My experience running smxi on Linux Mint Debian Edition
UncleVom
Status: Interested
Joined: 12 Sep 2008
Posts: 21
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smxi with Linux Mint Debian Edition.
32 bit on EeePC 1000HE.

Did user login and then sudo -s

Could not get wireless network to start, it had been working in GUI before I did ctrl-alt-F1, so I quit smxi and plugged in a cable.

Then reran smxi from the prompt.

It started fine.
I picked Liquorix sources, aptitude and full-upgrade and just followed along and did an update.
Tons of updates, but it was a fresh (version 1) install from a DVD so not too surprising.
I got a bunch of warnings from insserve about mint missing LSB tags and overrides and finally "udev active, skipping device node creation". then "inserve:warning: script 'K01mintsystem' missing LSB tags and overrides" followed by "inserve:warning: script 'mintsystem' missing LSB tags and overrides" then it hung, I waited for about five minutes to confirm the freeze, there was no disk activity.

Hard rebooted after ctrl-alt-del shutdown hung too.

Did a "sudo dpkg --configure -a" from the "sudo -s" command prompt and everything completed with continued warnings about 'K01mintsystem' and 'mintsystem'.

I reran smxi and it breezed throught the now empty upgrade and I picked "kernel options" and the apt kernel and aptitude informed me that I had to install a bunch of what looked like unrelated gnome and some qt4 stuff not sure why but it all installed without complaint then the Liquorix Kernel 2.6.35-6 came up and installed fine.

I then went to graphics and got an xorg.conf installed and reinstalled the Intel driver.

Rebooted with the Liquorix kernel and thus far everything seems to be working fine.

Maybe just a bad night when the stars didn't quite align, maybe I should have selected apt-get instead of aptitude.

So my conclusion is that smxi can work with Linux Mint Debian Edition, but it may or may not work right on the first pass.

P.S.
It has been suggested that the "hang" that I experienced may have been caused by one of the piped "Change Log" type messages that need input to continue. So if it happens to you give a "q", "esc" or "enter" key input to see if it clears, before resorting to the reboot.
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UncleVom
Status: Interested
Joined: 12 Sep 2008
Posts: 21
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A follow-up:

Ran a fresh crop of updates today and received no insserve warnings so I think the issue may have been resolved in the previous bunch of updates.
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techAdmin
Status: Site Admin
Joined: 26 Sep 2003
Posts: 4127
Location: East Coast, West Coast? I know it's one of them.
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oh, ok, yes, the first release probably exposed some bugs.

The hang may be caused by an apt package waiting for a response, but without TELLING you this, I saw the same thing on an LMDE install, it was only by chance that I recognized the output as something from 'less' or 'more' which requires user action to exit, I think hitting 'q' to quit and continue.

Now and then debian maintainers do this, but the package never tells you this fact. One of the bigger bugs/user-incoherent allowed standard behaviors in apt that I can think of, and one of the most inexcusable ones.

What I have found is that if apt hangs, do not assume it's broken, assume there is an invisible and undeclared pause that requires some user input, so try: <enter> and if that doesn't work, try 'q', and if that doesn't work, try esc
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Richard
Status: Interested
Joined: 10 Mar 2007
Posts: 42
Location: Venezuela
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Good info.
Installed Lmde
ran the mintupdate first to check for issues
added testing and sid,
then added APT::Default-Release "testing"; to apt.conf
(it just seems to work better for me)
did aptitude update && aptitude safe-upgrade

then installed smxi for the full-upgrade
Saw some of the same messages as above but nothing major.

Reran with a few quibbles.
Installed Vbox and it seems OK.
Still haven't learned how to migrate vbox installs from one installation to the next. The .vdi is on my /data partition.
Always end up reinstalling WinXP in Vbox. Guess it is just true-to-life. :(

All in all, smxi presented no problems with Lmde.

Been away running mostly Linuxmint & Peppermint, waiting for Lmde.
with Lxde added it is very quick. Just like Debian. :)

regards,
Richard.

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techAdmin
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Joined: 26 Sep 2003
Posts: 4127
Location: East Coast, West Coast? I know it's one of them.
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Re vbox, use the import existing disk function, make sure the permissions on the vbox image are set to be owned/writable by all, not your other user name. Even the same user name can have different id numbers, so don't assume.

Machine -> New -> machine name, ram allocation -> Use existing hard disk, browse to it.
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Richard
Status: Interested
Joined: 10 Mar 2007
Posts: 42
Location: Venezuela
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Thanks!
Used New and chose the existing disk.
And it's running.
I knew there had to be a way.

Regards,
Richard.
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