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HOWTO: Speeding up Debian

Share your HowTo, Documentation, Tips and Tricks. Not for support questions!.
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Bulkley
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#41 Post by Bulkley »

Lou wrote:Keeping your system lean and mean, requires maintenance:

1. Removing is not enough, you have to PURGE! and not only that, then you have to go to your /home and enable the 'hidden files', and remove manually any vestige of the app you wiped out (dot files).
Yes it does require maintenence. From time to time I think about doing a fresh minimalist install, just to clean it up. The reason I don't is that I know that it would only be a few months before I would have to start purging again. So, my constant challenge is getting rid of what I no longer need.

Question: does removing the dot files help speed it up?

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Pobega
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#42 Post by Pobega »

Bulkley wrote:
Lou wrote:Keeping your system lean and mean, requires maintenance:

1. Removing is not enough, you have to PURGE! and not only that, then you have to go to your /home and enable the 'hidden files', and remove manually any vestige of the app you wiped out (dot files).
Yes it does require maintenence. From time to time I think about doing a fresh minimalist install, just to clean it up. The reason I don't is that I know that it would only be a few months before I would have to start purging again. So, my constant challenge is getting rid of what I no longer need.

Question: does removing the dot files help speed it up?
It's barely noticable, it probably only speeds up doing "ls" in your home directory, or opening Nautilus/Thunar/PCManFM if you have "View Hidden Files" selected.

Removing the hidden recipe files is good if you just want a clean home directory, so that you can "ls -a" in peace.
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Lou
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#43 Post by Lou »

Bulkley wrote: Question: does removing the dot files help speed it up?
All your config files for the app you just 'purged' sometimes stay put, if you wanna clean up everything you have to delete them.

afterwards,

$ sudo apt-get clean

I do apt-get clean 2-3 times a week, debfoster is great too, and once you install 'localepurge' it keeps your skystem free of locales you never use automatically.

Edit: as for speeding it up, maybe not much, but it keeps your box clean and mean, and saves future headaches.
Last edited by Lou on 2007-05-01 15:23, edited 1 time in total.
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Lou
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#44 Post by Lou »

DeanLinkous wrote:Not sure if it was mentioned but.... XFE is a awesome lite GUI/clicky file manager!
xfe is my favorite file manager, it's light and fast and easy to use, right click on a file and choose from the menu:

open with, open, delete, move, copy, paste, extract to, you name it, plus you can drag it and drop it wherever you want.
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Lou
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#45 Post by Lou »

llivv wrote:I was able to do almost everything in ice that you posted above. :wink: I have Area51 as a theme with one user and aeteria with another. I'm wondering if I now ( after moving config files around) understand why you mentioned grabbing the theme from it's default location.
As in everything in life, the first time you do something, you're a dummy. After you do it 5 times, you are good, after 20 times, you are a genius!

Read:
HOWTO: IceWM Basic Configuration
http://forums.debian.net/viewtopic.php?t=5450

it will answer some questions.

Then you begin to invent your own tricks, so working with your box becomes easier, second nature.

Coincidently, ( you say you don't bother with the mouse and use your keymap instead) which is probably why I can't figure out what iceconf is doing underneath the gui. I'm going to try renaming my $/.ice as well as my just recently created /etc/ice directories and see if I can't map things better that way.
Iceconf is there because you install it, in the icewm howto and the wiki from icewm.org, you're supposed to create an .icewm in your /home.

If it is not there yet, then:

$ mkdir /home/your_name/.icewm

$ nano .icewm/preferences

and put there your preferences, same with winoptions and keys:

$ nano .icewm/keys
$ nano .icewm/winoptions

But as times passes, you start getting smart, and taking shortcuts:

I chose all my preferences, winoptions, and keys and put them all in an 'icewm' folder i created in my web mail (yahoo mail), so when i do an new debian install, and i do:

$ sudo apt-get install icewm icewm-themes menu

i go to my web mail and copy/paste my config, it takes 5 minutes:

.icewm/preferences

OpaqueMove=0
OpaqueResize=0
SmartPlacement=1
MenuMouseTracking=1
ModSuperIsCtrlAlt=1
UseMouseWheel=1
QuickSwitch=1
AutoReloadMenus=1
ShowProgramsMenu=1
ShowThemesMenu=1
ShowHelp=1
TerminalCommand="aterm"
ShutdownCommand="sudo halt"
RebootCommand="sudo reboot"
WorkspaceNames=" 1 ", " 2 "


ShowTaskBar=1
TaskBarAutoHide=1
TaskBarShowClock=1
TaskBarShowAPMStatus=0
TaskBarAtTop=1
TaskBarShowAPMStatus=0
TaskBarShowAPMTime=0
TaskBarShowMailboxStatus=1
TaskBarShowWindows=1
TaskBarShowShowDesktopButton=0
TaskBarShowTray=1
TaskBarShowWindowIcons=0
TaskBarShowCPUStatus=0
TaskBarShowNetStatus=0
TaskBarShowCollapseButton=0
TaskBarWorkspacesLeft=1
TimeFormat="%a %d %b %R"
TaskBarShowShowDesktopButton=0
TaskBarShowWindowListMenu=0
TaskBarShowMailboxStatus=0
NormalTaskBarFontName="-*-sans-medium-r-*-*-*-100-*-*-*-*-*-*"
NormalTaskBarFontNameXft="sans-serif:size=10"
ActiveTaskBarFontName="-*-sans-r-*-*-*-100-*-*-*-*-*-*"
ActiveTaskBarFontNameXft="sans-serif:size=10"

.icewm/keys

key "Ctrl+Alt+F12" aterm
key "Ctrl+Alt+F11" xfe
key "Ctrl+Alt+F10" xchat
key "Ctrl+Alt+F9" xzgv
key "Ctrl+Alt+F8" iceweasel
key "Ctrl+Alt+F7" opera
key "Ctrl+Alt+F6" icedove
key "Ctrl+Alt+F5" aterm -e scrot -c -d 10

key "Alt+Ctrl+KP_Divide" aumix -v -5 # lower volume
key "Alt+Ctrl+KP_Multiply" aumix -v +5 # raise volume

Here Ctrl+Alt = Windows key

the reason for that is, that the windows key does not interfere with other apps default keys i use. Besides it's easier for me to move from right to left.

