting from Floppies
 2.5 Booting the Installation System
3 Step-by-Step Installation
 3.1 Select Color or Monochrome Display
 3.2 Debian GNU/Linux Installation Main Menu
 3.3 Configure the Keyboard
 3.4 Last Chance to Back Up!
 3.5 Partition a Hard Disk
 3.6 Initialize and Activate a Swap Partition
 3.7 Initialize a Linux Partition
  3.7.1 Mount a Previously-Initialized Partition
 3.8 Install Operating System Kernel and Modules
 3.9 Configure PCMCIA Support
 3.10 Configure Device Driver Modules
 3.11 Configure the Network
 3.12 Install the Base System
  3.12.1 Configure the Base System
  3.12.2 Make Linux Bootable Directly from the Hard Disk
 3.13 Make a Boot Floppy
 3.14 The Moment of Truth
 3.15 Set the Root Password
 3.16 Create an Ordinary User
 3.17 Shadow Password Support
 3.18 Remove PCMCIA
 3.19 Select and Install Profiles
 3.20 Package Installation with dselect
  3.20.1 Introduction
  3.20.2 Once dselect Is Launched
  3.20.3 A Few Hints in Conclusion
 3.21 Glossary
4 Logging In
 4.1 First Steps
 4.2 Command History and Editing the
Command Line
 4.3 Working as Root
 4.4 Virtual Consoles
 4.5 Shutting Down
5 The Basics
 5.1 The Command Line and Man Pages
  5.1.1 Describing the Command Line
 5.2 Files and Directories
  5.2.1 Using Files: A Tutorial
  5.2.2 Dot Files and ls -a
 5.3 Processes
 5.4 The Shell
 5.5 Managing Processes with bash
 5.6 A Few bash Features
  5.6.1 Tab Completion
 5.7 Managing Your Identity
6 Using the Shell
 6.1 Environment Variables
 6.2 Where Commands Reside: The PATH Variable
 6.3 Configuration Files
  6.3.1 System-Wide Versus User-Specific
Configuration
 6.4 Aliases
 6.5 Controlling Input and Output
  6.5.1 stdin, stdout, Pipelines, and Redirection
 6.6 Filename Expansion
7 More on Files
 7.1 Permissions
  7.1.1 File Ownership
  7.1.2 Mode
  7.1.3 Permissions in Practice
 7.2 Files Present and Their Locations
 7.3 File Compression with gzip
 7.4 Finding Files
 7.5 Determining a File’s Contents
 7.6 Using a File Manager
8 Working with Text Files
 8.1 Viewing Text Files
 8.2 Text Editors
 8.3 Using ae
9 The X Window System
 9.1 Introduction to X
 9.2 Starting the X Environment
 9.3 Basic X Operations
  9.3.1 The Mouse
  9.3.2 X Clients
  9.3.3 Troubleshooting
  9.3.4 Leaving the X Environment
 9.4 Customizing Your X Startup
10 Filesystems
 10.1 Concepts
 10.2 mount and /etc/fstab
  10.2.1 Mounting a Filesystem
  10.2.2 Example: Mounting a CD-ROM
  10.2.3 /etc/fstab: Automating the Mount Process
  10.2.4 Removable Disks (Floppies, Zip Disks, Etc.)
 10.3 Backup Tools
  10.3.1 tar
11 Networking
 11.1 PPP
  11.1.1 Introduction
  11.1.2 Preparation
  11.1.3 The Easy Way: wvdial
 11.2 Ethernet
12 Removing and Installing Software
 12.1 What a Package Maintenance Utility Does
 12.2 dpkg
 12.3 dselect
 12.4 Compiling Software
13 Advanced Topics
 13.1 Regular Expressions
 13.2 Advanced Files
  13.2.1 The Real Nature of Files: Hard Links and Inodes
  13.2.2 Types of Files
  13.2.3 The proc Filesystem
  13.2.4 Large-Scale Copying
 13.3 Security
 13.4 Software Development with Debian
II  Reference
A Reading Documentation and Getting Help
 A.1 Kinds of Documentation
  A.1.1 Using info
  A.1.2 HOWTOs
  A.1.3 Personal Help
  A.1.4 Getting Information from the System
B Troubleshooting
 B.1 Common Difficulties
  B.1.1 Working with Strangely-Named Files
  B.1.2 Printing
  B.1.3 X Problems
 B.2 Troubleshooting the Boot Process
C Booting the System
D The GNU General Public License
Index