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• TestDebian

Help Debian, by testing it and reporting bugs.

This page lists some modifications that you can make to your own (test) machine, in order to test some features (and report bugs!).

The four class of testers (risk) are equally useful to Debian. Classes depend on what situation you can recover yourself ¹. Each class of testers is very useful to Debian, since each different level tests a different level of maturity of the Debian release.

. Remember : Xen, OpenVz, UML, ?vserver:,Qemu... are your friends to run multiple systems on a single machine.

No risk

This class is suitable to any user, running Debian on production machine(s). Noobies, "man reportbug", and "aptitude show apt-listbugs".

• Use/test any software from DebianStable and report bugs & problems.

• (BTW, also submit documentation improvements: rephrase text, undocumented aspects, etc...).

• Enable SELinux² in "enforcing=0" mode. Report errors.

• Test Debian-Live CDs on various machines.

• Install ?Kernel/Oops... in the case you ever need it! (It's installed in Lenny/Desktop by default)

• Test installing Debian on any machine you can.

• Intel Core2 / AMD64 users : install Debian/i386 with both -686 and -amd64 kernel flavors, but use the latter ³.

Medium risk

This class is suitable for Desktop/Laptop advanced users.

• Same as above, plus

• Run DebianStable, with StableProposedUpdates on your test machine (Test the pending 4.0r8 and 5.0.1).

• Set dash as your /bin/sh (to detect bash-isms).

• Enable SELinux in "enforcing=1" mode; switch to "enforcing=0" in case of problems.

• Intel Core2 / AMD64 users : install Debian/amd64 distribution.

High risk

Advanced users may have a machine like this for development/test.

• Same as above, plus

• Enable Dependency-based init systems LSBInitScripts (Using insserv on Lenny should be fine, but removing it is very risky. see bug 475478).

• Exceptionally, you can do some AptPinning of specific backports, testing or unstable's packages (but keep in mind that you wouldn't get security updates this way).

• Test system running DebianTesting falls in this category too.

Very-high risk

Debian Developers likely have a test machine like this (typically in a Virtual machine).

• Same as above, plus

• Optionally, you can do some AptPinning of specific Experimental's packages.

  • like KDE4.1

• Test systems running DebianUnstable falls in this category.

  • Reminder: Check TopicDebianDevel before updating DebianUnstable each time.

DD Development System

Some system-wide features that are long-term goals should be enabled on development systems.

• Enable SELinux (at least in "selinux=1 enforce=0", to collect errors).

• Set dash as your /bin/sh (to detect bash-isms).

• see other entries from the LennyReleaseGoals and SqueezeReleaseGoals.