Debian -- User Support

Debian -- User Support
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Blog
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Planet
Wiki
User Support
IRC (real time Support)
Mailing Lists
Usenet Newsgroups
Debian User Forums
How to contact Package Maintainers
Bug Tracking System
Known Problems
Debian support is offered by a group of volunteers. If this community-driven support doesn't fulfil your needs and you can't find the answer in our
documentation
, you may hire a
consultant
to answer your questions or to maintain or add additional functionality to your Debian system.
IRC (real time Support)
IRC
(Internet Relay Chat) is a great way to chat with people from all over the world in real time. It's a text-based chat system for instant messaging. On IRC you can enter chat rooms (so-called channels) or you can directly chat with individual persons via private messages.
IRC channels dedicated to Debian can be found on
OFTC
. For a full list of Debian channels, please refer to our
Wiki
. You can also use a
search engine
to check for Debian-related channels.
IRC Clients
To connect to the IRC network, you can either use OFTC's
WebChat
in your preferred web browser or install a client on your computer. There are lots of different clients out there, some with a graphical interface, some for the console. Some popular IRC clients have been packaged for Debian, for example:
irssi
(text mode)
WeeChat
(text mode)
HexChat (GTK)
Konversation
(KDE)
The Debian Wiki offers a more comprehensive
list of IRC clients
which are available as Debian packages.
Connect to the Network
Once you have the client installed, you need to tell it to connect
to the server. In most clients, you can do that by typing:
/server irc.debian.org
The hostname irc.debian.org is an alias for irc.oftc.net. In some clients (such as irssi) you will need to type this instead:
/connect irc.debian.org
Join a Channel
Once you are connected, join channel
#debian
by typing this command:
/join #debian
Note: graphical clients like HexChat or Konversation often have a button
or a menu entry for connecting to servers and joining channels.
Mailing Lists
More than thousand active
developers
spread around the world work on Debian in their spare time—and in their own timezones. Therefore we communicate primarily through e-mail. Similarly, most of the conversation between Debian developers and users happens on different
mailing lists
For user support in English, please contact the
debian-user
mailing list.
For user support in other languages, please check the
index
of other user mailing lists.
You can browse our
mailing list archive
or
the archives without the need to be subscribed.
Of course, there are plenty of other mailing lists, dedicated to some aspect of the Linux ecosystem and not Debian-specific. Please use your favorite search engine to find the most suitable list for your purpose.
Usenet Newsgroups
A lot of our
mailing lists
can be browsed as newsgroups, in the
linux.debian.*
hierarchy.
Debian User Forums
Debian User Forums
is a web portal
where thousands of other users discuss Debian-related topics, ask questions,
and help each other by answering them. You can read all boards without
having to register. If you want to participate in the discussion and publish
your own postings, please register and log in.
How to contact Package Maintainers
Basically, there are two common ways to get in touch with a maintainer of a Debian package:
If you'd like to report a bug, simply file a
bug report
; the maintainer automatically receives a copy of your bug report.
If you simply want to send an email to the maintainer, use the special mail aliases set up for each package:
package_name
>@packages.debian.org
Bug Tracking System
The Debian distribution has its own
bug tracker
with bugs reported by users and developers. Every bug has a unique number and is kept on file until it is marked as resolved. There are two different ways to report a bug:
The recommended way is to use the Debian package
reportbug
Alternatively, you can send an email as described on this
page
Known Problems
Limitations and severe problems of the current stable distribution
(if any) are described on
the release page
Please pay particular attention to the
release
notes
and the
errata
Back to the
Debian Project homepage
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See our
contact page
to get in touch. Web site source code is
available
Last Modified: Fri, Nov 14 19:52:34 UTC 2025