Gparted will not label an existing FAT32 partition

[Richard Owlett]

Several years ago I purchased an external 1 TB USB connected
drive for backups.
The base of the enclosure says it is a Seagate drive.
Partitions:
#1 is ntfs 293 GiB [146 GiB used] labeled "FreeAgent GoFlex Drive"
#2 is extended partition for remainder of drive
#5 is fat32 62.5 GiB [31.5 GiB used] with no label


I successfully mounted partitions 1 and 5. Both are readable and
contain files from unknown Windows machines. On my Windows
Desktop hardware C:\Documents and Settings\user\Recent indicates
that it had been used on that machine back in 2011. There is
similar evidence that it had been used on my Windows Laptop in
2012. Neither machine reports files with "goflex" in filename
{case insensitive search}.

I attempted to label partition 5 with Gparted, but the "Label"
menu option was greyed out.
The "Label" option was available for partition 1. I had no
problem creating partition 6 as fat32 and labeling it.

Any suggestions as to what the problem is?
Is there another option that would allow me to label the
partition with no other effects on that partition?



TIA

[Nicolas George]

Le primidi 21 brumaire, an CCXXV, Brian a écrit :
> gparted for labelling a partition is overkill. Use dosfslabel.

dosfslabel label will not label a partition, it will label a filesystem.

Regards,

--
Nicolas George

[Brian]

gparted for labelling a partition is overkill. Use dosfslabel.

--
Brian.

[Reco]

Hi.

On Fri, 11 Nov 2016 18:59:29 +0100
Nicolas George <geo...@nsup.org> wrote:

> Le primidi 21 brumaire, an CCXXV, Brian a écrit :
> > gparted for labelling a partition is overkill. Use dosfslabel.
>
> dosfslabel label will not label a partition, it will label a filesystem.

gparted does not label partitions either, it does label any supported
filesystem or swap inside a partition. Brian's advice is valid.

As for the original problem - gparted is a GNOME application, so it's
expected to silently refuse doing potentially dangerous operations.

Reco

[Brian]

On Fri 11 Nov 2016 at 21:33:58 +0300, Reco wrote:

> As for the original problem - gparted is a GNOME application, so it's
> expected to silently refuse doing potentially dangerous operations.

And yet gparted(8) and the manual at

http://gparted.org/display-doc.php%3Fname%3Dhelp-manual

indicate setting a file system label is supported. Are we looking at a
bug in gparted?

--
Brian.

[Reco]

Hi.

Beats me as I don't know C++ gparted is written in, nor have any desire
to learn it. Plain C is enough for me, and there's strace for the cases
when it does not.

Presumably gparted checks if a partition is used by something (a mounted
filesystem maybe?) and fails silently (i.e. makes a button inactive) if
it considers such check successful.

Whenever such check is justified, and whenever the implementation of
the check is flawless is something left to be seen.

Personally I'd say it's not worth the trouble to investigate the
issue as dosfslabel should do the job without the (potentially
dangerous) need to run GUI tool as root. There's a reason they use
PolicyKit for nearly everything else which requires root in a modern
GNOME, after all.

Reco

[Pascal Hambourg]

Le 11/11/2016 à 16:47, Richard Owlett a écrit :
> Partitions:
> #1 is ntfs 293 GiB [146 GiB used] labeled "FreeAgent GoFlex Drive"
> #2 is extended partition for remainder of drive
> #5 is fat32 62.5 GiB [31.5 GiB used] with no label

(...)

> I attempted to label partition 5 with Gparted, but the "Label" menu
> option was greyed out.
> The "Label" option was available for partition 1. I had no problem
> creating partition 6 as fat32 and labeling it.

Gparted needs external software to enable some features.
According to <http://gparted.sourceforge.net/features.php>, mtools is
required to change the label on a FAT filesystem.

[Brian]

A nice resolution of the issue; tested to work. mtools is a Suggests: of
gparted. People will not get it on a default Debian.

--
Brian.

[David Wright]

On Fri 11 Nov 2016 at 18:59:29 (+0100), Nicolas George wrote:
> Le primidi 21 brumaire, an CCXXV, Brian a écrit :
> > gparted for labelling a partition is overkill. Use dosfslabel.
>
> dosfslabel label will not label a partition, it will label a filesystem.

