• Post-Release Test Results for Debian 10.8 Live KDE i386 on real har

    From Andrew M.A. Cater@21:1/5 to Linux-Fan on Mon Feb 8 10:30:02 2021
    On Sun, Feb 07, 2021 at 08:49:58PM +0100, Linux-Fan wrote:
    Hello,

    yesterday I participated in the testing of release live DVD images for the old i386 architecture.

    Unfortunately, I could not test the KDE live image due to getting a black screen (with movable mouse cursor) on the installed as well as live disk. Later, I tried the DVD on another i386 machine and this time the GUI worked. I also tested the Calamares installer and although installation took very long by modern standards :) (~2.5h) it worked successfully. The only (minor) issue I experienced was that during the installation, KDE's lock screen (?) kscreenlocker_greet would sometimes start causing a black screen similar to the one experienced before on the other machine. This could be fixed by interactively switching to a VT and killing the kscreenlocker_greet process.

    I currently keep my notes of the tests including screenshots at https://masysma.lima-city.de/37/debian_i386_installation_reports.xhtml

    Having newly gained access to the Debian Wiki (thanks again :) ), I imagine it would make a lot of sense to move all these records to the Wiki? Are
    there already pages about installation walkthroughs "by screenshots" that I could add to? Are there suggestions for the names/paths/structure under
    which such pages might best be created?

    My first idea would be to create a subpage Teams/DebianCD/ReleaseTesting/Buster_r8/1105a and put all the screenshots from that test as well as hardware details there, then create a similar page Teams/DebianCD/ReleaseTesting/Buster_r8/1105c etc. I could link these pages from the overview table at https://wiki.debian.org/Teams/DebianCD/ReleaseTesting/Buster_r8
    This is just a basic idea though and I am happy for any better suggestions
    or comments.

    Thanks in advance
    Linux-Fan

    öö

    Firstly - Thank you very much for coming in and spending time and contributing meaningful tests yesterday: your effort is very much appreciated, especially
    so if you spent 2.5 hours with the Calamares install.

    I'm not sure if putting details of the tests for each point release with screenshots into the wiki would necessarily be helpful. The tests for the
    point releases are ephemeral - as much as anything else, they are a test of lots of paths through the Debian installer to try many combinations of
    choices of filesystem, for example.

    The Debian main website at www.debian.org is going through various editing processes at the moment. One of the things that does get asked for quite often is a good explanation of how to install Debian with screenshots: it might be that this would be a better use of your energy and enthusiasm as it would
    have much wider benefit.

    I would be happy to work with you to realise this if you think it would be useful to others. The debian-www team are also looking at ways to improve
    the main site.

    With every good wish - and thanks once again

    All the very best, as ever,

    Andy Cater

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  • From Linux-Fan@21:1/5 to Andrew M.A. Cater on Mon Feb 8 12:30:02 2021
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    Andrew M.A. Cater writes:

    On Sun, Feb 07, 2021 at 08:49:58PM +0100, Linux-Fan wrote:
    Hello,

    yesterday I participated in the testing of release live DVD images for the old i386 architecture.

    Unfortunately, I could not test the KDE live image due to getting a black screen (with movable mouse cursor) on the installed as well as live disk. Later, I tried the DVD on another i386 machine and this time the GUI worked.
    I also tested the Calamares installer and although installation took very long by modern standards :) (~2.5h) it worked successfully. The only (minor)
    issue I experienced was that during the installation, KDE's lock screen (?) kscreenlocker_greet would sometimes start causing a black screen similar to the one experienced before on the other machine. This could be fixed by interactively switching to a VT and killing the kscreenlocker_greet process.

    [...]

    Firstly - Thank you very much for coming in and spending time and contributing
    meaningful tests yesterday: your effort is very much appreciated, especially so if you spent 2.5 hours with the Calamares install.

    Well, I read a book while the computer worked :)

    I'm not sure if putting details of the tests for each point release with screenshots into the wiki would necessarily be helpful. The tests for the point releases are ephemeral - as much as anything else, they are a test of lots of paths through the Debian installer to try many combinations of choices of filesystem, for example.

    Makes sense, yes.

    The Debian main website at www.debian.org is going through various editing processes at the moment. One of the things that does get asked for quite often
    is a good explanation of how to install Debian with screenshots: it might be that this would be a better use of your energy and enthusiasm as it would have much wider benefit.

    I would be happy to work with you to realise this if you think it would be useful to others. The debian-www team are also looking at ways to improve
    the main site.

    This is a good idea. I know that it would help at least some people because there are sometimes queries on debian-user about how to use a specific part of the installer. I recall there being questions about how to use the partitioning for instance:

    https://lists.debian.org/debian-user/2019/10/msg00586.html https://masysma.lima-city.de/experiments/20191014223544.xhtml

    On the other hand, searching online for "How to install Debian 10"
    yields https://phoenixnap.com/kb/how-to-install-debian-10-buster as the
    first result here. It is already pretty much what I would expect such a step-by-step guide to be. Similarly, if I want something specific like
    "How to setup RAID with Debian Installer", I get this on the first page of results: https://sleeplessbeastie.eu/2013/10/04/how-to-configure-software-raid1-during-installation-process/
    Back when I installed my first Debian on RAID, I referred to this one which must have turned up for a similar search: http://www.texsoft.it/index.php?c=hardware&m=hw.storage.boot-raid-squeeze&l=it

    I conclude that there are already some step-by-step guides out there. I
    still believe it would be worthwhile to have one available directly from [wiki.]debian.org and I would be happy to create screenshots and short descriptions. How large would the scope of such a guide be?

    The existent ones show one specific path through the installer each. I can imagine that it might be useful to show some different tasks like
    "Install with manual paritioning", "Install with RAID", "Install with
    LVM"... but this will quickly reach a high number of variants that I know I would not be able to maintain for long :) Hence, my idea would be to select
    a very limited number of walkthroughs to show in such detail (maybe one for each of the methods: Console, Graphical and Calamares?)

    The next question is of course: How exactly do I get started? By creating a wiki page, attaching to an existent one or is the installation guide a better place?

    [...]

    Linux-Fan
    öö

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