Linux Maintenance

I go over Linux Maintenance in this video. You will learn how to clear out cache, clean your package manager, and proper maintenance of Linux.

-Good Backups - Timeshift or Rsync
-Clean old Repos
==sudo apt autoclean && sudo apt autoremove
-Updates

What you DON'T need to do
-Defrag - Linux Filesystems don't fragment
-/tmp folder is auto cleaned
-There is No Registry to Clean .

[hjaltiatlason]

Ubuntu users FYI:
You can freeze any package including kernel packages by:
example-1:
sudo apt-mark hold <package_name>
example-2:
sudo apt-mark hold linux-image-generic linux-headers-generic

[danielmclaughlin]

Quick tip: When you type a command that should have been done with 'sudo' but you forgot it, you can type:
sudo !!
This will rerun the last command given under sudo without having to retype the entire command.

[El.Chef.Guevara]

I've been running Ubuntu on my main laptop, which I use intensively, for 5 years now. Haven't done anything to it and works perfectly

[PearComputingDevices]

with Bleachbit never run free hard drive space on an SSD! You'll unnecessarily write zeros to your drive, thus wearing it out faster. On the other hand it's extremely handy to do that now and then on mechanical drives.

[Sierra]

Because of LTT i can't stop reading you channel as "Chris Tech Tips" or "Titus Tech Tips"

[michadybczak]

Ah, you forgot to add that on Arch-based system we also need to:


- clean pacman cache (all downloaded packages are stored there and taking space)
- uninstalled orphaned packages or packages that were removed from the repo (and we cannot do that blindly, because it often happens that packages are marked as orphaned mistakingly)
- update our configs with pacnew files, this is a manual intervention that is needed to be done once in a while
- update git packages if you have any - they rarely show as an update and this is usually a manual action, although there are commands that can mass update git packages

[timothyt.]

If you use the APT package manager, I would recommend using nala to upgrade your packages. It's meant to be more user friendly, has a cleaner terminal output, and automatically does certain things for you (autoremoves/autopurges files that are dependencies no longer needed, automatically updates the source list before upgrading so you only need to run sudo nala upgrade, etc.). You also aren't replacing apt, so you can still go in and run maintenance scripts without needing to rewrite them first.

Of course, the apt command family is going to be your de-facto option for more advanced operations, but with nala upgrading is simple and enjoyable.

[MrHRScrc]

Thank you very much Chris, very handy for all new people in the Linux world. Nice video. Have a nice day!

[ivailogeimara]

One correction: 'apt-get autoremove' removes packages that are no longer needed i.e. packages that were installed as dependencies for another packages that were removed and these packages were left of and are no longer needed. On Arch there is no such command. You'd have to combine 2 commands: 'pacman -Qdtq' which gives you the packages that are no longer needed and remove them with 'pacman -Rsn' or combine them into 1 command: 'pacman -Rsn $(pacman -Qdtq)'.
Also if you use Arch it's probably a good idea to remove packages with 'pacman -Rsn' which removes packages that were installed as dependencies for the package you remove and are not needed by another package and also remove their config files in /etc, instead of 'pacman -R'.

[corrosionoc]

I love conky. It's one of my favorite add on apps. I love configuring it lol. It can be an insanely useful tool for monitoring your system...and it looks cool.

[cimbakahn]

Chris Titus Tech: Chris. Just a tip. I was always told to never stop bleachbit when it is in the process of cleaning. That you must let it finish or you will have problems.

[World_Theory]

That's really neat. I didn't know that you can keep Linux running indefinitely without a reboot. It's kinda ingrained into me that a computer is going to need a reboot eventually, because of memory leaking or whatever. That's mighty impressive!

[chrisbannister]

Note the difference between 'update' and 'upgrade'.

[cgw]

I find it easier to manage the repositories from synaptic (for a debian system). Just pull down the menu and tick/untick the repositories you have, you can also add new repositories and delete old ones. If you want to remove a package it will show you what else you would need to remove at the same time. There's really no need to edit /etc/apt/sources.list directly.


I also almost never reboot after an upgrade, if there are new graphics drivers, I tend to just kill Xorg and that does the job.

[matthewwebster]

Greetings, I have been transitioning to Linux exclusively for a few months now. This video has been very helpful. This and your other videos have been very helpful. Ciao!

[hsoj]

Great tips! Definitely love information like this for cleaning out old junk that builds up over time.

[spaceforrest]

You do the best tutorials Chris! Clear instructions, reasons why you're doing stuff, great explaintions and poiniant tips. But best of all is your smooth delivery and non-intimdatng predisposition. Love your work mate, it gets me pumped about the future of the world. Thank you kind sir. 👍💯

[yvrelna]

I don't recommend doing most of these except verifying your backups, installing updates, and removing no longer needed and orphaned packages (dependencies of older version of packages that are now no longer needed).

Especially that thing you do with Bleachbit or similar tool is going to cause more problems than it solves. Unless you have a particular problem with a specific application, you generally shouldn't micromanage these cache files. It won't make your system any faster, and more likely than not it will just slow down programs and cause data corruptions.

In low disk system, it may be worthwhile to clean the package managers' download caches, but if you aren't running low on disk space, you don't need to worry about it.

One maintenance that I recommend that hasn't been mentioned, if you're using Ubuntu-based system on btrfs system, you may need to remove the automatically created btrfs snapshot that apt created before a major system upgrade. Once you've confirmed the upgrade is successful and you decided you likely won't be rolling back, you can just delete the snapshot using btrfs tools. apt won't remove them automatically, and these snapshots take up quite a lot of disk space (and because of copy on write, they'll take even more space the longer you keep them).

[yehonatan]

Stacer is a really nice system cleaner worth trying out. Then there is Sweeper, Deborphan and Debfoster

[mgsd]

3:23
I see Your transparency effects are grainy. I suggest changing composer from OpenGL 3 to OpenGL 2. It helped in my case.
Best wishes ;)