Debian

How Can You Install Google Chrome Browser on Debian?

Suparna Ganguly — Wed, 27 Oct 2021 16:00:00 +0000

Google Chrome is a widely used web browser in the world. Google Chrome is fast and secure as well. However, it is not an open-source web browser. Hence, Debian comes with a pre-loaded Chromium browser, and not a Chrome. Chromium is an open-source browser.

If you still want to install the Google Chrome browser on Linux, this article is for you. Installing Chrome on Linux has a little twist as it’s not an open-source browser. So let’s check out how you can easily install Chrome browser from a Linux terminal.

Google Chrome Privacy Concerns

The source code of Google Chrome is free software. But, the binaries which Chrome is distributed with come under a restrictive BSD license. In Linux, a Google Chrome web browser is included as a pre-compiled RPM or DEB package. You need the root access to install Google Chrome from a RPM or DEB package.

The Linux Package Signing Key within an apt key ring gives Google a path to install anything virtually into the user's OS. This is done through the google-chrome-stable package because no additional involvement of the system administrator is required while updating this package in future.

What You Need to Install Chrome

Login as sudo user.
Pre-installed wget package.

Installing Google Chrome Browser on Linux

Now I’ll guide you through the steps to install the Google Chrome browser on your Linux system.

Step 1: Download Google Chrome

First, open the Linux terminal using the terminal icon or by pressing Ctrl+Alt+T. To download the latest updated version of Google Chrome, run the below-given wget command.

wget https://dl.google.com/linux/direct/google-chrome-stable_current_amd64.deb

Side Note: Wget utility helps download files from the internet. Using Wget, HTTP, FTP, and HTTPS files can be downloaded. It uses the following syntax.

wget [options] [url]

Most of the Linux distros come with a pre-loaded wget utility. If not, please use the below command to get wget on your system.

sudo apt install wget

Step 2: Install Google Chrome

Once the browser is downloaded, install Chrome. To install, write:

sudo apt install ./google-chrome-stable_current_amd64.deb

The above command is useful in installing the Chrome web browser. After completing the installation, you will be required to enter the user password.

Starting Google Chrome

Once you have installed Chrome on your Linux system, start it by typing “google-chrome” on the terminal. You can also open Google Chrome using the Google Chrome icon given within the Activities list.

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FOSS Project Spotlight: Daylight Linux Version 3

Hamdy Abou El Anein — Wed, 13 Mar 2019 12:00:00 +0000

by Hamdy Abou El Anein

Daylight Linux is the only official distribution for the Raspberry Pi to work with the Fluxbox interface. With Fluxbox, Daylight Linux is one of the lightest and fastest distributions for all Raspberry Pi models.

Many programs, games and system tools were developed during a long year of work in Python 3 to create version 3.

Figure 1. The System at Boot

The system works with autologin, but you also can use these login/passwords: "root"/"toor" and "Daylight"/"toor".

Figure 2. The Daylight Linux Menu

Figure 3. The Daylight Linux Desktop with System Information

Figure 4. The Daylight Linux File Manager

A live version also is available for computers. This version aims to provide Debian-based Linux with the lightness of Daylight Linux.

Daylight Linux version 3 runs on all Raspberry Pi models, and it's based on Debian Buster. Visit the official website for more information and to download.

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The State of Desktop Linux 2019

Bryan Lunduke — Mon, 31 Dec 2018 12:30:00 +0000

by Bryan Lunduke

A snapshot of the current state of Desktop Linux at the start of 2019—with comparison charts and a roundtable Q&A with the leaders of three top Linux distributions.

I've never been able to stay in one place for long—at least in terms of which Linux distribution I call home. In my time as a self-identified "Linux Person", I've bounced around between a number of truly excellent ones. In my early days, I picked up boxed copies of S.u.S.E. (back before they made the U uppercase and dropped the dots entirely) and Red Hat Linux (before Fedora was a thing) from store shelves at various software outlets.

Side note: remember when we used to buy Operating Systems—and even most software—in actual boxes, with actual physical media and actual printed manuals? I still have big printed manuals for a few early Linux versions, which, back then, were necessary for getting just about everything working (from X11 to networking and sound). Heck, sometimes simply getting a successful boot required a few trips through those heavy manuals. Ah, those were the days.

