linux-preinstall

Put first-time setup in easy mode for GNU+Linux systems! Make the system ready to use from day one.

These scripts automatically install programs and configure settings many users expect, and inform you of any manual steps needed. I regularly update and use these scripts for myself and people I help. These scripts have been in development since 2016, but due to growth and specialization I've added them to git to make installation even easier (web install from git).

Install only the packages you want for the specific task (such as development, video, streaming, desktop publishing, etc), but don't miss any you need (These groups may be lighter or heavier than distro-specific groups defined in the repositories, but usually lighter and more comprehensive for creators of any sort. The project is moving toward using metadata and Python to avoid the overlap between different groups and reduce the size of each group).

Installing the linuxpreinstall python module also adds some useful commands (See the "Modular Features" section).

GOALS

• Make the GNU+Linux system ready to use from day one.
• Separate scripts by distro (Ubuntu, Fedora).
• Separate scripts by workflow (end user, developer, server).
• Move as many features to the python linuxpreinstall module as seems reasonable.
  • A major feature that would have to be ported is selecting the correct package name depending on the distro (See the bash-based api.rc and the python-based linuxpreinstall/static/package_names.csv (WIP)).

Design Choices

• Flatpaks are installed as root. In edge cases, that fixes small issues related to permissions and accessibility of binary paths, shortcuts, etc.
• The flatpak is preferred over another package usually, for the most up-to-date version, and one that can be updated in one command rather than many which is the case for AppImage. For help with AppImage "install" and "uninstall" including icons (trimmed to one command each!) See nopackage.
• The "Overview" section describes more about how linux-preinstall is unique.

Install

Open terminal, then cd to the repo directory. If you don't have it yet, run the following to install/update from the web:

cd ~
if [ ! -d git ]; then mkdir git; fi
cd git
if [ ! -d linux-preinstall ]; then
  git clone https://github.com/Hierosoft/linux-preinstall.git
  cd linux-preinstall
else
  cd linux-preinstall
  git pull
fi

echo "Installing `pwd`..."
python3 -m pip install --user `pwd`

Overview

There are some things that are for everyone that Linux distros don't provide for various reasons such as:

• The package isn't well-maintained but works fine.
• There is no packaged version for the distro's package manager (There is no RPM or deb, or at least one not submitted to the distro nor upstream distro's repo if any). In other words, the maintainer of the project doesn't compile such a package and there is no separate package maintainer (That's where you can help if you learn how!).

Linux Preinstall aims to solve that.

doc contains Additional and WIP documentation for linux-preinstall or programs with which linux-preinstall assists.

Where there may be things that are too simple to script (one line or requires clicks) but too obscure to memorize, various tutorials and/or examples are included, such as:

• Always Install (any GNU+Linux System)
• AlwaysAdd/
• AlwaysRemove/
  • See also keyring for help with annoying keyring popups, though a keyring generally is required and not automatic except in KDE for some reason :(
• MissingMimetypes/
• drivers/Broadcom_B43_Wifi.ubuntu.sh
• JNLP format.md
• centos kiosk with screensaver picture list sync from windows via samba
• TV Tuners (analog)
• tar.md
• list of forensic_imaging_tools.md
  • See also rotocanvas (visual diff and algorithmic (non-ai) similarity search).
• macOS

In some cases, instructions for beginners are included. Scripts such as those listed below may be helpful for you if you are starting linux or starting someone else on linux:

• camera essentials
• Fedora Linux (formerly "Fedora tips - with notes on 26.md")
• list of linux games (formerly Games for linux, semi-popular; game listings and stores, Linux; and games, casual from AUR (applies to Arch-based distros including Manjaro))
• Lubuntu essentials
• LXQt essentials
• music essentials
• ..and any other files that may be named with "essentials" in doc

WIP (Work in progress) documents:

• troubleshooting-developer/
• doc/developer/document_etl.md (Word or Writer image extraction via unzip and emf conversion)
• projects: This generally contains project files content that becomes part of linux-preinstall (not necessarily WIP, but may have previous WIP versions as separate files or layers).

IT

This section explains scripts and usage of this repo that is specific to IT work (fixing computers and networks usually typifies the Information Technology field).

