Distro That INCLUDES Flash? (not Lenny)

[paulmo]

over the past year and half I've run Lenny on 2 desktops and 2 lappers, but I'm tired of having to troubleshoot crashing Iceweasel and Flash issues. I'm not asking for tech support, rather, is there a Debian distro that runs "out of the box"?

[dasein]

...is there a Debian distro that runs "out of the box"?

Pure Debian? No.

There are multiple Debian-based distros that run Flash OOTB, however (including Mepis and an obscure little distro known as Linux Mint).

[secipolla]

Try Google Chrome (the browser, not the OS), it comes with Flash pre-installed.

[mvdan]

There are multiple Debian-based distros that run Flash OOTB, however (including Mepis and an obscure little distro known as Linux Mint).

Obscure?

[...] is there a Debian distro that runs "out of the box"?

There might be, like LMDE. But Debian won't. No install image will carry non-free software from now on (except the non-free drivers netinstall images).

[dtl131]

Why do you need it pre-installed? Is it that difficult to download and put libflashplayer.so in ~/.mozilla/plugins (and delete/overwrite the old version) ?
If you're having crashes, it's probably the player itself and/or your video driver, which won't magically fix itself in a distro with Flash pre-installed.

[rolltide101x]

Linux Mint Debian Edition

http://www.linuxmint.com/download_lmde.php

[Ahtiga Saraz]

Mepis is another Debian based and multimedia-friendly distro you might like.

[62chevy]

SalineOS If you like Xfce. The only thing in /etc/sources.list is Debian stuff.

Personally I prefer to do that stuff myself but I do understand because my wife does not want to know anything about it, it just needs to work.

[vbrummond]

The only Debian based distro I would recommend using is Mepis. It uses KDE as a default. Though as said why worry about finding a distro with it preinstalled? Also, why not use Squeeze instead of Lenny? Install the new Debian 6 and upgrade Firefox/Iceweasel to a modern version, and simply install flash with apt-get install flashplugin-nonfree. Note you need non-free added to your sources.list.

Here is how to install a modern firefox: http://mozilla.debian.net/

[paulmo]

Do I have to do a whole new install to upgrade to 6?

Thanks for distro suggestions...will check on Mint, but thinking that as the foundation for all those other distros, my Debian should be taking care of me. Browsers (Ice and Epiph.) still crashing periodically so trying to install Chrome; running into dependency problems (Lenny 5.0.9 and up to date):

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dpkg -i google-chrome-stable_current_i386.deb
(Reading database ... 96071 files and directories currently installed.)
Preparing to replace google-chrome-stable 15.0.874.121-r109964 (using google-chrome-stable_current_i386.deb) ...
Unpacking replacement google-chrome-stable ...
dpkg: dependency problems prevent configuration of google-chrome-stable:
 google-chrome-stable depends on libasound2 (>> 1.0.22); however:
  Version of libasound2 on system is 1.0.16-2.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libc6 (>= 2.11); however:
  Version of libc6 on system is 2.7-18lenny7.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libcups2 (>= 1.4.0); however:
  Version of libcups2 on system is 1.3.8-1+lenny10.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libdbus-1-3 (>= 1.2.14); however:
  Version of libdbus-1-3 on system is 1.2.1-5+lenny2.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libdbus-glib-1-2 (>= 0.78); however:
  Version of libdbus-glib-1-2 on system is 0.76-1.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libfontconfig1 (>= 2.8.0); however:
  Version of libfontconfig1 on system is 2.6.0-3.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libfreetype6 (>= 2.3.9); however:
  Version of libfreetype6 on system is 2.3.7-2+lenny8.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libgconf2-4 (>= 2.27.0); however:
  Version of libgconf2-4 on system is 2.22.0-1.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libgcrypt11 (>= 1.4.2); however:
  Version of libgcrypt11 on system is 1.4.1-1.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libnspr4-0d (>= 4.7.3-0ubuntu1~) | libnspr4 (>= 4.8.7-0ubuntu1); however:
  Version of libnspr4-0d on system is 4.7.1-5.
  Package libnspr4 is not installed.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libstdc++6 (>= 4.4.0); however:
  Version of libstdc++6 on system is 4.3.2-1.1.
 google-chrome-stable depends on libatk1.0-0 (>= 1.30.0); however:
  Version of libatk1.0-0 on system is 1.22.0-1.
dpkg: error processing google-chrome-stable (--install):
 dependency problems - leaving unconfigured
Processing triggers for menu ...
Processing triggers for man-db ...
Errors were encountered while processing:
 google-chrome-stable

