No window manager install...

[jpsimm]

Yes, I like Debian but I like to keep it simple and clean. I want my computer to boot to a prompt only. I wonder if a no wm install can be done. Wish me luck kids.

[tynman]

Yes, it is definitely an option. It is used every day for servers (where gui may not be required) and by people who prefer to install X, window manager, and their favorite gui apps a la carte. In the Debian Installation Software selection window, simply UN-select all the various "desktop" options, including the "default desktop" (Gnome, XFCE, etc.), and no gui stuff will be installed.

[jpsimm]

Thanks.. Years ago, (decades ago) I used computers before there were any graphics at all. They were quite satisfactory. Indeed one could produce hard copy results in both paper (dot matrix) and punch card (IBM cards) forms and memory was via magnetic tape. I am thinking now that it would be fun to, as you say, use a PC with applications, "ala carte". Back in 82 everyone was buying Commodore 16's and 64's to have fun with. These had no window managers to gobble up memory. It was easy then. And yes I used a reel to reel tape for memory. I'd like to try it again just to see what a difference there might be. What I like less and less with 'puters now is the obvious move away from being self contained and more towards the idea that we all simply have terminals through which we connect to various clouds where our data is kept. I don't like this idea. Too much loss of both privacy and authority. Every time we download an "app" we have to give permission to the author to access virtually everything in our computer. Too much involvement by those who think of marketing. No thanks to that. OK that's off the point but I had to say it. I would like to have only those applications that I am going to use to be presented to me in graphical form. Everything else can be as though it were a terminal. Call me a purist. The truth is I am extremely fussy when it comes to the administration of mindless machines.