There are some parts of linux-preinstall that are in current use for computer clients:

• One use for the documents such as ones above is that you can place a link to them on a person's desktop, and then update them with git automatically such as a cron job running git pull as that user (cd /home/user/git/linux-preinstall && sudo -u user git pull # where user is the username).
• The "expertmultimedia-managed" folder is only for setting up computers to "phone home" (provide self-identification and an IP address for remoting) to Expert Multimedia, and isn't for general use.

Scripts

Beyond tutorials and examples, linux-preinstall includes many usable (See disclaimer in license) scripts.

The following long subsections describe each category of scripts.

Software and Software Group Installation

The most frequent type of script included is one that installs a program that is hard to install or installs a list of programs related to a specific type of user or workflow. This is more effective than tasksel (for Debian/Ubuntu) or groupinstall (for RedHat/Fedora) because the programs and groups here are recommendations not merely a full list that may leave you unsure of what will work well, or a list that is only for a fixed role of a computer rather than a circumstantially elected or self-selected role of a person. In the case of the server folder here, that is a computer role, but that is mostly an exception and applies to webmasters. It is also more fine-grained than an "x server" group in group systems (where "x" is LAMP [Linux-Apache-MySQL-PHP] or something like that) in that each of this repo's scripts handles installation for a specific workflow and not more.

In other words, the selections are "opinionated": The individual software packages are scripted here because they are recommended based on effectiveness, fit, and whether software is maintained well. The result is that you get programs you may not know existed but may be the best for what you are doing. The software packages are grouped by script, by folder, or scripted individually are each included based on recommendation, rather than on the best (or selected as default based on opinion) of what one particular distro has to offer. The recommended packages are installed by any means necessary: install necessary repos and/or PPAs, or use flatpaks, AppImages, or downloaded binary archives. Other advantages of using any means necessary are that lists are more comprehensive and/or have more updated versions (than on repos) in many cases.

This project recommends installing certain programs in those ways. In Debian-based distros, such versions are especially useful if you want only versions of system packages vetted according to their philosophy but want cutting-edge versions of desktop applications. Even beyond such distros, some of these programs are maintained well (perhaps better than you think if you only look at releases) but don't provide distro-specific packages or even releases often (or the distro doesn't vet, process, or accept the packages due to lack of help or by choice). See the lists of programs currently recommended to be obtained by special means:

• Flatpaks.list (maintained on developer's computer via cd projects && flatpak list --app | cut -f1 > Flatpaks.list)
  • except ignore those in projects/Flatpaks-only_for_testing.list.
    • For installing Minetest, you should normally use Poikilos' EnlivenMinetest instead for the minetest.org version with a stable API and official support for many mods. Minetest documents or scripts in linux-preinstall are secondary if present and may be removed at any time or may download EnlivenMinetest scripts.
  • or see projects/Flatpaks-all.list but ignore those also in that list or in projects/Flatpaks-runtimes.list (Runtime packages are automatically installed as dependencies for the installed apps). NOTE: There is at least one that has an asterisk since each version has a different package name (The version number is in the package name). The list was made manually by comparing Flatpaks.list to projects/Flatpaks-all.list.
  • Flatpaks can be installed system-wide with sudo then automatically updated in one shot via sudo flatpak update!
• AppImages.list: This list is manually maintained such as by comparing it to the result of ls ~/.local/lib64/ | grep mage (those installed using nopackage; only old versions would be somewhere like ls ~/Downloads/1.InstallManually | grep mage) on the developer's computer.
• Unpackaged.list (generated manually on the developer's computer such as by comparing it to ls ~/.local/lib64/ | grep -v mage and ls ~/.local/lib)
  • Unpackaged versions of Blender are available via Poikilos' blendernightly project.
  • Some of these programs are recommended to be built from source. In such cases, usually a scripts to build the software from source (or a document describing how) is in the linux-preinstall project.
  • Some applications are in zip/gz/etc. binary distributions and have install scripts in this project historically (predating the nopackage project), but in such cases instead use nopackage to install the software and report any errors at the Issues section on that repository.
  • world_clock is available via Poikilos' world_clock repo.
  • bfg is a tool for stripping old data from git repos to save space and increase the speed of many operations done over the internet. It may be easier than purging using the git-filter-repo python add-on for git. See "How to remove/delete a large file from commit history in the Git repository?] on StackOverflow for details on both methods to avoid the older and more complex "git-filter-branch" method.
  • Ulauncher is an application launcher with a fast and comprehensive search feature.
  • Umlet is a UML diagram creation tool.