.icewm/winoptions

aterm.startMaximized: 1
icedove.startMaximized: 1
xchat.startMaximized: 1
xzgv.startMaximized: 1
iceweasel.startMaximized: 1
xfe.startMaximized: 1

in winoptions you can knock off the titlebar also but i like to go to the theme so EVERY app appears with no title bar:

$ sudo updatedb
$ locate icewm
$ sudo nano /usr/share/icewm/themes/Area51/default.theme

once in the theme file i edit the line:

TitleBarHeight=17

and leave it like this:

TitleBarHeight=0

save/exit

then i restart icewm:

Ctrl + Alt + Delete + r

the reason i do this, is because i use a 17" crt, i want more real estate, like i said you configure icewm the way it's better for you. The taskbar will be at the top a la Gnome in auto-hide.

Last, i put this line in my .bashrc and .bash_profile:

alias startx='startx -- -dpi 80'

save/exit/reboot to take effect, if the fonts are too small, increase the -dpi number to 85,90.95. etc until you're happy.


Clear as mud??
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Hevoos
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#46 Post by Hevoos »

When I ran sysvconfig I noticed that I have three daemons running that seems to do the same thing, these are:
cron
atd
and anacron

Do I really need all three of them, or can I just remove atd and anacron?

Lou
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#47 Post by Lou »

This is up to you, do

$ apt-cache show

for cron, anacron and at

and draw your own conclusions, i opted for letting them run.
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#48 Post by Bulkley »

Question: do I need ppp and pppconfig? I haven't used a dial-up modem since I switched to adsl which used pppoe. Or, are they mixed somehow?

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#49 Post by Lou »

I don't really know, i didn't touch them just to play it safe. Maybe somebody else will enlighten us :lol:
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mzilikazi
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#50 Post by mzilikazi »

Bulkley wrote:Question: do I need ppp and pppconfig? I haven't used a dial-up modem since I switched to adsl which used pppoe. Or, are they mixed somehow?
They are optional packages.
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Bulkley
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#51 Post by Bulkley »

mzilikazi wrote:
They are optional packages.[/quote]

Unfortunately, when I went to remove ppp, it wanted to remove pppoe.

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#52 Post by mzilikazi »

Doh! Somehow I completely missed that you were now using adsl.
Here's what I probably should have told you:

Code: Select all

apt-cache depends pppoe
pppoe
  Depends: libc6
  Depends: ppp
Debian Sid Laptops:
AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual-Core Processor TK-55 / 1.5G
Intel(R) Pentium(R) Dual CPU T2390 @ 1.86GHz / 3G

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Pobega
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#53 Post by Pobega »

I have a question: I heard somewhere that if you apt-get -b source xorg <yourwm> that it will be faster and more responsive. Is this true, or is it bologna?
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#54 Post by Lou »

Never heard of it, let us know :D
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Pobega
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#55 Post by Pobega »

I guess I'll give it a shot when I get my laptop back, I sent it into System76 for repairs. Hopefully I'll have it back by the end of the week.
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lucho115
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#56 Post by lucho115 »

i use sysvconfig , rcconf and sysv-rc-conf but i cant remove from the init the avahi and hal daemons, where i have to look to disable to load at boot time, anybod knows?
thks
luchox

CooSee
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#57 Post by CooSee »

lucho115 wrote:i use sysvconfig , rcconf and sysv-rc-conf but i cant remove from the init the avahi and hal daemons, where i have to look to disable to load at boot time, anybod knows?
thks
hallo,

/etc/default/avahi-daemon


CooSee ' Ya

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chrismortimore
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#58 Post by chrismortimore »

Hevoos wrote:When I ran sysvconfig I noticed that I have three daemons running that seems to do the same thing, these are:
cron
atd
and anacron

Do I really need all three of them, or can I just remove atd and anacron?
They do different things:
  • cron - a usual cron simply executes a command at regular intervals, and does little thinking about it.
  • at - lets you execute a command at a particular time, or add it to a queue of commands and stuff.
  • anacron - makes sure that the things in cron actually get ran. cron assumes that the computer is on 24/7, so if something is set to run at 03:00 every morning and your computer isn't on, it'll never run. Each time anacron is ran, it checks when the jobs were last ran, and then runs anything that should be done.
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chrismortimore
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#59 Post by chrismortimore »

Pobega wrote:I have a question: I heard somewhere that if you apt-get -b source xorg <yourwm> that it will be faster and more responsive. Is this true, or is it bologna?
If you set hardware specific compiling options so it's optimised for your machine, it'll be quicker. But trust me on this, it is almost certainly not worth the time and hassle.
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Kateikyoushi
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#60 Post by Kateikyoushi »

I second that, considering the compilation time especially in this case, it does not worth the small speed boost.

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