Does a partition have a label?

Cheers,
David.

[Doug]

I wonder if there is a LIVE disk that includes the various external
software files? It would be handy to have such a disk.
If anyone knows of such, please advise.

--doug

[Nicolas George]

Le primidi 21 brumaire, an CCXXV, David Wright a écrit :

> Does a partition have a label?

Yes, depending on the partition scheme.

Regards,

--
Nicolas George

[Brian]

http://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/current-live/i386/iso-hybrid/

has files with package contents. Any use?

--
Brian.

[David Wright]

On Fri 11 Nov 2016 at 20:32:52 (+0100), Nicolas George wrote:
> Le primidi 21 brumaire, an CCXXV, David Wright a écrit :
> > Does a partition have a label?
>
> Yes, depending on the partition scheme.

Any reference. You see, I find label a very slippery word.
You can label a disk at almost every level: a sticky label,
a disklabel (partition table), a filesystem label, a volume label
(perhaps those two are equivalent), and whatever is handled by
devlabel (which might be historic).

So I'm unsure what you mean by a partition label, where it's
stored, and how it differs from a filesystem label.
Is it new-fangled?

Cheers,
David.

[Michael Milliman]

On 11/11/2016 09:47 AM, Richard Owlett wrote:
> Several years ago I purchased an external 1 TB USB connected drive for
> backups.
> The base of the enclosure says it is a Seagate drive.
> Partitions:
> #1 is ntfs 293 GiB [146 GiB used] labeled "FreeAgent GoFlex Drive"
> #2 is extended partition for remainder of drive
> #5 is fat32 62.5 GiB [31.5 GiB used] with no label
>
>
> I successfully mounted partitions 1 and 5. Both are readable and
> contain files from unknown Windows machines. On my Windows Desktop
> hardware C:\Documents and Settings\user\Recent indicates that it had
> been used on that machine back in 2011. There is similar evidence that
> it had been used on my Windows Laptop in 2012. Neither machine reports
> files with "goflex" in filename {case insensitive search}.
>
> I attempted to label partition 5 with Gparted, but the "Label" menu
> option was greyed out.
> The "Label" option was available for partition 1. I had no problem
> creating partition 6 as fat32 and labeling it.
>

It has been some time since I have had to do anything similar. However,
as I recall, if the partition is mounted, gparted will not add/change
the label. You have to unmount the partition first, which gparted will
do (with a different command). Once unmounted, gparted is then willing
to modify the partition. I know this sounds obvious, but then sometimes
it is the most obvious things we overlook:-)

> Any suggestions as to what the problem is?
> Is there another option that would allow me to label the partition
> with no other effects on that partition?
>
>
>
> TIA
>

--
73's
Mike, WB5VQX

[Seeker]

I like SystemRescueCd for partitioning/troubleshooting.

https://www.system-rescue-cd.org/SystemRescueCd_Homepage

Later, Seeker

[Nicolas George]

Le primidi 21 brumaire, an CCXXV, David Wright a écrit :

> Any reference. You see, I find label a very slippery word.
> You can label a disk at almost every level: a sticky label,

True, but not really relevant.

> a disklabel (partition table),

This is BSD slang. But this was what I was referring to.

> a filesystem label,

Indeed. That is the most common one.

> a volume label
> (perhaps those two are equivalent),

I do not think "volume" means anything in the Linux world.

> and whatever is handled by
> devlabel (which might be historic).

It looks like a tool to make symlinks based on the above labels.

> So I'm unsure what you mean by a partition label, where it's
> stored, and how it differs from a filesystem label.

Well, the filesystem label is stored in the filesystem metadata, i.e.
probably the superblock. The partition label is stored in the partitions
metadata, i.e. the "partition table".

> Is it new-fangled?

MBR-style partition tables do not contain labels, if that is what you
are asking. But GPT does.

[Brian]

You are 100% correct about not having the partition mounted. It does
lead to the labelling option being greyed out. Easy enough to overlook,
as you say.

It turns out the actual issue is one of not having a suggested package,
mtools, installed.

--
Brian.

[Brian]

May I say I appreciated the correction about labels being applied to
file systems and not partitions. I'd done a copy and paste (with a
change to a spelling) without any thought in mind to disabuse the OP
about the technical aspects. It seemed more important to get him on
the road.