Debian, Ubuntu, Fedora, openSUSE—I spent a good amount of time living in the biggest distributions around (and many others). All of them were fantastic. Truly stellar. Yet, each had their own quirks and peculiarities.

As I bounced from distro to distro, I developed a strong attachment to just about all of them, learning, as I went, to appreciate each for what it was. Just the same, when asked which distribution I recommend to others, my brain begins to melt down. Offering any single recommendation feels simply inadequate.

Choosing which one to call home, even if simply on a secondary PC, is a deeply personal choice.

Maybe you have an aging desktop computer with limited RAM and an older, but still absolutely functional, CPU. You're going to need something light on system resources that runs on 32-bit processors.

Or, perhaps you work with a wide variety of hardware architectures and need a single operating system that works well on all of them—and standardizing on a single Linux distribution would make it easier for you to administer and update all of them. But what options even are available?

To help make this process a bit easier, I've put together a handy set of charts and graphs to let you quickly glance and find the one that fits your needs (Figures 1 and 2).

Figure 1. Distribution Comparison Chart I

Figure 2. Distribution Comparison Chart II

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Papa's Got a Brand New NAS: the Software

Kyle Rankin — Mon, 29 Oct 2018 12:00:00 +0000

by Kyle Rankin

Who needs a custom NAS OS or a web-based GUI when command-line NAS software is so easy to configure?

In a recent letter to the editor, I was contacted by a reader who enjoyed my "Papa's Got a Brand New NAS" article, but wished I had spent more time describing the software I used. When I wrote the article, I decided not to dive into the software too much, because it all was pretty standard for serving files under Linux. But on second thought, if you want to re-create what I made, I imagine it would be nice to know the software side as well, so this article describes the software I use in my home NAS.

The OS

My NAS uses the ODROID-XU4 as the main computing platform, and so far, I've found its octo-core ARM CPU and the rest of its resources to be adequate for a home NAS. When I first set it up, I visited the official wiki page for the computer, which provides a number of OS images, including Ubuntu and Android images that you can copy onto a microSD card. Those images are geared more toward desktop use, however, and I wanted a minimal server image. After some searching, I found a minimal image for what was the current Debian stable release at the time (Jessie).

Although this minimal image worked okay for me, I don't necessarily recommend just going with whatever OS some volunteer on a forum creates. Since I first set up the computer, the Armbian project has been released, and it supports a number of standardized OS images for quite a few ARM platforms including the ODROID-XU4. So if you want to follow in my footsteps, you may want to start with the minimal Armbian Debian image.

If you've ever used a Raspberry Pi before, the process of setting up an alternative ARM board shouldn't be too different. Use another computer to write an OS image to a microSD card, boot the ARM board, and at boot, the image will expand to fill the existing filesystem. Then reboot and connect to the network, so you can log in with the default credentials your particular image sets up. Like with Raspbian builds, the first step you should perform with Armbian or any other OS image is to change the default password to something else. Even better, you should consider setting up proper user accounts instead of relying on the default.

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Maru OS Brings Debian to Your Phone

James Darvell — Mon, 13 Jun 2016 19:15:18 +0000

by James Darvell

Have you ever had the suspicion that your smartphone wasn't quite pulling its weight? New Android phones ship with more processing power than a laptop had a few years ago, but the most taxing thing we use them for is Candy Crush.

Maybe these phones are so smart because they avoid doing real work? Well, that's about to change.

Maru OS, a hybrid operating system combining Linux and Android, has just come out of private beta. You can download it and take it for a spin today—if you have a Nexus 5.

Maru OS is an interesting project that aims to turn your Android smartphone into a "context-sensitive device". When you plug it in to a monitor, it boots a Debian-based desktop distro. Meanwhile, Android is still running on the phone. As soon as you unplug it, the desktop state is stored. When you plug the device back in to the screen, the desktop state restores in about five seconds.

