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<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8" /><title>Chapter 2. Getting and installing Debian GNU/Linux</title><link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="debian.css" /><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.79.1" /><link rel="home" href="index.en.html" title="The Debian GNU/Linux FAQ" /><link rel="up" href="index.en.html" title="The Debian GNU/Linux FAQ" /><link rel="prev" href="basic-defs.en.html" title="Chapter 1. Definitions and overview" /><link rel="next" href="choosing.en.html" title="Chapter 3. Choosing a Debian distribution" /><meta xmlns="" name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" /><style xmlns="" type="text/css">
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    </style></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">Chapter 2. Getting and installing Debian GNU/Linux</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="basic-defs.en.html"><img src="images/prev.png" alt="Prev" /></a> </td><th width="60%" align="center"> </th><td width="20%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="choosing.en.html"><img src="images/next.png" alt="Next" /></a></td></tr></table><hr /></div><div class="chapter"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h1 class="title"><a id="getting-debian"></a>Chapter 2. Getting and installing Debian GNU/Linux</h1></div></div></div><div class="toc"><p><strong>Table of Contents</strong></p><dl class="toc"><dt><span class="section"><a href="getting-debian.en.html#version">2.1. What is the latest version of Debian?</a></span></dt><dt><span class="section"><a href="getting-debian.en.html#updatestable">2.2. Are there package upgrades in `stable'?</a></span></dt><dt><span class="section"><a href="getting-debian.en.html#inst-disks">2.3. Where/how can I get the Debian installation images?</a></span></dt><dt><span class="section"><a href="getting-debian.en.html#cdrom">2.4. How do I install Debian from CD-ROMs?</a></span></dt><dt><span class="section"><a href="getting-debian.en.html#cdimage-symlinks">2.5. Why does the official stable released CD-ROM contain symlinks for `frozen' and `unstable'? I thought this CD contains just `stable'!</a></span></dt><dt><span class="section"><a href="getting-debian.en.html#remoteinstall">2.6. Can I get and install Debian directly from a remote Internet site?</a></span></dt><dt><span class="section"><a href="getting-debian.en.html#alternativebootinstaller">2.7. Are there any alternative strategies for booting the system installer?</a></span></dt></dl></div><p>
The official document giving installation instructions is the <a class="ulink" href="https://www.debian.org/releases/stable/installmanual" target="_top">Debian GNU/Linux
Installation Guide</a>.  We'll give some additional notes about getting and
installing Debian GNU/Linux here.
</p><div class="section"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title"><a id="version"></a>2.1. What is the latest version of Debian?</h2></div></div></div><p>
Currently there are three versions of Debian GNU/Linux:
</p><div class="variablelist"><dl class="variablelist"><dt><span class="term"><span class="emphasis"><em>release 10, a.k.a. the `stable' distribution or buster</em></span></span></dt><dd><p>
This is stable and well tested software, it changes if major security or
usability fixes are incorporated.
</p></dd><dt><span class="term"><span class="emphasis"><em>the `testing' distribution, currently called bullseye</em></span></span></dt><dd><p>
This is where packages that will be released as the next `stable' are placed;
they've had some testing in unstable but they may not be completely fit for
release yet.  This distribution is updated more often than `stable', but not
more often than `unstable'.
</p></dd><dt><span class="term"><span class="emphasis"><em>the `unstable' distribution</em></span></span></dt><dd><p>
This is the version currently under development; it is updated continuously.
You can retrieve packages from the `unstable' archive on any Debian FTP site
and use them to upgrade your system at any time, but you may not expect the
system to be as usable or as stable as before - that's why it's called
`<span class="strong"><strong>unstable</strong></span>'!
</p></dd></dl></div><p>
Please see <a class="xref" href="ftparchives.en.html#dists" title="6.1. How many Debian distributions are there?">Section 6.1, “How many Debian distributions are there?”</a> for more information.
</p></div><div class="section"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title"><a id="updatestable"></a>2.2. Are there package upgrades in `stable'?</h2></div></div></div><p>
No new functionality is added to the stable release.  Once a Debian version is
released and tagged `stable' it will only get security updates.  That is, only
packages for which a security vulnerability has been found after the release
will be upgraded.  All the security updates are served through <a class="ulink" href="ftp://security.debian.org" target="_top">security.debian.org</a>.
