Suggestion - CLI Only

[reo4ua]

Hi,

I've just converted an Acer C720 chromebook over to lubuntu for the sole purpose of using rdesktop to access a remote windows server. This works great but I want to eliminate ALL bloat and the 20 second boot time.

What's the easiest way for a beginner with limited CLI experience to install a CLI only environment with wifi? The only other app besides rdesktop that I really need is firefox. Should I expect that it will just work for the most part or will it be necessary to find video drivers, lan drivers, keyboard, trackpad, etc. and then learn how to install/test different ones until I find the right combo?

 

[JasKinasis]

If you want a CLI only installation, then install Debian via the Debian minimal net install .iso image.
Once the base system is installed, you can add any extra things you need.

A CLI only Environment boots to a login terminal though. Once you’re logged in, you can only run terminal based applications.

So if you go CLI only, you won’t be able to use Firefox, as it is a windowed, graphical application. All graphical applications require X, Wayland, or Xwayland to be installed and a desktop environment, or window manager, in order to run.

But after installing the base system, you could always install X11 and a window manager like openbox and then configure your environment to boot to a login shell.

So you still boot and log into a terminal.
Then whenever you need to use any graphical applications, you can use the startx command to manually start X11 with your chosen wm before being able to use graphical, windowed applications like Firefox.

That way, your desktop only loads/starts when you want it to. But that’s hardly a beginner-friendly setup.

The other way, which is even less beginner friendly would be to install Arch Linux, which would allow you to set up your system with minimal bloat, but will require a lot more manual configuration than setting up Debian via the minimal net install.