Devuan without D-Bus
This document describes how to remove D-Bus from Devuan incorporating changing to a lightweight window manager, choosing a browser and an alternative solution to D-Bus dependent auto-mounting.
Choosing a window manager
Unlike desktop environments most window managers do not depend on D-Bus, so you should choose to install a window manager.
- jwm
- blackbox
- fluxbox
- fvwm
- fvwm-crystal
- openbox
Installing and configuring Fluxbox
We will be using Fluxbox as it is simple and intuitive.
root@devuan:~# apt-get install fluxbox
Make Fluxbox the default window manager for your user when using the startx script.
user@devuan:~@ echo "exec fluxbox" >> .xinitrc
You can now invoke the startx script to use fluxbox.
user@devuan:~@ startx
A good option for a display manager is WDM.
root@devuan:~# apt-get install wdm
Choosing a web browser
There are few web browsers depending on dbus components, however some are better than others. Here are a handful of web browsers you might choose from.
- xombrero
- lynx
- links2
- dillo
- midori
- firefox-esr
We will go with the well known Firefiox ESR since it's the most featured.
root@devuan:~# apt-get install firefox-esr
Removing D-Bus from Devuan
We can now remove dbus from Devuan.
root@devuan:~# apt-get purge dbus
We should also remove any packages orphaned by dbus removal.
root@devuan:~# apt-get autoremove --purge
Note: Beware that apt-get autoremove
may, in some cases, select packages for removal that you actually want to keep. Thus, having a good look at the list of packages to be removed before saying “y” on the confirmation prompt is adviced. In case autoremove
selects any package that you would like to keep, just run apt-get install <package>
to mark it as manually installed.
A simple alternative to auto-mounting
Without D-Bus you will not have auto-mounting available for most file managers, because those parts require D-Bus and simpler methods of mounting are not always implemented. We will set up mount points for ourselves, so that more sensible file managers can mount the volumes with just a few clicks.
Manual mount points
Make a directory for the new mount point. You can also do this also for other storage devices, but this will give you an example based on a USB device.
root@devuan:~# mkdir /media/usb0
Backup your fstab before proceeding.
root@devuan:~# cp /etc/fstab /etc/fstab.backup
Now we can edit the fstab.
root@devuan:~# editor /etc/fstab
We need to add a mount point for a USB drive at the end of the fstab. Be sure to set the user option so that non-root users can mount the drive.
/dev/sdb1 /media/usb0 auto user,noauto 0 0
The device nodes for usb disks will vary depending on your setup. You can find out which device nodes will be used by plugging in the drive and using the lsblk utility.
Plug in a USB drive to test your work.
user@devuan:~$ mount -v /media/usb0 user@devuan:~$ umount -v /media/usb0
Choosing a file manager
For a graphical file manager that can mount and umount drives based on your fstab you can use Xfe.
root@devuan:~# apt-get install xfe
As of the ascii release you can also use spaceFM for the same purpose. Information on this is pending.
An interesting and minimalistic file manager is the ncurses based Midnight Commander.
root@devuan:~# apt-get install mc
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