I'd like to give you my reason why I would prefer the graphical installer if available: I can copy/paste passwords and encryption keys to make sure they are the same.

Well, the netinstall image doesn't include any mouse support, which I guess is a shame (but hey, it's tiny)... So some extra keystrokes and/or gratuitous use of cat might be needed.

Both the graphical and minimal live images can install the system with refractainstaller though, and they both have mouse-driven copy-paste, so there's a viable option if you run full disk encryption or something (what else?) that needs input of long strings to the installer.

Most of my personal stuff is on other harddrives, so I don't have to risk overwriting my "stuff" by mistakenly formatting the wrong partitions.

So, I have most /home/glenn/"folders" linked from drives mounted in /home/glenn/local/... including .steam.

This actually keeps all of the files I use across 3 installs handy for immediate use after install. I am not paranoid, but I see how this may look.

I may use something like this to speed things up, if I can't do it at install time

This is the place where I use copy and paste during install, but it's just "/home/glenn/local/"...

But I miss it when I can't use it, especially when re-installing over and over in the same few hours because I haven't configured my hd for grub...

cat /home/glenn/bin/partition-mount-points >> /etc/fstab (which came first, the chicken or the egg?)

# added partition mount points to /etc/fstab
# /home/glenn/local/archive was on /dev/sde2 during installation
UUID=6e63d11b-5c17-464b-a24f-37eccf62b8a0 /home/glenn/local/archive ext3    defaults        0       2
# /home/glenn/local/data was on /dev/sdb3 during installation
UUID=b48cda1b-036c-40d9-95ff-11d293575eca /home/glenn/local/data ext3    defaults        0       2
# /home/glenn/local/free was on /dev/sdb6 during installation
UUID=50e5ae79-34ee-4b8d-882c-ec8d035c29d4 /home/glenn/local/free ext4    defaults        0       2
# /home/glenn/local/stuff was on /dev/sde5, changed hdd stuff2media,, 20200404
UUID=3526dd53-54a4-41c4-aa53-d045a31756fb /home/glenn/local/stuff ext3    defaults        0       2
# /home/glenn/local/other was on /dev/sdb2 during installation
UUID=53eacede-f187-4c51-b88f-19acf032c759 /home/glenn/local/other ext4    defaults        0       2
# /home/glenn/local/spare was on /dev/sdb4 during installation
UUID=a36886b2-abab-4e14-a6e0-e28f958a2cee /home/glenn/local/spare ext3    defaults        0       2
# /home/glenn/local/media was on /dev/sdd1 ,changed stuff to media, vis-a-vis, medfia2stuff april 2020
UUID=2ea11d82-8db0-44b0-ae48-4c05a77d6f21 /home/glenn/local/media ext4    defaults        0       2
# /home/glenn/local/videos was on /dev/sde4 during installation
UUID=8336ebbb-f6fa-4f1a-9217-1584c866fe77 /home/glenn/local/videos ext4    defaults        0       2
# /usr/src was on /dev/sdb5 during installation
UUID=9d43068e-4c32-4075-be49-fefeb5f189f7 /usr/src        ext4    defaults        0       2
# swap was on /dev/sdb1 during installation
UUID=b9482d32-3479-41c7-886a-214d22742741 none            swap    sw              0       0

then I can link my personal files...

link documents and files.sh

#!/bin/bash
# link documents and files

ln -s /home/glenn/local/data/bin /home/glenn/
ln -s /home/glenn/local/data/build /home/glenn/
ln -s /home/glenn/local/data/Documents /home/glenn/
ln -s /home/glenn/local/data/Movies /home/glenn/
ln -s /home/glenn/local/data/Music /home/glenn/
ln -s /home/glenn/local/data/My_system /home/glenn/
ln -s /home/glenn/local/data/Pictures /home/glenn/
ln -s /home/glenn/local/data/songs /home/glenn/
ln -s /home/glenn/local/data/Templates /home/glenn/
ln -s /home/glenn/local/data/Videos /home/glenn/

edit, I had 2 steam links in there that were just plain wrong...

