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Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

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sunrat
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#21 Post by sunrat »

Head_on_a_Stick wrote:The Refracta tools are alive and well, fsmithred is still maintaining them.

There is also live-sdk, which looks very interesting.
Looks interesting but they are both based on Devuan. My ultimate goal is a vanilla Debian system (which has systemd) with minimal Plasma desktop from kde-plasma-desktop with a bunch of audio production packages, with custom tweaks to optimise audio performance. Basically a live installable .iso of what I use for audio production.
I'll try mx-snapshot again for science and will look more into refracta-snapshot, but it looks like Debian live-build may be the right tool.
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#22 Post by sunrat »

Good news, everyone! Update - the mx-snapshot worked. As it booted to a console I figured it must be a graphics issue and maybe it wasn't loading the nvidia drivers I have on the installed system I used for the snapshot.
Added a simple GRUB option "xorg=nvidia" and it booted up to Plasma desktop. 8) :D
Obviously if I make a snapshot to share it won't have nvidia driver installed.
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#23 Post by sgosnell »

When I installed the keyring .deb with gdebi it didn't work, for some reason, but dpkg did the job. I started reading the list of MX packages and my eyes glazed over. Most seem to be the same as Debian. Is there a list anywhere that has just the packages unique to MX, or that are significantly changed from the Debian package?
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#24 Post by sickpig »

sgosnell wrote:Is there a list anywhere that has just the packages unique to MX, or that are significantly changed from the Debian package?
comment out everything else and just leave mx repo active then do

Code: Select all

apt list 
And you should start a new thread as your question is not really concerned with this howto.

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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#25 Post by sgosnell »

It's pertinent to whether someone would consider it worth the trouble to do it. It's easy enough to pipe the list through grep, but that's just a list of all the MX package, which I already have. What's so new and shiny about the MX packages, that would tempt someone to go to the trouble of getting them? I admit I've never spent any time researching MX.
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#26 Post by sickpig »

sgosnell wrote: I admit I've never spent any time researching MX.
Well if you do you will realize their utility.

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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#27 Post by sgosnell »

Well that's why I asked. Just looking for a link to something that lists the packages unique to MX.
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#28 Post by sickpig »

"MX tools" they are what yast is to open suse. equally good.

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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#29 Post by sunrat »

Be aware that MX tools were developed specifically for MX and mostly for their Xfce version for which they are quite functional and useful. They may not work at all or work as expected in Debian. Their recent KDE version has only a limited subset because of this.
MX also does not use Systemd as default and uses a custom GRUB so anything depending on these may be suboptimal. For instance the mx-snapshot of my Buster/KDE system takes ages to boot to login including some worrying instances of the screen turning entirely black for many seconds during boot sequence. It seems to work ok once booted though.
I have abandoned the Debian media respin I was attempting to create with mx-snapshot and plan instead to learn Debian live-build to create it sometime soon.
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#30 Post by Deb-fan »

sgosnell wrote:When I installed the keyring .deb with gdebi it didn't work, for some reason, but dpkg did the job. I started reading the list of MX packages and my eyes glazed over. Most seem to be the same as Debian. Is there a list anywhere that has just the packages unique to MX, or that are significantly changed from the Debian package?
Feel compelled to comment, based on Debian ... "Debian based" basically means, Debian gnu/Linux renamed something else, while there's a bit more to it and not to take away from the enhancements or efforts whichever Debian based distro maintainers-devs include in the configurations of Debian they put out, plenty of really cool Debian based with useful features and things their userbases enjoy, not going to be found on Debian itself out-of-box ... so it's all good. Only yeah, they're bound to be 99.999% Debian gnu/Linux. Debian can easily be config'ed to do the same as any and/or all of them given the required effort, know-how and desire to set things up in such a way.

Never tried it but based on @Stevepussers efforts, things he's mentioned here/there and having seen the guy online many places, over many yrs and feel somewhat gotten to know him, imo he's a very competent nixer and a good guy, who clearly puts much effort into Mx and supporting gnu/Nix too, think it-Mx must be some Nixy goodness. Haven't read this tute either, though Head_on tends to really know his stuff so am sure it's valid and useful info. This has been a Debian fanboi moment, lol ... just keeping it real homies.

All hail Debian gnu/Linux, do it ! Do IT, ... do it ... NOW !!! Hail Debian !!! HAiL ! HaIl ! HAIL !!!! :D

Oops, post fanboi moment( DO IT ! ... HAIL DEBIAN !), if you've added or do add MX repo's, then supplemented via google search, surely in gnu/Nix there's an easy way to list out the pkgs in/from a given repo. Don't know the cmd involved off the top though. Shouldn't take much effort to find out how ...
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#31 Post by sgosnell »

If you read my posts above, I know how to list the packages in a repository. But there are thousands of packages. I was just looking for an easy way to find the unique MX packages, since most of them are identical to the Debian repository. I can easily list either, or both, packages, but that doesn't tell me what I want to know. That data may not exist, but I am interested in seeing it, because that would tell me whether or not it's worth adding it.
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#32 Post by sunrat »

You could go look in their repository in a browser. Only way I can think of to find the packages without adding mx to your sources.
Once you add and update the MX repo, there are several ways to check what is available from there. It can be removed from sources without installing anything if no packages pique your interest.
You can just use Synaptic in the Origin tab.
Or search with

Code: Select all

apt search mx
Or grep the local packages list

Code: Select all

grep -h "Package:" /var/lib/apt/lists/*mx*
Or list all available packages with "mx" in their title

Code: Select all

apt list --all-versions *mx*
Simples! :wink: 8)
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#33 Post by Deb-fan »