But, this is getting interesting.

--
Brian.

[Richard Owlett]

But Gparted was already active for other reasons ;/

[Richard Owlett]

Apparently it does according to the authors of Gparted.
Who am I to argue?

[Doug]

On 11/11/2016 01:42 PM, Brian wrote:
> On Fri 11 Nov 2016 at 19:30:51 -0600, Doug wrote:
>
>> On 11/11/2016 01:07 PM, Pascal Hambourg wrote:
>>>

/snip/

>>> Gparted needs external software to enable some features.
>>> According to <http://gparted.sourceforge.net/features.php>, mtools is
>>> required to change the label on a FAT filesystem.
>>>
>>>
>> I wonder if there is a LIVE disk that includes the various external software
>> files? It would be handy to have such a disk.
>> If anyone knows of such, please advise.
> http://cdimage.debian.org/debian-cd/current-live/i386/iso-hybrid/
>
> has files with package contents. Any use?

I'll take a look at that--thanx!

--doug
>

[Brian]

How relevant is that to your immediate problem? Or have you forgotten
about what you asked?

Did installing mtools solve it? That is the essential point.

Once you sort that you can argue to your heart's content about labels
and what gparted says.

--
Brian.

[Richard Owlett]

Yes and No.
The table at http://gparted.sourceforge.net/features.php
indicates that dosfstools is required to work with fat16 or fat32
partitions. Footnote 6 then indicates that mtools is required to
label those partitions.

*HOWEVER* that is not _quite_ true. Gparted has no problem
labeling fat16/fat32 partitions *IT* creates.

[Richard Owlett]

YES there is. Goto http://gparted.org/download.php .

[Richard Owlett]

I've been bit by that a number of times. None of the partitions
had been mounted.

The problem was missing mtools. When I had used Synaptic to
install Gparted it had pulled in dostools but not mtools. Is that
a "bug" or "annoyance"?

[Thomas Schmitt]

Hi,

David Wright wrote:
> So I'm unsure what you mean by a partition label, where it's
> stored, and how it differs from a filesystem label.

See "Partition name (36 UTF-16LE code units)" in
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GUID_Partition_Table#Partition_entries

This describes the GPT partition table which is the newer of the
two usual partition table formats. Lots of partitions are possible
on a disk.

The older format is MBR with 4 primary partitions and 4 logical
ones in one of the primary partitions. Also known as "MSDOS"
partition table. No partition names there.


Have a nice day :)

Thomas

[Doug]

/snip/

>>> Gparted needs external software to enable some features.
>>> According to <http://gparted.sourceforge.net/features.php>,
>>> mtools is required to change the label on a FAT filesystem.
>>>
>>>
>> I wonder if there is a LIVE disk that includes the various
>> external software files? It would be handy to have such a disk.
>> If anyone knows of such, please advise.
>>
>> --doug
>>
>>
>
> YES there is. Goto http://gparted.org/download.php .
>
>
>

OK, Thanx. I have an older copy--I don't know if it has all the supplemental
files--so I just downloaded this one and I'll burn a copy. This program
is one
of the most useful programs that one should have in his arsenal! It is
perfectly clear as to what's going on, where, and I use it in prep for any
new install, rather than whatever is on the install disk, since it shows
everything on the drive, where it is, how big it is, etc., and allows you to
move and shrink things that may make the new install fit and work
better. (You can even shrink Windows with it!)

--doug

[Richard Owlett]

My Live CD is rev 0.11.0 , it apparently has everything.
Jessie has 0.19.0 .
The website, I noticed, has a later rev.

[Pascal Hambourg]

Le 11/11/2016 à 22:17, Thomas Schmitt a écrit :
>
> The older format is MBR with 4 primary partitions and 4 logical
> ones in one of the primary partitions.

Huh ? The number of logical partitions is unlimited.

[Brian]

On Fri 11 Nov 2016 at 15:03:57 -0600, Richard Owlett wrote:

> The problem was missing mtools. When I had used Synaptic to install Gparted
> it had pulled in dostools but not mtools. Is that a "bug" or "annoyance"?

Not installing a recommended package on a default Debian would be a bug.
Not installing a suggested package isn't.

