Safe to Remove?

[SteveRiley]

What? No Solitaire? Oh, what ever so you do with those laptops?

Why, I linger on this here fine forum

Ditto here. Especially on a laptop with an embedded GPU -- no way to change out video.

I only have the following xserver* packages installed:

xserver-xorg-video-vesa
xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
xserver-xorg-video-vmware
xserver-xorg-video-intel

xserver-xorg-input-all
xserver-xorg-input-wacom
xserver-xorg-input-mouse
xserver-xorg-input-evdev
xserver-xorg-input-vmmouse
xserver-xorg-input-synaptics

You can purge -video-vmware and -input-vmmouse, as they're used only for VM guest (not host) installs. And -wacom, too, unless you actually have a digitizing tablet.

Like you guys, I also remove all the unneeded Xorg stuff. I'd also just as soon get rid of the plethora of printer drivers, but I occasionally find myself needing to print in unpredictable locations so I let the drivers to remain installed.

[Snowhog]

I also remove all the unneeded xserver-xorg-video- and xserver-xorg-input- files I don't need.

Ditto here. Especially on a laptop with an embedded GPU -- no way to change out video.

I only have the following xserver* packages installed:

xserver-xorg-video-vesa
xserver-xorg-video-fbdev
xserver-xorg-video-vmware
xserver-xorg-video-intel

xserver-xorg-input-all
xserver-xorg-input-wacom
xserver-xorg-input-mouse
xserver-xorg-input-evdev
xserver-xorg-input-vmmouse
xserver-xorg-input-synaptics

[oshunluvr]

* kpat

What? No Solitaire? Oh, what ever so you do with those laptops?

I also remove all the unneeded xserver-xorg-video- and xserver-xorg-input- files I don't need.

[SteveRiley]

Even with oodles of hard drive space, I prefer to remove packages that I know I won't use. My reasoning for this comes purely from my background as an infosec practitioner. Every program installed on a machine also has to be kept up-to-date, even if it's a program you never use. Vulnerabilities can creep in anywhere. So to keep a machine's potential attack surface as low as possible, I purge packages that are unnecesssary for me.

I used to install just the base Ubuntu CLI mode, and then construct a hand-built KDE distribution. However, I'm not following that approach anymore, since joining the Kubuntu membership. I feel it's important to install the distribution as envisioned by the maintainers. After installation, then, I add extra packages that I use and remove packages that I don't need. Admittedly, the distinction between the two approaches is probably slight. But it's what I do now.

In Xplorer4x4's "Top 10" post, I mentioned a few packages that I purge, and Xplorer4x4 wanted to know more:

Hey Steve, few question if you don't mind. How can I purge the foreign language fonts and such? How come you disable the update notifiers?

First, the fonts and other unused items. Here is the list of packages I purge after installing Kubuntu. These packages are all part of the "recommends" set of various metapackages, and can thus be purged without removing the corresponding metapackage. Note: this is taken from my Quantal alpha 3 installation on my X1.

From kubuntu-desktop
* akonadi-facebook
* avahi-autoipd
* avahi-daemon
* bluedevil
* bluez
* bluez-alsa
* bluez-cups
* brltty
* dragonplayer
* fonts-kacst-one
* fonts-khmeros-core
* fonts-lao
* fonts-lklug-sinhala
* fonts-nanum
* fonts-sil-abyssinica
* fonts-sil-padauk
* fonts-takao-pgothic
* fonts-thai-tlwg
* fonts-tibetian-machine
* ibus-qt4
* im-switch
* jockey-kde
* kaccessible
* kmag
* kmousetool
* kpat
* kppp
* kubuntu-firefox-installer
* kvkbd
* libnss-mdns
* muon-notifier
* plasma-widget-facebook
* plasma-widget-kimpanel
* quassel
* ttf-indic-fonts-core
* ttf-punjabi-fonts
* ttf-wqy-microhei
* xcursor-themes

From ubuntu-standard
* apparmor
* ppp
* pppconfig
* pppoeconf
* ufw

(I replace Quassel with Quassel-client, because I run a Quassel Core on my home server.)

Next, I run sudo apt-get --purge autoremove to clean up remaining depends. This won't, however, clean up any recommends, so I install and run deborphan to list left-over recommends from the packages that I purged (there are several). I feed the output of that into sudo apt-get purge.

Finally, the update notifiers... both my computers are laptops, which I power down at the end of each day. Cold-booting each morning takes very little time, since both laptops are equipped with SSDs. Each morning, part of my daily routine is

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

I prefer to manage updates manually rather than let a background daemon continually poll for updates.

----

Oh, and one other thing... while I know it isn't too popular around here, I find Aptitude to be a useful maintenance tool for parts of this exercise. It is so much faster to navigate the package lists with Aptitude when removing all those recommends.

[dibl]

For Debian, if the package named in the apt-get command has no dependencies, and there are no other complications or conflicts, then it will be installed without a request for confirmation. If packages other than the one named in the apt-get command have to be pulled in, then that triggers the request for confirmation. I believe the *buntus follow this protocol for apt-get.

[Snowhog]

'A' reason for the "sometimes it prompts; sometime it doesn't" would be timing. If you have used a sudo'd command within the last x time, and then use another sudo command, the prompting is offered.

[Xplorer4x4]

Then just include the simulate option:

sudo apt-get remove --simulate <package>

Thanks thats very useful! Like I said, I can't recall if it prompts me every time when doing remove --purge or not but I know for a fact that when doing sudo apt-get install <package> it sometimes prompts me to answer yes or no and sometimes it doesn't. Is there a reason for this? Is there a way to make apt-get install to always prompt me when doing installs?