So I try this:

Code: Select all

apt-get -f install

However this does the OPPOSITE of downloading dependencies, effectively aborting install:

Code: Select all

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree       
Reading state information... Done
Correcting dependencies... Done
The following packages will be REMOVED:
  google-chrome-stable
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 1 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
1 not fully installed or removed.
After this operation, 107MB disk space will be freed.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]? 

Both y or n aborts the install.

I should mention I had to instill NVIDIA the debian way about a month ago, and that's working. The crashing was intermittent before (1-2x/mo.) but now is several times DAILY.

Thanks in advance for guidance on this issue.

My sources.list:

Code: Select all

#Debian Main Repos
deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ lenny main contrib non-free 
deb-src http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ lenny main contrib non-free 

# Debian Update Repos
deb http://security.debian.org/ lenny/updates main contrib non-free 
deb http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ lenny-proposed-updates main contrib non-free 
deb-src http://security.debian.org/ lenny/updates main contrib non-free 
deb-src http://ftp.us.debian.org/debian/ lenny-proposed-updates main contrib non-free 

[vbrummond]

Do I have to do a whole new install to upgrade to 6?

No, you can probably safely upgrade. This guide might be of help. http://www.debian.org/releases/squeeze/ ... ng.en.html

Upgrading is not difficult however it does involve downloading a lot of packages. Generally when I do an upgrade I follow these steps:

1. Remove extra packages and repositories. Generally I disable 3rd party repositories and uninstall packages that won't be useful in the new release. This bit of clean-up can make the install a lot faster and less of a headache.
2. Change lenny to squeeze in /etc/apt/sources.list (or synaptic). Update the sources (using apt-get update). Then download all of the new packages with apt-get --download-only dist-upgrade.
3. When you have all the packages downloaded, reboot into recovery mode (might be called single user mode).
4. While in recovery mode finally do the upgrade using

apt-get dist-upgrade

.

The upgrade might take around 30 mins and will involve a few questions now and then. It might be wise to glace through the release notes first. An upgrade is not very difficult, but it might be safer (or even simpler) just to back up data and bookmarks and just do a fresh install of Squeeze. You can also test a live cd first to ensure it works for you.
http://www.debian.org/releases/squeeze/ ... ase-notes/
http://www.debian.org/CD/

Thanks for distro suggestions...will check on Mint, but thinking that as the foundation for all those other distros, my Debian should be taking care of me. Browsers (Ice and Epiph.)

Distros like Mint and etc are ok, but I also never saw "codecs preinstalled" as a real reason to not use Debian. As of squeeze and its backports even h264 and libmp3lame is available.

still crashing periodically so trying to install Chrome; running into dependency problems (Lenny 5.0.9 and up to date)

This is likely because the web is making a huge move to html5 and newer javascript that older browsers are less able to cope with.

However this does the OPPOSITE of downloading dependencies, effectively aborting install:

It will be impossible to install without a lot of essential core packages being newer versions. This will possibly require a lot of work and a lot of potential for problems. I think there is a backports for lenny but I am not sure how in-depth they are. I doubt all of these libraries will be available from it.

Thanks in advance for guidance on this issue.

Hopefully I can be of help!

[62chevy]

Hopefully I can be of help!

I think you just gave the best advice for upgrading Lenny to Squeeze. I always find the release-notes helpful for upgrading and you gave him the link so maybe the OP will use it.

[stevepusser]

The killer for Lenny would be that libc6 upgrade. That would need a new kernel and many other upgrades, so you may as well go for Squeeze. If all you needed was newer ALSA libraries (libasound2), that may already be in lenny-backports; if not, it's simple to backport.

[paulmo]

Running Squeeze

Thanks all esp. vbrummond, great instructions plus the single user mode install was an added step beyond the docs.

Had to install the nvidia-kernel-dkms...and use lynx browser to search instructions (again...) but now in Gnome City.