[mythtv-users] Recommended replacement to mythbuntu-desktop for Ubuntu 22.04

[Paul Gardiner]

On 22/09/2022 03:23, James Linder wrote:
> 
> 
>> On 22 Sep 2022, at 2:30 am, Mike Perkins <mikep at randomtraveller.org.uk> wrote:
>>
>> On 21/09/2022 13:24, Tom Bishop wrote:
>>> On Wed, Sep 21, 2022 at 6:23 AM OpenMedia Support <support at openmedia.co.nz>
>>> wrote:
>>>>> On Tue, Sep 20, 2022 at 10:41 PM Stephen Worthington <
>>>>> stephen_agent at jsw.gen.nz> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> On Wed, 21 Sep 2022 11:27:13 +1200, you wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Been really happy with the small footprint the mythbuntu-desktop has
>>>>>>> always provided, but for a 22.04 upgrade I need to change to something
>>>>>>> else for my frontends
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> xubuntu-desktop and lubuntu-desktop both pull in a lot of redundant
>>>>>>> packages I don't require. Any other recommended options?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Steve
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I just did "apt remove mythbuntu-desktop" on my mother's MythTV box.
>>>>>> No other packages were removed (or added), and doing that should make
>>>>>> it possible to do the upgrade to 22.04.  But I have not tried that
>>>>>> yet.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On new installs, you would probably have to install xubuntu-desktop
>>>>>> and then remove the packages you did not want.  Or get a list of all
>>>>>> the packages that xubuntu-desktop installs and manually install only
>>>>>> the ones you want.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> With the -desktop packages, it seems the dependencies are one way -
>>>>>> installing the -desktop package will install all the packages it
>>>>>> wants, but removing any of those packages afterwards will not cause
>>>>>> the -desktop package to be removed, and the packages you removed will
>>>>>> not be reinstalled.
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Mate is the desktop that I have been using for most of my installs even
>>>>> for
>>>>> my daily driver, not as light as xubuntu-desktop but its pretty snappy
>>>> and
>>>>> does what I need/want...also use it for my daily driver for most all my
>>>>> installs. Still probably pulls more than you would like but its pretty
>>>>> light.
>>>>
>>>> currently all the alternative *-desktop options are too large for a
>>>> dedicated media frontent..
>>>>
>>>> Current frontend has 1644 packages already which is a bit heavy. EG Cups,
>>>> lots of unused fonts,
>>>>
>>>> xubuntu-desktop would add 425 packages which includes games, more fonts,
>>>> more cups components, plus libreoffice.
>>>>
>>>> Even swapping to ubuntu-server adds a lot of stuff I simply don't need.
>>>> Any other options?
>>> Ubuntu-server is probably your best option which has a minimal installation
>>> option and then only install the packages that you want/need.
>> Why go to the monkey when you can go directly to the organ-grinder :)
>>
>> My main front end is a basic Debian install. Just untick everything except ssh and the tools. Once I reboot and get a login prompt I install lxde - note, not lxde-desktop, which pulls in everything including the kitchen sink. That gives me a GUI from which I can then install whatever bits of mythtv I need.
>>
>> I even have a much slimmer version which only uses openbox and automatically boots into nothing else but mythfrontend. If you are interested I'll have to dig out details; stuff has to be done in a certain order in order not to be locked out!
> 
> First why bother?
> 
> Second, as per Mike’s suggestion, there are LOTS of distros you can use, you just need to put in the hard-yard to install and maintain. Choose your option, I use SuSE minimum install (Really minimum, icewm no pulse, nothing) but imho ubuntu server is probably an easy way to go.
> If you are going to try to use a pre-packaged fe,be no doubt lots of dependancies will be pulled in.

There's a way to set up a frontend so that you can keep it up to date 
remotely from the server that runs the backend. You never need to 
physically touch the frontend or have any risk of down time because an 
install runs into problems. You can use kiwi-ng to build a minimal 
image. kiwi-ng has several options: it can produce installation media or 
a Live CD image. A Live CD image is good because that uses a tmpfs 
overlay, which in turn means there is no need to ever shut the frontend 
down: cutting the power has no risk of leaving the disc in a bad state. 
The Live CD image can be served from the backend using AOE, or can be 
written to the frontend's disc. Even the writing of the image to disc 
can be done remotely, so there is no need to physically touch the 
frontend even for that stage. The frontend is set up to network boot 
using grub, with config files on the backend controlling whether the 
frontend boots using AOE or its local disc. Typical update workflow is 
to build a new image on the server, change the frontend to boot from it 
with AOE, test it for a bit and, if it works, write it to local disc and 
change to boot from the disc.

Here's the kiwi-ng script I use: 
https://github.com/Glidos/kiwi-mythfrontend. It's specific to SuSE and 
my particular set up, but apparently kiwi-ng can be used for other distros.