Questions specific to the Debian official distribution (stable, testing, or unstable); if you are using a derivative of Debian (e.g. Mint, Ubuntu, Kali, etc), then use that distribution’s tag instead.
Debian is a community-driven Linux distribution with a very large number of packages and many supported architectures. Development started in 1993. Several distributions derive from it in some form, including linux-mint, ubuntu, and kali-linux, among many others.
Use this tag for questions that apply specifically to a Debian release; if the question concerns a derivative distribution, use that distribution's tag instead.
If you’re using a derivative, don’t assume that Debian works the same way — that may be the case, but it’s not always true.
Philosophy
The goal of the Debian project is to produce a free operating system. The Debian Free Software Guidelines are one of the notable definitions of free software, and the Open Source Definition derives from it. Debian provides a small amount of non-free software, though it is not formally part of Debian.
Releases
At any point in time, there are at least three distributions of Debian:
- stable: the officially released distribution.
- testing: the preparation ground for “stable”. This can be seen as a rolling release.
- unstable: the latest packages as they come in.
In addition to unstable, experimental serves as a staging area for experimental packages which might not work for everyone; also used during pre-release freezes for package uploads instead of unstable, and for new packages.
The previous released distribution is known as oldstable and is supported in parallel of the current released distribution, initially by the project as a whole, later in life by the long-term support (LTS) effort.
In addition to Debian GNU/Linux, there are projects for BSD-based versions of Debian and Debian GNU/Hurd.
Documentation
- FAQ
- Installation manual (including supported hardware)
- Debian Reference
- Wiki
- Mailing list archives
- Security information
- Bug reports (
https://bugs.debian.org/42to see bug #42) - Available packages (quick search:
https://packages.debian.org/package-name) and search for package contents - Manual pages (e.g. man(1):
https://manpages.debian.org/man.1)
Common tasks
- Update the local copy of repository catalogs:
apt update(this should be done before installing or upgrading packages) - Install a package:
apt install package-name - Apply updates:
apt upgrade - Remove a package:
apt remove package-name(preserving local configuration) orapt purge package-name - Remove packages which are no longer needed:
apt autoremoveorapt autopurge