The lists and individual program install scripts make programs in linux-preinstall generally easier to install.

Install scripts are categorized by a person's role and/or workflow, such as:

• everyone
• drivers
• developer
• educational
• migration

Folders named "unused" are not recommended, and there may be a better option. For example, VirtualBox is not recommended, and qemu install scripts are provided instead.

For an explanation of the expertmultimedia-managed folder, see the "IT" section above.

The names of scripts specify the distro when necessary. See the "Script Naming Conventions" section below for more information.

After running install scripts, post-install instructions are often appended to a file called PostInstallInstructions.md (It should appear on the Desktop--See issue #18 for more feature status).

If there is a program that is not available in a repo and not available on here, it may yet be within one of the scripts (suchas developer/developer.fedora.sh). If not, it may be on flathub even if not in any install script in this repo. Otherwise, if only an AppImage, zipped build, or single binary is available, you can usually use nopackage to install it (and an icon!) in one shot.

Developer Tools

The linux-preinstall project includes various useful tools for developers in the developer folder, including:

• An improved fork of a geany-openscad highlighter.

Server Tools

• ./server/optional/php-set-version.apache.ubuntu.sh or ./server/optional/php-set-version.nginx.deb.sh: Choose (specify as a parameter) a specific version of php as the system's php and get all of the matching dependencies such as for WordPress, and uninstall all other versions and their packages. Only use the script that matches your chosen server technology (Apache or NGINX)!

Server Scripts

• See [System commands][#system-commands].

Configuration Tools

MATE

The linuxpreinstall.mate module manages the MATE desktop environment.

For managing panels, the list of IDs is a list of strings, but each object definition is a different path. Use the id to construct the path. The structure is clear when browsing org/mate/panel/objects using dconf-editor:

Each item has the following values (IDs/values in parens below are only examples). This list is a list of values for one item (the example item is org/mate/panel/objects/object-1/, which varies depending on your configuration (the actual ID folder would be in gsettings get org.mate.panel object-id-list.

• enumeration action-type 'The action type this button represents. Possible values are "lock", "logout", "run", "search" and "screenshot". This key is only relevant if the object_type key is "action-applet".'
  • Default: 'none'
  • Current value: Default value
• string applet-iid:
  • "WnckletFactory::ShowDesktopApplet" (object-1)
• string attached-toplevel-id "Panel attached to drawer" (default '', Current value: Default value)
• string custom-icon
• Boolean has-arrow (true)
• string launcher-location (default '', Current value: Default value)
• Boolean locked
• menu-string path 'The path from which the menu contents is [constructed]. This key is only relevant if the use_menu_path key is true and the object_type key is "menu-object".' [fixed spelling]
  • Default: 'applications:/'
  • Current value: Default value
• enumeration object-type
  • Default: 'launcher'
  • Current value: 'applet'
• Boolean panel-right-stick 'Interpret position relative to the bottom/right edge'
• i (Signed 32-bit integer) position: "...number of pixels from the left (or top if vertical) panel edge." -- See also panel-right-stick.
• string tooltip
• string toplevel-id: "Toplevel panel containing object"
  • Default: ''
  • Current value: 'top'
• Boolean use-custom-con
• Boolean use-menu-path: "Use custom path for menu contents"
  • Default: false
  • Current value: Default value

Script Naming Conventions

Pick which folders and scripts to run based on whatever you want to do (See the "Software and Software Group Installation" section).

For best results, the following usage order is recommended:

1. Run the chosen script without *-nonroot in the name if present, and run any such script as root (or via sudo bash followed by the script name).
2. Run the matching script where the name is the same except with "-nonroot" or "-sudoer" added to the name if there is one. Run the "-nonroot" script as regular user (without sudo).
   • Some of the scripts call sudo but change settings for the current user. Such scripts (should) have "sudoer" in the name.

• If the name includes .debian.*, then it is known to work on Debian and may work on Ubuntu.
• If the name includes .ubuntu.*, then it is known to work on Ubuntu and probably will not work on Debian.
• If the name includes .deb.*, then it may work on Debian, Ubuntu or any other deb-based distro.
• If the name includes .fedora.*, then it will work on Fedora but may not work on other rpm-based distros.
• If the name doesn't include any distro name, the script attempts to adapt to all popular distros (If such a script fails to detect a known package installer command or other known and applicable distro-specific feature, it will show an error and return non-zero on exit).