I'm a creature of my environment, and once I become accustomed to something, like a tool or a "shortcut",
I find it difficult (or strange) to not use it. I'm lazy too. :-)

Anyhow, I've gone on enough.

I am really loving Beowulf, it's the best OS I have ever used.

I like a full install with KDE, but I have install with only openbox, but using kde apps... :-)

I have xfce4 and cinnamon versions on separate hd's for my adventures and to see what is being created by our Devs.

Thank you, and "I'll keep coming back".

Tatwi wrote:

golinux wrote:

Note that this option is no longer available in Beowulf and probably beyond.

Heh, I didn't even notice!

Neither did I. If I need an installer I'll pick the TUI one every time, and frankly I don't understand what a GUI provides in that context besides a bigger install image and more to go wrong. Starting an X server and all the baggage that entails just to have a pretty installer nuts.

I'd like to give you my reason why I would prefer the graphical installer if available: I can copy/paste passwords and encryption keys to make sure they are the same.

And I do not suffer from CLI-o-phobia. I started my PC career exactly with CP/M when I was on university. My theses was written on a CP/M 8085 and printed of with  a I think 9 needle printer.

Well, installation is possible with the CLI installer, and just for avoiding a few keystrokes I never would use the GUI. But see above, that are very valid reasons, especially when you are dealing with 40 or more character long encryptions keys. This makes the difference.

Also love Beowulf, though I had to fight my way through key typos.

rolfie

golinux wrote:

Note that this option is no longer available in Beowulf and probably beyond.

Heh, I didn't even notice!

Neither did I. If I need an installer I'll pick the TUI one every time, and frankly I don't understand what a GUI provides in that context besides a bigger install image and more to go wrong. Starting an X server and all the baggage that entails just to have a pretty installer nuts.

On the OP at hand:
As the patient does not belong to the tap-and-drool selfie-stick demographic, I suspect this is simply a case of classic CLI-o-phobia. For the unfamiliar, a disorder brought on when suppressed memories of CP/M, DOS, the Windows command prompt and other shells designed to torment their users are brought to light, often upon encountering a similar text-interface aesthetic years later.

For this I usually prescribe the LFS treatment, followed by a light regime of Slackware or Gentoo use. Symptoms generally resolve in short order given sufficient exposure to bash/zsh, the GNU utilities and a proper POSIX environment.

Indeed. Hell, the Gentoo "installer" is perfectly fine in 2020.

Why would you need copy-paste in the installer anyway?
I mean you can use GPM at the console, but why?

Ascii did have a nice gui installer, cut and paste options with the mouse. I didn't find that with Beowulf.

I've had to wait for after install to setup wifi (05:00.0 Network controller: Intel Corporation Wireless-AC 9260 (rev 29)),
but had a full desktop.iso to install plasma from. Thank you.

I hear you, but I find it's well worth the persistence.

still a few things I'm working towards, mostly with sound/usb/apulse. But if I didn't have that I'd have nothing to do. :-)

I'm loving Beowulf.

Tatwi wrote:

When starting the Debian/Devuan normal installer (full or net-install), there is an option for "Graphical Installer", which is functionally identical to the NCurses "DOS knockoff", but it looks prettier. Functionally, this installer is perfectly fine and visually the graphical version is also fine. Every step is clear and well documented and it's not possible to reach the end of the installer without having a working system.

Note that this option is no longer available in Beowulf and probably beyond.

Heh, I didn't even notice!

I appreciate this choice. The Debian Ncurses installer is better laid out than the Slackware Ncurses installer, making it just a little easier to navigate, but both are fast, functional, and fine even in 2020.

When starting the Debian/Devuan normal installer (full or net-install), there is an option for "Graphical Installer", which is functionally identical to the NCurses "DOS knockoff", but it looks prettier. Functionally, this installer is perfectly fine and visually the graphical version is also fine. Every step is clear and well documented and it's not possible to reach the end of the installer without having a working system.

Note that this option is no longer available in Beowulf and probably beyond.

1. Ancient installer that looked like a bad DOS knock-off.
Back to Xubuntu.
I expect a modern OS to have a graphic installer and to be able to detect my WiFi card.