</p><p>
Security updates serve one purpose: to supply a fix for a security
vulnerability.  They are not a method for sneaking additional changes into the
stable release without going through normal point release procedure.
Consequently, fixes for packages with security issues will not upgrade the
software.  The Debian Security Team will backport the necessary fixes to the
version of the software distributed in `stable' instead.
</p><p>
For more information related to security support please read the <a class="ulink" href="https://www.debian.org/security/faq" target="_top">Security FAQ</a> or the <a class="ulink" href="https://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/securing-debian-howto/" target="_top">Debian Security
Manual</a>.
</p></div><div class="section"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title"><a id="inst-disks"></a>2.3. Where/how can I get the Debian installation images?</h2></div></div></div><p>
You can get the installation images by downloading the appropriate files from
the <a class="ulink" href="https://www.debian.org/distrib/" target="_top">Debian website</a>.
</p><p>
Please refer to <a class="ulink" href="https://www.debian.org/CD" target="_top">Debian GNU/Linux on
CDs</a> for more information about CD (and DVD) images.
</p></div><div class="section"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title"><a id="cdrom"></a>2.4. How do I install Debian from CD-ROMs?</h2></div></div></div><p>
Installing Debian from CD is straightforward: configure your system for booting
off a CD, insert your CD, and reboot.  Your system will now be running the
Debian Installer.  See the <a class="ulink" href="https://www.debian.org/releases/stable/installmanual" target="_top">Debian GNU/Linux
Installation Guide</a> for more information.
</p></div><div class="section"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title"><a id="cdimage-symlinks"></a>2.5. Why does the official stable released CD-ROM contain symlinks for `frozen' and `unstable'? I thought this CD contains just `stable'!</h2></div></div></div><p>
Official Debian CD images indeed contain symlinks like:
</p><pre class="screen">
 /dists/frozen -&gt; buster/
 /dists/stable -&gt; buster/
 /dists/testing -&gt; buster/
 /dists/unstable -&gt; buster/
</pre><p>
so that they work when your sources.list has an entry like
</p><pre class="screen">
 deb cdrom:[&lt;name as on cd label&gt;]/ unstable main [...]
</pre><p>
.
</p><p>
The fact these symlinks are present does <span class="emphasis"><em>not</em></span> mean the
image is `unstable' or `testing' or anything.  Read the CD label in
<code class="filename">/.disk/info</code> to find out which Debian version it contains.
This information is also present in <code class="filename">/README.txt</code> on the CD.
</p><p>
Read <a class="ulink" href="https://www.debian.org/releases" target="_top">https://www.debian.org/releases</a>
to find out what the current `stable' and `testing' releases are.
</p></div><div class="section"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title"><a id="remoteinstall"></a>2.6. Can I get and install Debian directly from a remote Internet site?</h2></div></div></div><p>
Yes.  You can boot the Debian installation system from a set of files you can
download from our FTP site and its mirrors.
</p><p>
You can download a small CD image file, create a bootable CD from it, install
the basic system from it and the rest over the network.  For more information
please see <a class="ulink" href="https://www.debian.org/CD/netinst/" target="_top">https://www.debian.org/CD/netinst/</a>.
</p></div><div class="section"><div class="titlepage"><div><div><h2 class="title"><a id="alternativebootinstaller"></a>2.7. Are there any alternative strategies for booting the system installer?</h2></div></div></div><p>
Yes.  Apart from CD or DVD, you can install Debian GNU/Linux by booting from
USB memory stick, directly from hard disk, or using TFTP net booting.  For
installing on multiple computers it's possible to do fully automatic
installations.  NB: not all methods are supported by all computer
architectures.  Once the installer has booted, the rest of the system can be
downloaded over the network, or installed from local media.  See the <a class="ulink" href="https://www.debian.org/releases/stable/installmanual" target="_top">Debian GNU/Linux
Installation Guide</a> for more information.
</p></div></div><div class="navfooter"><hr /><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="basic-defs.en.html"><img src="images/prev.png" alt="Prev" /></a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"> </td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="choosing.en.html"><img src="images/next.png" alt="Next" /></a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">Chapter 1. Definitions and overview </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="index.en.html"><img src="images/home.png" alt="Home" /></a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> Chapter 3. Choosing a Debian distribution</td></tr></table></div></body></html>

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