--
Brian.

[David Wright]

Yes, I guess we have to be more careful about distinguishing partition
and filesystem labels now that GPT is common. In the OP's instance, we
know that filesystem labels were meant because "extended partition"
was mentioned, so it's an MBR with no partition labels sensu stricto.

Cheers,
David.

[Thomas Schmitt]

Hi,

i wrote:
> > The older format is MBR with 4 primary partitions and 4 logical
> > ones in one of the primary partitions.

Pascal Hambourg wrote:
> Huh ? The number of logical partitions is unlimited.

You are right. Must have been some mislead memory from old experience
with partitioning tools.

[David Wright]

There was a period (rex) when Debian only created /dev/sda[1-8]
on SCSI disks, though this only affected whether you could *access*
a greater number of partitions, not *create* them.

Cheers,
David.

[rhkr...@gmail.com]

Ok, just to be part of this ongoing saga, I think the number of logical
partitions is limited to something like 12 or 16 (or maybe the total number of
partitions, primary plus logical is limited to 16. (And maybe that's a limit
of one or more OSs rather than a universal limit.)

[Felix Miata]

rhkr...@gmail.com composed on 2016-11-11 18:36 (UTC-0500):

> Pascal Hambourg wrote:

>> Thomas Schmitt composed:

>> > The older format is MBR with 4 primary partitions and 4 logical
>> > ones in one of the primary partitions.

>> Huh ? The number of logical partitions is unlimited.

> Ok, just to be part of this ongoing saga, I think the number of logical
> partitions is limited to something like 12 or 16 (or maybe the total number of
> partitions, primary plus logical is limited to 16. (And maybe that's a limit
> of one or more OSs rather than a universal limit.)

When libata was a juvenile it inherited SCSI's maximum block id minor number
15, making /dev/sd#15 the limit. It took awhile before the new major number
259 was provided with a larger maximum minor, 127 IIRC, to boost the libata
limit past 15.
--
"The wise are known for their understanding, and pleasant
words are persuasive." Proverbs 16:21 (New Living Translation)

Team OS/2 ** Reg. Linux User #211409 ** a11y rocks!

Felix Miata *** http://fm.no-ip.com/

[David Wright]

That doesn't seem to square with
http://forums.justlinux.com/showthread.php?147959-How-to-install-and-boot-145-operating-systems-in-a-PC
(Scroll down to "Partition Tables".)

Cheers,
David.

[Joseph Loo]

Your URL is talking about gpt scheme. The limitation is in the MSDOS
partition scheme

--
Joseph Loo
jl...@acm.org

[David Wright]

You only read the updates at the top!

> > (Scroll down to "Partition Tables".)

... and see

/dev/hda4 367 36483 290109802+ 5 Extended
...
/dev/hda60 34658 35265 4883728+ 83 Linux

Cheers,
David.

[Lisi Reisz]

On Friday 11 November 2016 21:58:58 Brian wrote:
> Not installing a recommended package on a default Debian would be a bug.

Aptitude on my current almost vanilla temporary Jessie install doesn't install
recommends. But it makes a big point of telling me a) that they are
recommended and b) that they are not going to be installed. I then often,
but not always, install them. It doesn't strike me as a bug. This is Debian
not Ubuntu.

I could, of course, reset aptitude. I am quite happy with the status quo.

> Not installing a suggested package isn't.

Lisi

[Brian]

Never really used aptitude but I've just installed it and ran the curses
variety of the program. "options" at the top of the screen shows

Option: Apt::Install-Recommends
Default: True
Value: True

The behaviour of your aptitude is presumably because you have adjusted
the default behaviour in some way. The new behaviour is not a bug.

Also, a default Debian doesn't have aptitude but apt-get. which installs
recommended packages by default.

--
Brian.

[Lisi Reisz]

On Saturday 12 November 2016 15:45:28 Brian wrote:
> The behaviour of your aptitude is presumably because you have adjusted
> the default behaviour in some way. The new behaviour is not a bug.

No, I haven't. This is a temporary machine, which I have not been using long.
I have adjusted very little. I don't remember claiming that anything was a

bug.

> Also, a default Debian doesn't have aptitude but apt-get. which installs
> recommended packages by default.

