Answers to: How can I improve this install script?

Answer by KenJackson

KenJackson — Tue, 17 Dec 2013 00:29:35 -0500

It could be improved by making use of looping. This allows separating out of the highly changeable items, like the list of applications, by putting them in variables or even reading them from an include script. For example:

REMOVE_APPS=(amarok empathy gimp gufw gwibber transmission-gtk)

for a in "${REMOVE_APPS[@]}"; do
    apt-get --yes -q --force-yes remove "$a"
done

Answer by rfelsburg

rfelsburg — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 19:27:09 -0400

To add to the list I would set PATH at the beginning, or set your commands to variable names.

export PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin

_iptables=/bin/iptables
$_iptables -P FORWARD DROP
$_iptables -A INPUT -m state --state RELATED,ESTABLISHED -j ACCEPT

Answer by mackal

mackal — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 22:54:07 -0400

replace the lines to add the PPAs with add-apt-repository ppa:/ (ex: add-apt-repository ppa:exaile-devel/ppa) this will also add the keys.

you can also replace the deb lines with it (ex: add-apt-repository deb http://www.geekconnection.org/remastersys/repository karmic)

Answer by Joehillen

Joehillen — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 05:25:16 -0400

You forgot to run apt-get upgrade after running apt-get update.

Also, you are making a backup of sources.list after adding your new repos to it. Is that on purpose?

Is this something you are running on several machines in an enterprise evironment? If so, I highly recommend dropping the custom scripts and using puppet instead. It is a total lifesaver.

Answer by Jazz

Jazz — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 19:48:56 -0400

You can get information about your system using uname. uname -m could for example return i686, x86_64, ... depending on your system.

You might also want to check the return values of certain commands. Writing a function that checks the last return value ($?) and handles/logs errors accordingly would be an easy solution for that.

A good source of ideas is the Advanced Bash-Scripting Guide.

Answer by Dee

Dee — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 19:42:22 -0400

That is a rather fine script. Thanks for sharing.

Add gshutdown, monkey-bubble, and tuxpaint?