Currently, Maru works only on Google's Nexus 5. Now that the project has been made open source, the original developers hope to see it reach other platforms soon. You can use any Android-compatible Bluetooth keyboard and mouse, and you can plug it in to any HDMI screen.

The Android component is an up-to-date version of Android Lollipop, without bloatware, which means faster performance. So the Android side of the experience is pretty nifty.

But, what about the Debian desktop? The performance is a little slower than one would hope, which to be expected since the Nexus 5 is past its prime.

Nevertheless, it's a neat idea, and it's still the early days for Maru. Right now, your desktop or laptop has nothing to fear, but who knows, maybe the next release will make them obsolete!

Clearly, the fact that Maru can run only on one specific handset is a major obstacle. Hopefully, this will be addressed in future updates. Maru could develop into a very useful tool in the future, especially if you spend much time traveling—being able to do serious work on a pocket-sized device would be very useful.

One feature I'd like to see in future releases is tighter integration between the phone OS and the desktop environment. Right now, both environments can access the phone's storage and networking features, but there is a sharp division between the Android environment and Debian. Being able to synchronize data across the divide would be useful. Motorola achieved something similar back in 2011 with its Webtop software. But, as I mentioned, it's still the early days for the new OS. Right now, I'm impressed by the core functionality.

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Debian Project Aims to Keep the CIA Off Our Computers

James Darvell — Tue, 15 Sep 2015 16:13:53 +0000

by James Darvell

Lunar, one of the lead developers on the Debian ReproducibleBuilds project, has recently outlined a serious security hole that could impact all open-source software, including most Linux distributions. It potentially exposes users to unwanted scrutiny from third parties, including security agencies. His project is designed to close this hole.

One of the big advantages of open source software is that third parties can inspect the code to ensure it does what it's supposed to. If any malicious code is present, it can be detected and eliminated. But when software is distributed in the form of a binary executable, there is a risk that malicious code (not present in the original source code) has been added.

This doesn't necessarily mean that the developer intended to distribute corrupted code. If the developer is using a compromised compiler, it could introduce the malware as the source code is turned into an executable.

This may sound a little far-fetched, but in actual fact it is a real security concern. The Snowden leak has revealed that the CIA is working on ways to exploit these weaknesses to install snooping software onto consumer devices all over the world.

At a recent conference organized by the CIA, a team of developers presented a proof of concept. They had managed to bypass Apple's digital certificates to produce a corrupted version of XCode, Apple's proprietary compiler. This compiler is used to by independent developers to make OS X and IOS apps. The corrupted version embeds spyware into any application compiled by the developer without their knowledge.

These apps could find their way into the app stores, and potentially onto millions of consumer devices. This would allow security agencies to snoop on the conversations and private messages of millions of innocent users all over the world.

If Apple is a hot target, then Linux is an even more tempting one. Security conscious users who understand the risk of commercial platforms often use Linux for its tighter security features. This includes people who the security agencies are VERY interested in spying on.

Anti-virus software can detect fragments of known malware, but this is only possible after instances of the malware have been discovered and analyzed. It doesn't protect against new or previously undetected malware infections. In short, anti-virus software is not enough to protect against this type of attack.

The only way to be sure that a binary executable does not include any unexpected code is to compile the source code and compare the two files. If the freshly compiled file does not match the binary executable under test, it could have added code, possibly malware.

While this is a basically sound idea, there is a major fly in the ointment. The source code for the majority of Linux packages is written in such a way that it doesn't always compile to produce an identical binary file.

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Goodbye, Pi. Hello, C.H.I.P.

James Darvell — Mon, 18 May 2015 16:29:26 +0000

by James Darvell

A new mini-computer is on the way, and it looks like it may be the Raspberry Pi killer we've all been waiting for (sorry Pi). C.H.I.P. is its name, and it looks set to wipe the floor with its established competitor on several counts:

1. It's completely open source. I don't just mean the software, either. The design and documentation are completely open source, so people can download the schematics and make their own version, adding improvements or tweaking the design.