^ Nice. :D had some funky, hacky junk running through mind, thanks for share @sunrat.
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#34 Post by sgosnell »

Listing the MX packages lists almost the entire Debian repository. It's useless. I've done it. It's a very long list of packages, and for most the difference between the Debian and MX package is that the name has mx added if it's from MX. I'm not going to compare more than a thousand packages to find this out.
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#35 Post by Deb-fan »

Again bottomline, if you cant figure something out regards doing just about anything gnu/nix, you simply need to google more. Have some rough ideas but not doing all the typing and testing to do something or show someone how to do something i really dont need- care about. This is a tute about adding Mx tools, not mx pkgs etc etc. Sorry @Head_on for participating in thread-jacking to this extent. Either way folks its not that big a deal, want Mx tools on Debian, Head_on has it covered. :)
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#36 Post by stevepusser »

Synaptic can sort packages based on origin--I am sure that apt or aptitude can do that on the command line, but am not going to search that for you.

MX uses the Debian repos, with its own repos on top like icing on the cake. We have our own native mx* packages, many backports of upstream Debian packages in main or testing, many many packages that aren't in Debian yet or that we improve for our version (Foliate, Strawberry, MystiQ, Pale Moon, and Cawbird are some that I maintain just off the top of my head), so I have to dispute that MX is "just Debian with makeup" and that the packages are "99.99% pure" Debian. :roll: Ow, my eyes are rolled so far back they got stuck.

Most of the native MX packages begin with mx-, so that's another way to sort them...I can remember a couple that don't, like aptgpg or apt-notifier, but those are just utilities. Oh wait, we have a metapackage to manage the mx-apps and remove obsolete versions, called "mx-apps":

Code: Select all

Depends: bash-config, mx-bootrepair, mx-boot-options, mx-conky, mx-codecs, mx-datetime, mx-docs, mx-menu-editor, mx-network-assistant, mx-packageinstaller, mx-remaster, mx-remastercc, mx-repo-manager, mx-select-sound, mx-snapshot, mx-system-sounds, mx-tools, mx-tweak, mx-usb-unmounter, mx-user, mx-viewer, mx-welcome, mx-live-usb-maker, live-kernel-updater, live-usb-maker, mx-idevice-mounter, ddm-mx, conky-toggle-mx, formatusb, mx-cleanup
Breaks: docs-mx, install-meta-mx, installer-mx, remaster-mx, switchuser-mx, user-management-mx
Replaces: docs-mx, install-meta-mx, installer-mx, remaster-mx, switchuser-mx, user-management-mx
Some of those also have dependencies on other native MX packages.
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#37 Post by sgosnell »

So, as I suspected, the information I was looking for does not exist. That's okay, I was just asking if it did. Lots of hand-wringing and pearl-clutching just to arrive at "No".
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#38 Post by Deb-fan »

Of course the info you want exists, mayhaps not in a neat little index but certainly exists, put it together for yourself. Again .. only an outline of rough idea, while doing something like "apt update" to refresh pkg list, clearly apt is doing that, likely it's updating a list of available pkgs in whichever repos are in sources. Thus that's kept in a file somewhere and such a file can be found/copied, then more repo's could be added, the list-file could be update'd again, copied and these files can be compared with basic nix cmds and utilities. Showing the similarities(shared pkgs) + what's different in them ... Certainly ways to make such files from xyz-repo's quickly-easily for whomever wishes.

Noted: Should be all of a couple cmds/secs to get a list of what's in the Mx repo's any repo's. Are a bunch of relevant cmds/tools, apt-list or who knows how many others, it's gnu/Linux ... when isn't there TONS of ways to go about doing whatever tasks fairly easily, has to be many methods of doing this type of thing, I just don't have enough of an interest to work one of them out and acid test the dang thing, other brain farts, if someone were really motivated to know such a thing, install a base Debian in ie: KVM and same for MX and make a copy of the "dpkg -l" output, in such VM's "dpkg -l > debian" and "dpkg -l > mx" etc, compare these files as stated above, you have the pearl list you want. :D Don't remember the cmds, are several but remember doing this to see the differences in kernel .config files-options used between various so called "desktop performance" vs stock kernels. To see what the maintainers were opting to set.

Still also as noted we are crapping up a how-to Head_on took his time to put together and clearly this is not good netiquette. Start a damn thread on anything and all things MX if that's your desire. Fark ! Ah ... doubt anyone is losing sleep over this regardless. :P
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#39 Post by stevepusser »

If you are just curious to see what version of a package MX has versus Debian and many other distros, just try Repology. Here's Foliate, for example:

https://repology.org/project/foliate/versions
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Re: Adding MX Linux tools to Debian

#40 Post by NFT5 »

Just revisiting this thread for a different reason and after reading through, realised that the list of MX specific tools is right there on their website, viz.

Many of these Tools were developed specifically for MX, while some were forked from existing antiX apps or are existing antiX apps; a couple were imported with permission from outside sources.

Live
Live USB maker
Live-usb kernel updater
Remaster tool
Snapshot
Maintenance
Boot options, now expanded to install grub themes
Boot repair
Cleanup
Menu editor
User manager
Setup
Nvidia driver installer
Codecs installer, now includes updated S3 texture packs
Conky
Network Assistant
Select sound
System sounds
Tweak
Welcome
System keyboard
System locales
Software
Fix GPG keys
Package installer: Popular Applications, Debian Stable and Backports, MX Test, Flatpaks
Repo manager
Utilities
Quick System Info
iDevice Mounter
For packages already installed but where there are later versions in MX the methods outlined in foregoing posts can work, or Synaptic can just show you upgradeable packages when the MX Repo is used like a backport.

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