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After I had some troubles with apt-get I added too much packages with the ubuntu-desktop package. Unfortunately, this happened on a ubuntu-server, so there are many unused packages now. Because I'm still a noob in ubuntu, I got a question:

What packages on Ubuntu Server 12.04.1 are need for a proper running server?

Thx for answers, if someone is interessted here's the list of my packages (output of dpkg --get-selections): http://pastebin.com/c8BA0YRp

Thx for answers and sorry for my bad english.

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As a new user, IMO, it is much much easier to perform a fresh install and install only the packages you need then it is to start removing ubuntu-desktop. – bodhi.zazen Feb 19 at 18:13
OK thx, I'll backup my data and try a reinstall. – ase34 Feb 19 at 18:29

1 Answer

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I'm supposing you want to remove all non-default packages.

First of all, the desktop version of Ubuntu has a manifest file listing all the packages contained on the cdrom (example). Unfortunately it seems that this manifest is not available online for server editions, but you can try to search it on the cdrom.

Also, if you installed ubuntu-desktop through apt-get you should inspect the log located in /var/log/apt/history.log. This log has entries like this (an example from my machine):

Start-Date: 2013-02-18  23:55:18
Commandline: apt-get install compizconfig-settings-manager
Install: compiz-plugins-main:amd64 (0.9.7.0~bzr19-0ubuntu10, automatic), compizconfig-settings-manager:amd64 (0.9.5.92-0ubuntu3), compiz-plugins:amd64 (0.9.7.12-0ubuntu1, automatic)
End-Date: 2013-02-18  23:55:35

So you can try to locate the command you issued to install ubuntu-desktop and get the listing of the installed packages.

If you opt to do a clean install, before try tasksel. It will probably damage your system because it doesn't deal well with dependencies, but you have nothing to loose :)

There you can select "Basic Ubuntu Server" and deselect "Ubuntu Desktop".

Good luck!

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OK thx, but will tasksel delete any data, or will it just install additional software? – ase34 Feb 19 at 18:46
tasksel should only install/remove software. In this case it should uninstall all ubuntu-desktop packages. The problem is that it does not deal well with dependencies, so instead of removing only ubuntu-desktop it can damage your system. As said, use it only as a last resort and backup important data. – Salem Feb 19 at 18:49
In tasksel, "Ubuntu Desktop" isn't selected, so I'll simply do a reinstall, but thx for your help. – ase34 Feb 19 at 20:18

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