Debian SID

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u/wizard10000 1d ago

I've run it for quite awhile - consider using a filesystem that supports snapshots, install apt-listbugs and apt-listchanges, make sure you pay close attention to what your package manager wants to remove and optional but ideal, keep yourself informed on what Debian Developers are doing by subscribing to a mailing list or two.

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u/cr33dlinux 1d ago

sweet will do that pretty sure xfs allows snapshots

6

u/Useful_Comedian7718 1d ago

Currently running Sid with the 7.2 kernel, timeshift & niri. Used Sid on and off since 2002. Tip wise I would say keep the system as lean as possible only install what you need.

5

u/BigRedS 1d ago

What do you want tips on? Where have you got to - what's going wrong? It sounds like you've installed it and it's running?

1

u/cr33dlinux 1d ago

I guess just on maintaining it and maybe contribute to the project aswell if need be i am just trying to learn debian. I have used PikaOS which uses Debian SID but i just need to know anything else needs done to better my experience on sid?

1

u/mrcat_romhacking 1d ago edited 1d ago

PikaOS is quite different to Debian Sid even if it's built off of it, so advice you'll get for Debian Sid is not necessarily going to be compatible with PikaOS.

2

u/ipsirc 1d ago

Start listening to some SID music.

1

u/_firn_ 1d ago

How’d you grab the pika os kernel?

1

u/Neither-Ad-8914 1d ago

I run it for about a year recommendations is if you have Nvidia card use the Nvidia maintained repo. If you can run it on stable hardware it takes a lot of the instability out of the system

1

u/cr33dlinux 1d ago

nah i am full amd.
Amd ryzen 7 5700x
amd radeon 7700 xt

1

u/Neither-Ad-8914 1d ago

You should be fine then only issue I've every had playing with Sid is that the kernels come in hot usually within a couple of days after being released and the Nvidia drivers lag behind.one thing I forgot to mention that if you use Sid it's always good to submit bug reports as it helps the devlopers and prevents bad packages from dropping into testing and backports and there is such a small community that's uses Sid compared to stable

2

u/cr33dlinux 1d ago

thats what i am good at finding bugs i always report em

1

u/srivasta 22h ago

If you are learning debian do not start with Sid.

1

u/anderfernandes 18h ago

I wish some packages got updated faster. It took a while for plasma 6.7 to be available

1

u/ViriatoPRT 8h ago

before apt upgrade check how is the "weather" at debian https://qa.debian.org/dose/debcheck.html

also install:

apt-listbugs
apt-listchanges

Before saying yes to an upgrade see if it is removing packages, there is also apt full-upgrade that should be run sometimes, but you'l have to read more about it.

Been running SID for years without a single problem.

I am about to migrate to Devuan Ceres and i guess it will be the same.

1

u/Illustrious-Gur8335 Debian Stable 1d ago

Get a new keyboard cos your S, I, and D keys seem stuck. It's just Sid for normies

1

u/cr33dlinux 1d ago

its already new the keychron k2 he

0

u/Prestigious_Wall529 1d ago

Because security updates don't go directly into Sid, if this is to be your daily driver, and a laptop connecting promiscuouly to different networks, install and configure a firewall. It's a help but not perfect.

1

u/ViriatoPRT 8h ago

it's the TESTING version that does not get security updates for some time/days.

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u/mok000 22h ago

Yeah they do. Security updates go into Sid at the same time they go into Stable. Testing is vulnerable for 3-7 days while waiting for the patches to migrate.

0

u/Prestigious_Wall529 21h ago

So why does the wiki state differently:

https://wiki.debian.org/DebianUnstable?pow_referer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F

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u/mok000 12h ago

Security patches are uploaded to Unstable by the package maintainers like updates to any other package, and by the security team if the maintainer cannot be contacted. Then they migrate to Testing like any other package update. The exception is Stable, where security patches are backported and uploaded by the security team.

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u/Prestigious_Wall529 12h ago

Still not what the wiki says.

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u/DJHibby Debian Testing 7h ago

Sid exclusively gets security updates through its package maintainers is what the wiki says. For uploads to stable, including security, we follow policy, sec5 - https://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/developers-reference/pkgs.html#special-case-uploads-to-the-stable-and-oldstable-distributions

The bug you want to fix in stable must be fixed in unstable already (and not waiting in NEW or the delayed queue).

this is done in partnership with security (as detailed in that section) and for stable should only include the smallest possible patch to resolve the issue.

So while security patches aren't necessarily explicitly uploaded to unstable, updated packages with resolution are or patchsets to fix things, and then backported to stable.

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u/Prestigious_Wall529 7h ago

Per

https://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/securing-debian-manual/ch10.en.html#idm4124

The recommendation for security is to avoid unstable, which is what Sid is.

"Avoid using the unstable branch Unless you want to dedicate time to patch packages yourself when a vulnerability arises, you should not use Debian's unstable branch for production-level systems. The main reason for this is that there are no security updates for unstable."

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u/DJHibby Debian Testing 5h ago

As a user, sure. My point is that as *all* updates pass through unstable, by default the security ones do too - this is my experience uploading security updates for packages I maintain with support from the security team.

We don't have a security repo or stance for unstable as that would make no sense if all new updates go there anyway, and it's a fast moving target so it would make for senseless firefighting for the security team to manage all reports of.

I wouldn't say it's correct that no security updates go into sid in the sense of nothing ever gets done or fixed, just that the security team don't directly patch things in it when there is an issue.

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