Debian Wheezy vs Debian Bullseye

Klaipedaville · 11-04-2021, 10:16 PM

I have an idea-question. There is a clean install of Bullseye on a VPS. This distro has new Bind, new Dovecot, new Apache, etc. If I back it up and then re-install it EXCLUDING new Bind, new Dovecot and all the other pre-installed packages that I do not need and then install slighlty older versions of Bind, Dovecot and so on, will that potentially work or will that create a mess of dependencies hell?

Can I also install just bare metals of Bullseye without Apparmor, without NFtables and some other "parts" that I do not need and do not like? How? By the way, are NFtables replacable? I'd like to stick to normal iptables.

Would really appreciate any pointers, advice, suggestions at all. Many thanks in advance!

HappyTux · 11-04-2021, 10:34 PM

It appears you can do the removals of the two mentioned program without any others being removed. For running the older versions you will want to look into apt-pinning and keeping a program at a fixed version using it. The dependency problems of doing this who knows until you get into it one thing you will miss is the security updates which in Apaches case just had one recently I remember seeing installed. Why would you want the older versions of the software and no security support in using them? The things you want to remove give it a try and see if it breaks the system in which case you get to fix it or restore the backup to get up and running again.

Code:

root@bullseye-raspi:~# acp apparmor
apparmor:
  Installed: 2.13.6-10
  Candidate: 2.13.6-10
  Version table:
 *** 2.13.6-10 500
        500 http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye/main arm64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
root@bullseye-raspi:~# agrs apparmor
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
The following packages will be REMOVED:
  apparmor
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 1 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Remv apparmor [2.13.6-10]
root@bullseye-raspi:~# acp nftables
nftables:
  Installed: 0.9.8-3.1
  Candidate: 0.9.8-3.1
  Version table:
 *** 0.9.8-3.1 500
        500 http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye/main arm64 Packages
        100 /var/lib/dpkg/status
root@bullseye-raspi:~# agrs nftables
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
Reading state information... Done
The following packages will be REMOVED:
  nftables
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 1 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Remv nftables [0.9.8-3.1]
root@bullseye-raspi:~# acp iptables
iptables:
  Installed: (none)
  Candidate: 1.8.7-1
  Version table:
     1.8.7-1 500
        500 http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye/main arm64 Packages
root@bullseye-raspi:~# alias acp
alias acp='apt-cache policy'
root@bullseye-raspi:~# alias agrs
alias agrs='apt-get -s remove'

ondoho · 11-04-2021, 11:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Klaipedaville

I have an idea-question. There is a clean install of Bullseye on a VPS. This distro has new Bind, new Dovecot, new Apache, etc. If I back it up and then re-install it EXCLUDING new Bind, new Dovecot and all the other pre-installed packages that I do not need and then install slighlty older versions of Bind, Dovecot and so on, will that potentially work or will that create a mess of dependencies hell?

Can I also install just bare metals of Bullseye without Apparmor, without NFtables and some other "parts" that I do not need and do not like? How? By the way, are NFtables replacable? I'd like to stick to normal iptables.

Would really appreciate any pointers, advice, suggestions at all. Many thanks in advance!

Yes, you can, as the previous post explained.
But the biggest question here is WHY?

Klaipedaville · 11-05-2021, 12:09 AM

Thank you so much, Stephen. Yes, I can of course give it try and see if it works. It's a brand-new VPS install so I can mess it up and break it up as much as I want just to test it around. Then a simple re-install will fix it all.

However, I would hate to configure it, migrate all the data and software there just to find out it will have big issues later. This is why I asked first for somebody to advise if this might be the case.

The reason for keeping my old versions is that they are completely different and extremly customized. I have of course tried the new ones before and it did not work at all. It simply breaks it all. The new versions mean to me "nothing works" without any options to fix it as the new changes do not support my customizations at all for the new versions having it totally new and differently re-built.

I am not a bank or some millitary base with nuclear missiles �� to be that concerned about security. I am completely fine with older versions. They did not become totally insecure all of a sudden. They are just slightly less secure and I am OK with that.

Klaipedaville · 11-05-2021, 12:23 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ondoho

Yes, you can, as the previous post explained.
But the biggest question here is WHY?

Thank you for your input.

I replied in my previous message.

HappyTux · 11-05-2021, 12:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Klaipedaville

Thank you so much, Stephen. Yes, I can of course give it try and see if it works. It's a brand-new VPS install so I can mess it up and break it up as much as I want just to test it around. Then a simple re-install will fix it all.

However, I would hate to configure it, migrate all the data and software there just to find out it will have big issues later. This is why I asked first for somebody to advise if this might be the case.

The reason for keeping my old versions is that they are completely different and extremly customized. I have of course tried the new ones before and it did not work at all. It simply breaks it all. The new versions mean to me "nothing works" without any options to fix it as the new changes do not support my customizations at all for the new versions having it totally new and differently re-built.

I am not a bank or some millitary base with nuclear missiles �� to be that concerned about security. I am completely fine with older versions. They did not become totally insecure all of a sudden. They are just slightly less secure and I am OK with that.

Then it makes absolutely no sense to upgrade to newer version of the OS only to have to jump through hoops to get old software to possibly work for you. You may as well use the old OS and software it is designed for and take the security risks there, you already know how that works.