GNU Hurd/ hurd/ running/ debian/ after install

First steps after installation.

So you have managed to get past the first native-install runs in single-user mode?

Time to get to work.

  1. Get Networking Running
  2. Setup GRUB
  3. Setup apt-get
  4. Random
  5. Console
  6. ?DebianXorg
  7. What about package XYZ?

Get Networking Running

?Network.

Check if your NIC was detected by GNU Mach:

# devprobe eth0

devprobe (run as user root) will print eth0 on successful detection. If it doesn't, your NIC was not detected correctly. You can then try to do the following (also as user root) for getting details:

# cat /dev/klog > ~/klog
[Wait a second, then press `Ctrl-C'.]

Now examine the ~/klog file.

If the NIC was detected:

# settrans -fgap /servers/socket/2 /hurd/pfinet -i eth0 -a 192.168.1.3 -g 192.168.1.1 -m 255.255.255.0

In order to use DHCP, you need to install the dhcp-client package and run dhclient eth0 etc.

Setup GRUB

You surely want grub to have a nice menu entry able to boot GNU, instead of typing a boring arcane. There are Debian-specific scripts that may help you. See GRUB's page for this.

Setup apt-get

Sometimes getting apt-get to work is not straightforward. Good mirrors to put in /etc/apt/sources.list are (as of Jan 2007):

deb http://mirrors.kernel.org/debian unstable main contrib
deb-src http://mirrors.kernel.org/debian unstable main contrib
deb http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian unreleased main
deb-src http://ftp.debian-ports.org/debian unreleased main

apt-get update a couple of times if some file fails to download.

If when doing your first apt-get, dpkg complains of missing programs, get root in a login shell (su -).

Installing packages without having a network connection is described ?DebianAptOffline.

Random

You often need scp and ssh. There is now a random-egd package available which uses a random translator by Ryan Hunter and the entropy gathering daemon as entropy source.

See random for more information.

Console

The latest Hurd package in Debian, plus the native-install script, creates all necessary device nodes and other magic. You just need to edit /etc/default/hurd-console to tune the parameters and tell it to start at bootup.

You can also call the Hurd console manually with the proper arguments:

console -d vga -d pc_kbd --repeat=kbd -d pc_mouse --repeat=mouse \
        -d generic_speaker -c /dev/vcs

cd /dev
ln -s cons/kbd .
ln -s cons/mouse .

?DebianXorg

You first must have setup the virtual console. See above.

Assuming you've installed WindowMaker and have tried running startx already:

[/etc/xorg.conf]

Section "Module"
#        Load           "dri"
#        Load           "speedo"
         .
         .
         .
EndSection

Section "InputDevice"
        Identifier      "Configured Mouse"
        Driver          "mouse"
        Option          "CorePointer"
        Option          "Device"                "/dev/mouse"
        Option          "Protocol"              "osmouse"
EndSection

Make sure not to have the Emulate3Buttons and ZAxisMapping settings set, as they lead to problems with e.g. dragging windows around.

What about package XYZ?

See if you can find a useful tip in package troubleshooting.