2. The operating system is based on Debian, which means that it supports thousands of apps out of the box.

3. Its single core CPU runs at 1GHz, beating the Pi's 700MHz CPU.

4. It has double the RAM--512MB instead of 256MB.

5. It has 4GB of storage built in.

6. It has built-in Wi-Fi.

7. It has built-in Bluetooth.

8. It can connect to almost any screen. The base unit supports composite video output, and there are adapters for VGA and HDMI.

9. There is an optional case that adds a touchscreen and a keyboard. It's the size of the original Game Boy.

Of course, this isn't the first Raspberry Pi competitor to offer more features than the original, but there's one big difference. Whereas all of the others have been more expensive than the Pi, this one is cheaper. Much cheaper--the basic unit is only $9.

The project was launched on Kickstarter on May 7, 2015, with a modest $50,000 target, which it smashed within hours. As I write this, the total pledge is $1,329,290, and there are less than three weeks left to go.

As you read this, the figures are bound to have changed, so here's a link for you to check it out directly: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1598272670/chip-the-worlds-first-9-computer/video_share.

With a smaller profile than the Pi, a lower price tag, a more powerful processor and more memory, it could quickly replace Pi as the number-one choice for projects.

It's packed with pins and sockets to help build whatever your imagination cooks up. It has:

Parallel LCD output.
Eight digital GPIOs.
One PWM pin.
SPI.
TWI (I2C).
UART.
USB.
MIPI-CSI.
Touch panel input.
Stereo audio out.
Mono audio in.
Composite video out.

They are continuing to tinker with the specifications leading up to the official release, so keep an eye on those.

The official public release is scheduled for next year, but crowdfunding backers will be able to land a "Kernel Hacker" package this September. This package is aimed at Linux developers who want to help to contribute to kernel modifications for the C.H.I.P. before its final release.

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More PXE Magic

Kyle Rankin — Wed, 26 Jun 2013 18:15:30 +0000

by Kyle Rankin

In this article, I've decided to follow up on a topic I wrote about not in my column directly, but as a feature article called "PXE Magic" in the April 2008 issue. In that article, I talk about how to set up a PXE server from scratch, including how to install and configure DHCP and TFTP. Ultimately, I even provide a basic pxelinux configuration to get you started. Since then, PXE menus with pxelinux have become more sophisticated and graphical and could seem a bit intimidating if you are new to it. In this column, I explain how to piggyback off of the work the Debian and Ubuntu projects have done with their PXE configuration to make your own fancy PXE menu without much additional work. I know not everyone uses Debian or Ubuntu, so if you use a different distribution, hold off on the angry e-mail messages; you still can use the PXE configuration I'm showing here for your distro, provided it gives some basic examples of how to PXE boot its installer. Just use these steps as a launching off point and tweak the PXE config to work for you.

Simple Ubuntu PXE Menu

If this is your first time configuring a PXE server, for the first step, I recommend following my steps in the "PXE Magic" article to install and configure DHCP and TFTP. Otherwise, if you have existing servers in place, just make sure that DHCP is configured to point to your TFTP server (if it's on the same machine, that's fine). And, if you already have any sort of pxelinux configuration in your tftpboot directory, I recommend that you back it up and move it out of the way—I'm going to assume that your entire /var/lib/tftpboot (or /tftpboot on some systems) directory is empty to start with. For the rest of this article, I reference /var/lib/tftpboot as the location to store your PXE configuration files, so if you use /tftpboot, adjust the commands accordingly.

Both Debian and Ubuntu provide a nice all-in-one netboot configuration for each of their releases that makes it simple to PXE boot a particular release yourself. The file is called netboot.tar.gz and is located in a netboot directory along with the rest of the different install images. For instance, the netboot.tar.gz for the i386 Ubuntu 12.04 release (named Precise) can be found at http://us.archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/dists/precise/main/installer-i386/current/images/netboot/netboot.tar.gz.

To get started, cd to your tftpboot directory, and then use wget to pull down the netboot.tar.gz file (I'm assuming you'll need root permissions for all of these steps, so I'm putting sudo in front of all of my commands), and then extract the tarball:

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Aptosid - An Overview

Michael Reed — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 13:00:00 +0000

by Michael Reed

aptosid might sound like a package management tool, but it's actually a desktop-orientated (KDE4 or XFCE) Debian derived Linux distro. It's more than a mere respin of Debian, but does it have what it takes to distinguish it from all of the other desktop distros?

