Debian Stretch

Debian is a software libre operating system for personal computers. The new Debian Stretch (9) distribution of GNU/Linux is the first Debian release to include the new KDE Plasma 5 desktop.

• Download the ISO image from the non-free section of the Debian file server. The non-free installation medium contains proprietary firmware and drivers for WiFi adapters and graphics cards where the manufacturer has not released a free software driver.
• Write the big ISO file to a USB stick using a tool for creating bootable USB sticks and boot from it. You might have to enable booting from USB in the BIOS settings before booting.
• Install Debian with KDE Plasma as desktop and reboot. Make sure that software updates are working.
• Install required proprietary firmware and drivers to get WiFi, Bluetooth, and 3D graphics working. In my case I had to install firmware for the Qualcomm Atheros QCA9565 / AR9565 Wireless Network Adapter and drivers for the AMD/ATI Kabini Radeon HD 8330 graphics card. Note that I currently have unsolved connectivity and low signal issues with the Qualcomm Atheros WiFi adapter. Instead I am accessing WiFi using USB tethering with an Android phone.

sudo apt-get install firmware-atheros firmware-amd-graphics
sudo apt-get install firmware-linux-nonfree libgl1-mesa-dri xserver-xorg-video-ati

• Add Debian Multimedia to get patent-encumbered functionality to work:

echo deb http://www.deb-multimedia.org stretch main non-free | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/deb-multimedia.list
wget http://www.deb-multimedia.org/pool/main/d/deb-multimedia-keyring/deb-multimedia-keyring_2016.8.1_all.deb
sudo dpkg -i deb-multimedia-keyring_2016.8.1_all.deb
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade

• Install gstreamer1.0-libav to get the JuK music player to work:

sudo apt-get install gstreamer1.0-libav

• Install qml-module-qtquick-xmllistmodel to get the network traffic display to work:

sudo apt-get install qml-module-qtquick-xmllistmodel

• Setup Debian support for Bluetooth headsets. This requires proprietary Bluetooth firmware:

sudo apt-get install pulseaudio pulseaudio-module-bluetooth pavucontrol bluez-firmware

• After rebooting you can pair a Bluetooth headset and use pavucontrol to redirect the output of a running media player to it.

More software I recommend:

• Clementine music player.
• Electrum instant on Bitcoin wallet
• LaTeX text processing
• Plymouth boot splash screen
• Deja-Dup backup solution (needs python-gi)
• KMyMoney personal finance manager
• Hugin panorama photo stitcher
• Luminance HDR

I’ll try to keep this up to date as I discover more useful things to install and setup.

Enjoy!

See also:

• Debian ATI Howto
• Debian Bluetooth a2dp
• KDE Wallet migration repeated at each login. Need to set ~/.config/kwalletrc to the following content for it to go away.

[Migration]
alreadyMigrated=true

[Wallet]
First Use=false

• Had to reenable Baloo file indexing using balooctl enable