LMDE half broken

[blaite]

Hi Mint-ers
I have been doing an update of my LMDE. It was having problems and I finally found out how to do it. It was having about 800MB of updates. It was in the evening and I was tired so I left it installing. I set up timer to switch computer off and since I have super fast internet I set it up for an hour.
It might have been to short time for the installation. After turning my computer grub is fine and it seems to turn on but shows me the log in window with no login and nothing to click.

I was looking here http://forums.linuxmint.com/viewtopic.p ... lit=update but I do not even understand what peopel are talking about.
I love my linux for the fact that unlike windows it just works and I have to know nothing about it.
I just know how to copy-paste stuff to terminal sometimes and how to change wallpaper and everything I need is already on my computer.

Is there a way to log from GRUB wih some commands and reinstall updates?
I will gladly learn something new and look for it myself but I have no idea what keywords to use. What do I really have to look for.

[Gerd50]

Hi,

you can try to boot the recovery mode. If it works and the terminal opens, update with the command

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sudo apt get-update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

[Telecaster72]

Hi,

you can try to boot the recovery mode. If it works and the terminal opens, update with the command

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sudo apt get-update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

good advice Gerd, just fixing a typo so he doesn't have to suffer more than necessary

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sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

I hope it works out for you blaite! By now you have learned the lesson NOT to set a timer to shut down your computer when making a big update
And about that you don't have to know anything to run Linux, that might be true, but you might find yourself having more knowledge about Linux than you ever thought you would in a while if you decide to stay...it just works like that, you get sucked into it and want to know more...

Maybe you should consider switching your repositories from "testing" to "squeeze" (stable), that way your system will be less likely to break after an update since "testing" is really testing, and sometimes things will break that way and you might not have the knowledge, time or energy to deal with what happened.
So if you can live with not having the absolute latest pre-alpha, alpha and beta versions of software i would recommend that.
When you have gotten warmed up and are feeling adventurous you can always change it back if it gets too stable and boring...

How do you do that then?
First make a backup of the sources.list file (the file that tells your system where to look for updates) in the terminal.

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sudo cp /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list.backup

Then type (or paste):

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sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

Then change every "testing" to "squeeze" in the text document and save it.

[blaite]

Hi,
you can try to boot the recovery mode. If it works and the terminal opens, update with the command

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sudo apt get-update && sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

It did not work, but there was another command that popped out as a suggestion so I did it and it worked out.

you might find yourself having more knowledge about Linux than you ever thought you would in a while if you decide to stay

I use it for 5 years already, but since I usually have zero problems there is not much occasions to learn. I do not mind it stays like that

Maybe you should consider switching your repositories from "testing" to "squeeze" (stable), that way your system will be less likely to break after an update since "testing" is really testing, and sometimes things will break that way and you might not have the knowledge, time or energy to deal with what happened.
So if you can live with not having the absolute latest pre-alpha, alpha and beta versions of software i would recommend that.
When you have gotten warmed up and are feeling adventurous you can always change it back if it gets too stable and boring...

How do you do that then?
First make a backup of the sources.list file (the file that tells your system where to look for updates) in the terminal.

Code: Select all

sudo cp /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list.backup

Then type (or paste):

Code: Select all

sudo gedit /etc/apt/sources.list

Then change every "testing" to "squeeze" in the text document and save it.

I might do that now, because after getting the system back, the updates has killed it totally. So now I have a new installation.
Can I do it just like that. It is not going to get messed up now?

[CiaW]

The one thing I would suggest is that sometimes there are updates that want to know if it should replace a config file or not, and it'll sit there waiting for a reply. I'll sometimes walk away from doing a large update and come back to see it hasn't finished for that reason. I also suggest you use the option to replace the current file (if you haven't modified it).

[Telecaster72]

I don't think there is any chance of it getting messed up just by switching the repositories to stable (squeeze).
It sounds like you just want things to work and breakage do not amuse you, no? I think if you want to have a rolling release like LMDE, stable would be the way to go for you, if you don't mind not always having the absolute latest builds of your software, leave the testing to those who like to test bleeding edge software and likes to troubleshoot.

I am getting a little bored with stable, there is hardly any updates, nothing breaks (knock knock) but then i am one of those who likes to troubleshoot but i don't really have the time to do so anymore plus my girlfriend has no understanding or sympathy for my inner nerd and gets pissed off when i break the system and she cant use the computer until i have fixed it...so i have to keep it solid. In time i will manage to break this too though, but for now there is peace in the house
If you change you might wanna add "backports" to the sources.list too.

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deb http://backports.debian.org/debian-backports squeeze-backports main

You are running Debian stable, because you prefer the Debian stable tree. It runs great, there is just one problem: the software is a little bit outdated compared to other distributions. This is where backports come in.
Backports are recompiled packages from testing (mostly) and unstable (in a few cases only, e.g. security updates) in a stable environment so that they will run without new libraries (whenever it is possible) on a Debian stable distribution. It is recommended to select single backports which fit your needs, and not to use all available backports.

http://backports.debian.org/