Utility Scripts

Additional scripts (scripts that do things rather than install things) are for IT and developer use, but may serve other people as well:

• utilities
• utilities-developer

Related Projects

Related projects

• nopackage: Install any AppImage, archive, deb, or binary as an icon (download icons automatically when known!) on any GNU+Linux system!
  • formerly the linux-preinstall tool called install_any.py
• rotocanvas: has several useful commands related to image sequences including (browseable) image "playlists".
• TemperatureSanitizer: See also TEMPerV1 verbose output files (files named with -vvv) for technical info.

Modular Features

The linux-preinstall project makes some commands available to you to use via any terminal (within the scope of the installation, whether that be a root or user install). The following subsections describe those features. To get the linuxpreinstall (The Python module, as opposed to scripts not in the linuxpreinstall directory but still inside linux-preinstall), you must perform the Python installation (See the "Install" section).

sortversion

The linuxpreinstall.versioning module helps identify version strings inside of names. A "." will only be included as part of the version if a number follows. Otherwise it will end the version, since it would seem to be the start of a file extension in that case. The usual use of it is using the utilities/sortversion command such as via:

ls | sortversion

To use the sortversion command in the utilities folder you must either have the linuxpreinstall module in your path or install sortversion as a symlink such as via (replace /home/user/git/linux-preinstall or ~/git/linux-preinstall with the location of your cloned linux-preinstall repo in the following commands!):

echo "If you copied and pasted this without changing it, don't expect it to work--You failed to follow the documentation."
sudo ln -s /home/user/git/linux-preinstall/utilities/sortversion /usr/local/bin/
# or:
# ln -s ~/git/linux-preinstall/utilities/sortversion ~/.local/bin/
# if that is in your user PATH. It can be added to your path in ~/.bash_profile (or whatever file is appropriate for your os) like:
# PATH=$PATH:$HOME/.local/bin:$HOME/bin
# # ^ before the "export PATH" line, otherwise add that afterward.

System commands

The system commands become available after installing the repository via pip (See the "Install" section).

• findmime: Find files by full/partial mimetype (such as "jpeg" or "image"!) in the current directory.
• cleanif: Remove files from directory 1 if they exist in directory 2 (great for if you unzip or copy a load of files to the wrong place!)
• unredirect_md: Change every redirect in a Markdown file to a real URL, whether there is an encoded URL in any query param (such as q=https%3A%2F%2Fblendermarket.com%2Fproducts%2FNatureClicker) or there is a 302 response.
• selectoutput: Select an output using a fuzzy search string such as analog or HDMI (not case-sensitive; requires pulseaudio-utils).
  • For an automated reconnect to run first, see utilities/reconnect-audio.sh which calls selectoutput hdmi if selectoutput is in the path.
• whichicon: Find what icon (.desktop) file provides a given command.
• sort-brisk-menu-favs: can sort the favorites ("Favourites" (en_GB)) menu.
• remove-bad-mate-items: Remove bad mate items (if no param is specified, remove items with a blank applet-iid).
• unthing: See linuxpreinstall/thingi.py for documentation.
• thumbnails: Clear thumbnail(s) for the specified file(s) so that the OS will regenerate the thumbnail cache for the specified file(s) on the next load/refresh of the folder in a File Explorer. See linuxpreinstall/thumbnails.py for documentation.

pycodetool commands

The following scripts utilize https://github.com/poikilos/pycodetool:

• changes: Look for repos in the current directory and show what changes are not yet committed (including untracked).

System commands for servers

• backup-nginx-symlinks

Commands moved to other repos

nopackage

The old install_any.py script's features have been moved to https://github.com/poikilos/nopackage which provides the new command nopackage:

You can use nopackage to install almost anything, such as a single file (AppImage or other), a zip file, or to install a deb package on any distro in your profile, all without superuser priveleges!

ggrep

• ggrep: Get a geany command to go to the line in the file from grep (searching within file(s)). Recursively search directories by default.
  • Moved to hierosoft

More Information

See the doc folder for fixes for your specific problem that may not be scripted yet or to learn more about GNU+Linux systems.

Changes

See changelog.md

References

See doc/references.md