Varies with time. Sometimes it is there and sometimes it isn't. When
aptitude isn't there, I install it. But I don't configure it.

So, after some exploring (aptitude show and aptitude search), in this
installation (Jessie, 8.6 - I installed Jessie 8.5) aptitude was *not*
automatically installed and the recommends of aptitude *were* automatically
installed. I must watch for next time I have to install/not install some
recommends and see why and when.

Interesting. Thanks.

Lisi

[Tixy]

I'm pretty sure installing recommends is Debian's default. I remember it
changing, and dug up this 2007 announcement of the fact...

https://lists.debian.org/debian-devel-announce/2007/08/msg00000.html

I also have as the very first step in my personal notes for installing
Debian instructions to disable that...

Create /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/20norecommends containing

APT {
Install-Recommends "false";
};

--
Tixy

[Felix Miata]

Brian composed on 2016-11-12 15:45 (UTC):

> On Sat 12 Nov 2016 at 13:45:38 +0000, Lisi Reisz wrote:

>> Brian wrote:

>> > Not installing a recommended package on a default Debian would be a bug.

>> Aptitude on my current almost vanilla temporary Jessie install doesn't install
>> recommends. But it makes a big point of telling me a) that they are
>> recommended and b) that they are not going to be installed. I then often,
>> but not always, install them. It doesn't strike me as a bug. This is Debian
>> not Ubuntu.

>> I could, of course, reset aptitude. I am quite happy with the status quo.

> Never really used aptitude but I've just installed it and ran the curses
> variety of the program. "options" at the top of the screen shows

> Option: Apt::Install-Recommends
> Default: True
> Value: True

I'd like to know how you found the above. Running aptitude 0.6.11 on vtty3
here as root in 8.6 I'm unable to find anything like that from its Options
menu, or anywhere else.

> The behaviour of your aptitude is presumably because you have adjusted
> the default behaviour in some way. The new behaviour is not a bug.

> Also, a default Debian doesn't have aptitude but apt-get. which installs
> recommended packages by default.

I booted 5 of 6 Jessie installations here in recent minutes. All contain

APT::Install-Recommends "false";

in /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/00InstallRecommends. Timestamp on the file on the
currently booted installation is 366 days old, same as on the previous one or
two booted (timestamp not noticed on the first two or three).

All my Jessie installations were made via HTTP, started from Grub, including
the following on the cmdline:

...tasks=standard base-installer/install-recommends=false...

What a "default" Debian installation includes or not I may never have seen,
at least not since my first, Etch, as all since, and maybe Etch too, have
been installed in same manner.

[David Wright]

On Sat 12 Nov 2016 at 20:27:37 (-0500), Felix Miata wrote:
> Brian composed on 2016-11-12 15:45 (UTC):
>
> >On Sat 12 Nov 2016 at 13:45:38 +0000, Lisi Reisz wrote:
>
> >>Brian wrote:
>
> >>> Not installing a recommended package on a default Debian would be a bug.
>
> >>Aptitude on my current almost vanilla temporary Jessie install doesn't install
> >>recommends. But it makes a big point of telling me a) that they are
> >>recommended and b) that they are not going to be installed. I then often,
> >>but not always, install them. It doesn't strike me as a bug. This is Debian
> >>not Ubuntu.
>
> >>I could, of course, reset aptitude. I am quite happy with the status quo.
>
> >Never really used aptitude but I've just installed it and ran the curses
> >variety of the program. "options" at the top of the screen shows
>
> >Option: Apt::Install-Recommends
> >Default: True
> >Value: True
>
> I'd like to know how you found the above. Running aptitude 0.6.11 on
> vtty3 here as root in 8.6 I'm unable to find anything like that from
> its Options menu, or anywhere else.

I type "?" which gives a list of key bindings. About 30 lines down it says
Control-t: Activate or deactivate the menu.
so I "q" back to the View and press "Ctrl-T" which pulls down the leftmost
menu (Actions). Use ← or → to get to the sixth menu which is Options.
Select the first item, Preferences and you get UI Options. Again, about
30 ↓ keystrokes gets to the line with, and when you're on it, the lower
pane displays as above and gives a few lines of explanation. The line is
[X] Install recommended packages automatically
Where in that sequence does your aptitude behave differently?