Somehow it’s nonsense. Complete nonsense. Most importantly, the installer does his job and does it perfectly. If you want beauties, you can go back to the land of Windows, but do you need it?  I will repeat my self. This installer works great.

When starting the Debian/Devuan normal installer (full or net-install), there is an option for "Graphical Installer", which is functionally identical to the NCurses "DOS knockoff", but it looks prettier. Functionally, this installer is perfectly fine and visually the graphical version is also fine. Every step is clear and well documented and it's not possible to reach the end of the installer without having a working system.

Wifi doesn't work? Yeah, welcome to the difference between using Debian rather than Ubuntu: Debian has always been and still is a chore to configure, which is the whole reason distros like Ubuntu exist. Devuan is Debian without Systemd, not Ubuntu without Systemd.

Ps. I've been using Linux since 1998. In all that time, I would say that Mint 17.3 XFCE was the pinnacle of Linux for me, because it was a normal GNU/Linux system that "just worked". Sadly Mint 17 is no longer supported and it doesn't work on my new laptop, so I have reluctantly moved on. Devuan being Debian and Debian being what it is, it has taken me a few weeks to configure Devuan 3 to function essentially the same as my old favorite Mint 17. For me, a person who used to use plain old Debian before he used Mint 17, it was an effort I didn't mind undertaking. I certainly appreciate (and prefer!) the "it just works" mindset, but new versions of Mint use Systemd and I'd rather not, so I really don't have a problem stepping back into a base Debian system and configuring it myself. For me it's worth the effort, but I can completely understand how it may not be worth the effort to someone else.

Well, here are 2 spots of constructive criticism:

1. How about offering a graphical installer as an option?

2. How about setting the system up so as soon as it is installed it can detect WiFi?

I don't know what you have installed. Devuan has both of features you mentioned in the comment.

The old OpenBSD installer was the worst that I had come across - it was curses based & used to make you use cylinders, & you had too keep count of where you were too.

So, OP, you've been using Linux almost as long as I have......each distro does things their own way, so you shouldn't really complain about one that chooses to use curses installers, it's up to the devs what they want to use, we get the privilege of using their hard work for free.

If you are used to linux, openbsd is a whole different ball game when it comes to disk management. Being only relatively new to BSD i could imagine earlier implementations would have tested ones patience.

So, OP, you've been using Linux almost as long as I have......each distro does things their own way, so you shouldn't really complain about one that chooses to use curses installers, it's up to the devs what they want to use, we get the privilege of using their hard work for free.

You've been around linux long enough to see that every release gets bigger and more hungry for resources. Part of the reason we left the graphical installer out of the installer isos was to leave more room for applications that might be needed when installing without a network connection.

If you've used graphical installers on other distros, you might be disappointed with the debian-installer's rendition. The ncurses variety that you saw is actually easier to use - it requires less motion.

You can see for yourself. There's a graphical installer in the mini.iso on this page.
https://pkgmaster.devuan.org/devuan/dis … tboot/gtk/

The mini.isos get made when the installer gets rebuilt. They're mainly for testing, and they require a wired network connection to get even the most minimal working system.

The live isos use a different installer that just copies the system from the media to the hard drive. It takes about 10 minutes, but you don't get to choose the software.

.

1. To help.

2. To be helped.

Consider the following . . .

All the kids who attend my language school, and their parents, are well aware that I use almost exclusively Linux
in my work (this, at one of my homes, is a Macintosh computer), and I have advised quite a few parents on
"re-tooling" their factories' computers after they finally work out how expensive and time-consuming running
Windows is. I have also set up any number of laptops with Linux for richer kids, charging them so I can buy
2 year old desktops to install Linux on and give out for free for the poorer kids.

This works in terms of propagating Linux.

Now I have gone down the Greek path (MX-Linux) and regretted it.

I am beginning to see that Ubuntu and its derivatives lead to a sort of mental laziness with kids because
they, wrongly, assume it "just works" without any effort on their part. From a pedagogical point of view
that is not a message I want to send out.

So . . . .