Looking at the approach that aptosid (lower case only, the name is a portmanteau of the Latin word for adapt and the name of the Debian unstable branch) takes, it's clear that it is a distant cousin of Ubuntu. Both distros are desktop orientated, fairly simple to install and based on Debian. The major differences are that aptosid offers rolling updates and only comes in KDE4 and XFCE flavors. It features enhancements over and above pure Debian in order to broaden hardware support. However, as it conforms to the Debian definition of free software, non-free codecs are installed by adding the non-free Debian archives.

Booting from the live ISO image is the first stage of carrying out an aptosid installation. Being a KDE man, I tried out the KDE4 edition, and the first thing that hit me upon booting was the wacky custom artwork that is paired with a dark theme. Garish or an acquired taste, it certainly lends this distro a distinctive atmosphere. Even when booting the ISO image inside a VirtualBox VM, things are fast and stripped down, a good sign.

The aptosid desktop. Shades aren't supplied with the download. Apart from the radical custom art, it's a pretty standard KDE4 desktop.

Installing aptosid isn't quite as idiot proof as a standard Ubuntu install. For example, the user has to manually partition the hard disk using a choice of tools including Gparted. Beyond that, the options, which are selected before beginning the installation, are fairly minimal. The link on the backdrop that takes you straight to the Aptosid IRC channel is a welcome touch that more and more distros have begun to include.

The relative speediness of the live CD was, thankfully, carried over to the fully installed desktop. Restricting the VirtualBox VM to 512MB, the desktop was still very responsive, which has to be good stuff considering that it's KDE4 that we're talking about here. I'm not going to list the default applications, as the website already does that, but suffice to say that an up-to-date Iceweasel build (Firefox by another name) is the web browser and the other applications are the standard ones that you'd expect to find on a KDE4 desktop.

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Customize a Distro with Remastersys

Michael Reed — Mon, 28 Mar 2011 13:00:00 +0000

by Michael Reed

Remastersys is a complete system backup tool, but it can also be used to create your own customized remix of an Ubuntu or Debian installation. Basically, you customize a running system and create an install disk that will recreate it. If you've ever wanted to create your own distribution, you won't believe how simple this is to use. Mikebuntu, here we come...

These examples all presume that you are basing your personalized remix on Ubuntu 10.10, as there are a few extra steps involved in the creation of a Debian remix.

The approach is very simple: you install a Linux system, alter it, run Remastersys and then deploy a customized installation disk that will recreate that altered system. The installer works in the normal Ubuntu way, so any files that were lying about in your original home directory, for example, won't be copied across. This also means that each program will be installed with clean, unaltered settings. There are, however, ways of including customizations, if you need to.

One handy way of working with Remastersys is to use it with a VM such as VirtualBox. This way, you install Debian or Ubuntu within a virtual machine, customize it, and Remastersys creates the installation disk for you. There is currently a 4GB limit to the size of the ISO file that it can create, which should be sufficient in most cases.

Once you have a fresh install of Ubuntu ready, begin by adding the Remastersys repository to the file /etc/apt/sources.list

# Remastersys
deb http://www.geekconnection.org/remastersys/repository karmic/

Then refresh the package list by either clicking on reload in Synaptic or by typing

sudo apt-get update

You can now customize away by adding and removing packages on the system. When you've got things how you want them, run Remastersys. Once you've installed it, using the package manager, it's located under the the Gnome system menu.

Here, you will be presented with a set of options to fine tune the installation disk. When you are ready, click on the “dist” option, and after much churning, an ISO file is created. Note that the default target location for the ISO is /home/remastersys/remastersys/, rather than in the personal home directory of the main user.

If you have carried this out within a VM, you will have to establish some sort of file sharing in order to get the ISO file back onto your host machine so that you can burn it to a disk. Boot from the disk in the normal way and you'll be presented with a fairly typical set of install options. The installation itself uses the standard Ubuntu installer.

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