> >The behaviour of your aptitude is presumably because you have adjusted
> >the default behaviour in some way. The new behaviour is not a bug.
>
> >Also, a default Debian doesn't have aptitude but apt-get. which installs
> >recommended packages by default.
>
> I booted 5 of 6 Jessie installations here in recent minutes. All contain
>
> APT::Install-Recommends "false";
>
> in /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/00InstallRecommends. Timestamp on the file on
> the currently booted installation is 366 days old, same as on the
> previous one or two booted (timestamp not noticed on the first two
> or three).
>
> All my Jessie installations were made via HTTP, started from Grub,
> including the following on the cmdline:
>
> ...tasks=standard base-installer/install-recommends=false...
>
> What a "default" Debian installation includes or not I may never
> have seen, at least not since my first, Etch, as all since, and
> maybe Etch too, have been installed in same manner.

I don't understand what you mean by "via HTTP, started from Grub".
I install Debian systems either by upgrading from a previous version,
or by booting up a CD, normally a netinst version. The latter always
boots straight into the screen where one can choose "Advanced Options"
and "Expert Install" (my choices) or other options. I don't even recall
whether Grub is doing the booting, or one of those other methods like
syslinux etc. It all just flashes by.

Cheers,
David.

[Felix Miata]

David Wright composed on 2016-11-12 22:09 (UTC-0600):

> On Sat 12 Nov 2016 at 20:27:37 (-0500), Felix Miata wrote:

>> Brian composed on 2016-11-12 15:45 (UTC):

>>>Never really used aptitude but I've just installed it and ran the curses
>>>variety of the program. "options" at the top of the screen shows

>>>Option: Apt::Install-Recommends
>>>Default: True
>>>Value: True

>> I'd like to know how you found the above. Running aptitude 0.6.11 on
>> vtty3 here as root in 8.6 I'm unable to find anything like that from
>> its Options menu, or anywhere else.

> I type "?" which gives a list of key bindings. About 30 lines down it says
> Control-t: Activate or deactivate the menu.

I open the menu with F10.

> so I "q" back to the View and press "Ctrl-T" which pulls down the leftmost
> menu (Actions). Use ← or → to get to the sixth menu which is Options.

Same my way.

> Select the first item, Preferences and you get UI Options. Again, about
> 30 ↓ keystrokes gets to the line with, and when you're on it, the lower
> pane displays as above and gives a few lines of explanation. The line is
> [X] Install recommended packages automatically
> Where in that sequence does your aptitude behave differently?

There are two panes, upper and lower, each about half a screen. I assumed
that the last item showing was the last available option under preferences.
Now that I know about the additional options, I see, and it does indeed
report that the default is True.

I suppose it must be that my installer cmdline option
install-recommends=false must be taken into account, but I'm perplexed that
multiple Jessie installations have the same Nov. 2015 timestamp on
/etc/apt/apt.conf.d/00InstallRecommends while including False instead of the
reported default True.

>> I booted 5 of 6 Jessie installations here in recent minutes. All contain

>> APT::Install-Recommends "false";

>> in /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/00InstallRecommends. Timestamp on the file on
>> the currently booted installation is 366 days old, same as on the
>> previous one or two booted (timestamp not noticed on the first two
>> or three).

>> All my Jessie installations were made via HTTP, started from Grub,
>> including the following on the cmdline:

>> ...tasks=standard base-installer/install-recommends=false...

>> What a "default" Debian installation includes or not I may never
>> have seen, at least not since my first, Etch, as all since, and
>> maybe Etch too, have been installed in same manner.

> I don't understand what you mean by "via HTTP, started from Grub".

A recent installation's boot menu stanza:

title Install Debian via HTTP
kernel (hd0,2)/debian/linux showopts vga=791 ---
netcfg/disable_dhcp=true netcfg/get_hostname=myhost tasks=standard
base-installer/install-recommends=false splash=0
initrd (hd0,2)/debian/initrd.gz

All my machines are multiboot. Virtually all my installations begin as
minimal, so that I can configure to not install optional packages as a matter
of course, keeping space required low, and updates time and bandwidth minimized.