[Snowhog]

The only one there that I don't think you can simply remove is nepomuk, but why not try each of them?

sudo apt-get remove <package>

will show you what it is going to remove and ask you if you really want to, just check to see if nothing else important will be removed with it.

If anything does go wrong you should be able to install kubuntu-desktop to gain back all the required applications.

Then just include the simulate option:

sudo apt-get remove --simulate <package>

[Xplorer4x4]

Kdenetwork and kdenetwork-filesharing are needed if you want to use dolphin and ssh between machines, which I do on my home LAN.

In thinking about your original question, I'll offer one additional unsolicited observation. KDE (the whole kubuntu-desktop suite) is, by design, a full "environment" -- the developers deliberatedly packed in many utilities as well as productivity packages, trying to offer a fully functional system for broad application. For the person who is interested in a somewhat minimal OS, starting with KDE and then finding all the things you don't require is probably not the most direct path to happiness. As Rob_H pointed out, there are distributions that are designed to let you only install what you need. And even something like lubuntu would be a far less "full" place to start, and then you could add what you need to that. Just trying to give you some ideas.

I thought I made it clear I am not interested in a different distro can we stop beating a dead horse? I don't really care that they might let me select only what I want, but I have only listed 7 programs so far. Thats 7 out of how many packages that make up the Kubuntu distro? Hundreds? Thousands? Even if I throw in 10-15 widgets we are talking minimal amount of packages here in the grand scheme of things. I suspect the other distros may not require selecting each and every package but I suspect it would still require more research then what it will require to strip a few packages out of Kubuntu.

Kdenetwork package itself, is hardly needed:
http://packages.ubuntu.com/precise/a...twork/filelist

lol thanks sumski, always helpful. Precise(no pun intended) and to the point.

[dibl]

Kdenetwork package itself, is hardly needed:

Right, even rdepends on kdenetwork leads to not much.

This system is almost 2 years old -- I think there was a reason I had kdenetwork installed on it, but it doesn't look very necessary today.

[sumski]

Kdenetwork and kde-filesharing are needed if you want to use dolphin and ssh between machines, which I do on my home LAN.

In thinking about your original question, I'll offer one additional unsolicited observation. KDE (the whole kubuntu-desktop suite) is, by design, a full "environment" -- the developers deliberatedly packed in many utilities as well as productivity packages, trying to offer a fully functional system for broad application. For the person who is interested in a somewhat minimal OS, starting with KDE and then finding all the things you don't require is probably not the most direct path to happiness. As Rob_H pointed out, there are distributions that are designed to let you only install what you need. And even something like lubuntu would be a far less "full" place to start, and then you could add what you need to that. Just trying to give you some ideas.

Kdenetwork package itself, is hardly needed:
http://packages.ubuntu.com/precise/a...twork/filelist

[dibl]

Kdenetwork and kdenetwork-filesharing are needed if you want to use dolphin and ssh between machines, which I do on my home LAN.

In thinking about your original question, I'll offer one additional unsolicited observation. KDE (the whole kubuntu-desktop suite) is, by design, a full "environment" -- the developers deliberatedly packed in many utilities as well as productivity packages, trying to offer a fully functional system for broad application. For the person who is interested in a somewhat minimal OS, starting with KDE and then finding all the things you don't require is probably not the most direct path to happiness. As Rob_H pointed out, there are distributions that are designed to let you only install what you need. And even something like lubuntu would be a far less "full" place to start, and then you could add what you need to that. Just trying to give you some ideas.

[Xplorer4x4]

Yes I did miss the edit, and as for ubuntu packages, that is my first stop every time. I actually use Add to Search Var in Firefox and created a search based on both name and description. Usually it is pretty helpful, just not in that case, atleast not to me.

[dibl]

network bandwidth is also important as those packages need updating as well and the more unneeded packages you have the longer updates will take.

OK, yes that's true, to the extent that you are using a distribution that does lots of updating, which I suppose Kubuntu is. Less true for Debian stable and other distros of that type.

@Xplorer4x4, maybe you missed my edit where I used apt-cache depends and learned that there's no damage done by removing kppp for my situation (not that I'll bother).

To learn a bit more about a package, probably the first place to look is ubuntu packages.

[Xplorer4x4]

Sure I have 6TB, but I think you missed the obvious "1x80GB Intel X25-M G2 SSD." I only have 80GB for my OS drive. Yes Kubuntu takes up amazingly less space in this state compared to a fresh install of Win 7 Ultimate. Yes, even with Windows 7 I had sufficient space left on my SSD. However, james147 makes some great points. Most of which sums up what I was going to say. I will expand and say in my case bandwidth is not a concern, but then again faster updates is a plus even on a 10Mbit connection. It also helps clean out the menu. Sure this can be accomplished kia KDE Menu Editor but I why hide it when I can possibly remove the package and forget about it.

You say you would not remove kppp because you need kdenetwork? Well a little bit of googling tells me pretty much nothing of value about this package. Atleast not that was at my level of understanding because,like I said, I am still pretty new to the linux world. This is the type of scenario that made me create this thread in hopes of helping myself and others. So far it has really failed to do so. I do appreciate the tip on "apt-cache rdepends." Oh and I could try the manual, but I typically find they are not the most n00b frindly explanation. Rather then going around in circles criticizing my request for help, why not utilize your time to truly help?