Normally when I want to install any distro, I fetch the installation kernel
and initrd from an appropriate location on the Internet, if I haven't done so
already and saved on the LAN. Isos represent a lot of downloading of packages
that won't be installed here. Release isos don't get updated, so HTTP gets
latest available packages instead of installing multiple versions of various
packages or leaving a fresh installation in need of update. Similar is
commonly the reasoning with pre-release isos.

[Lisi Reisz]

On Sunday 13 November 2016 04:09:13 David Wright wrote:
> > I'd like to know how you found the above. Running aptitude 0.6.11 on
> > vtty3 here as root in 8.6 I'm unable to find anything like that from
> > its Options menu, or anywhere else.
>
> I type "?" which gives a list of key bindings. About 30 lines down it says
>    Control-t:    Activate or deactivate the menu.

etc.

I assume you mean n-curses aptitude. I meant at the CLI.

Lisi

[David Wright]

Oh, I was just answering Felix's question of Brian.

For the CLI, I think you (as the appropriate user) just:
cat /etc/apt/apt.conf /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/* ~/.aptitude/config | less
but then I assume you need to study man 5 apt.conf to ascertain
which options and settable, and which are defaults, etc. and
man <command> for any defaulting options that might take precedence
over the configuration files' options. The curses help that I described
has already merged the options from configuration files and the
commandline, hence the displayed Default and Value lines.

Cheers,
David.

[Brian]

On Sat 12 Nov 2016 at 23:44:56 -0500, Felix Miata wrote:

> David Wright composed on 2016-11-12 22:09 (UTC-0600):
>

> >Select the first item, Preferences and you get UI Options. Again, about
> >30 ↓ keystrokes gets to the line with, and when you're on it, the lower
> >pane displays as above and gives a few lines of explanation. The line is
> > [X] Install recommended packages automatically
> >Where in that sequence does your aptitude behave differently?
>
> There are two panes, upper and lower, each about half a screen. I assumed
> that the last item showing was the last available option under preferences.
> Now that I know about the additional options, I see, and it does indeed
> report that the default is True.
>
> I suppose it must be that my installer cmdline option
> install-recommends=false must be taken into account, but I'm perplexed that

install-recommends=false means no recommended packages installed when
using d-i and also set it up for the installed system with

APT::Install-Recommends "false";

in /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/00InstallRecommends. This will prevail for apt
*and* aptitude.

> multiple Jessie installations have the same Nov. 2015 timestamp on
> /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/00InstallRecommends while including False instead of the
> reported default True.

Similar timestamps? Installed on the same day? Check timestamps on
directories.

The reported "True" is the hard-coded aptitude default. The "Value" will
be shown as "False" because of 00InstallRecommends.

--
Brian.

[Brian]

On Sun 13 Nov 2016 at 07:01:27 -0600, David Wright wrote:

> On Sun 13 Nov 2016 at 11:16:51 (+0000), Lisi Reisz wrote:
> > On Sunday 13 November 2016 04:09:13 David Wright wrote:
> > > > I'd like to know how you found the above. Running aptitude 0.6.11 on
> > > > vtty3 here as root in 8.6 I'm unable to find anything like that from
> > > > its Options menu, or anywhere else.
> > >
> > > I type "?" which gives a list of key bindings. About 30 lines down it says
> > >    Control-t:    Activate or deactivate the menu.
> > etc.
> >
> > I assume you mean n-curses aptitude. I meant at the CLI.
>
> Oh, I was just answering Felix's question of Brian.

And very well answered it was, too.

Before going on to respond to the following paragraph I want to repeat
(in a slightly different way) what I said previously. A default install
sets up the installed system to download recommended packages with apt,
If aptitude is installed afterwards it also downloads recommended
packages by default. A failure of apt or aptitude to do this would be a
bug.

> For the CLI, I think you (as the appropriate user) just:
> cat /etc/apt/apt.conf /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/* ~/.aptitude/config | less
> but then I assume you need to study man 5 apt.conf to ascertain
> which options and settable, and which are defaults, etc. and
> man <command> for any defaulting options that might take precedence
> over the configuration files' options. The curses help that I described
> has already merged the options from configuration files and the
> commandline, hence the displayed Default and Value lines.

apt-config dump | grep Recommends

--
Brian.

[Lisi Reisz]

Thanks, David.

Lisi