im surfing whonix files and debian files and i have couples of files/programs which r not really useable or related to whonix and/or some programs r not been found inside whonix but it is there inside debian.
“sweeper” it is inside debian by default but not inside whonix which is i wonder why it is not
“Reportbug” why is it still there? it is not really useable , because since the user using whonix then the user will and should only contact whonix for his problems why would he contact debian ?
and if we talk about whonix inside qubes , i think we need a list of how many programs we need to remove from there.
removing unnecessary programs = reducing the image size on downloading , reducing upgrading size and time , reducing unwanted bugs or even reduce load inside the image = better use of the resources better performance.
We don’t aim to install all the packages that Debian installs. If a compelling argument to install some package that is useful in context of this distribution, perhaps made by multiple users, then maybe it gets added. Such as it happened with the password manager. ( Add Password manager by default )
Related:
For Whonix 13 there are two [Qubes specific] tickets for that.
Reportbug is installed most likely because of the above issues. Anyhow. Reportbug is okay. Bugs that equally apply to Debian may also be reported to Debian directly through reportbug. (info by Paul Wise of Debian) This is because Whonix does not recompile / ship own binary packages / just new packages / configs. So for example any crash bug in kwin or whatever should equally apply to Debian even if it was produced on Whonix.
Whonix comes with OpenVPN, That doesnt sound necessary, Very rare use case where OpenVPN needed anywhere to begin with let alone using one.
user@debian-clearnet:~$ sudo apt remove --purge openvpn*
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
liblzo2-2 libpkcs11-helper1
Use 'sudo apt autoremove' to remove them.
The following packages will be REMOVED:
kicksecure-cli* kicksecure-dependencies-cli* kicksecure-qubes-cli*
kicksecure-qubes-gui* openvpn*
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 5 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
After this operation, 1,911 kB disk space will be freed.
Do you want to continue? [Y/n]
This forum thread can be used to discuss default installed packages that should not be installed by default but that shouldn’t be added to systemcheck_unwanted_package list.
xfce stuff listed here actually due to whonix marking them as dependencies, for example xfce4-whiskermenu-plugin and genmon which are xfce plugins has nothing to do with gnome. The rest are just gnome leftover stuff which seems got installed with gdm or so from before.
Unrelated to gdm. The packages with gnome in their name are providing artwork (desktop backgrounds and icons) which are in active use. Just gnome inside the package name isn’t good enough reasons to avoid these packages. I checked just now, these dependency packages are up-to-date. These dependency would only be removed if replaced by something else appropriate and contributed source code change suggestions.
Some may wonder why gvfs is included in Whonix xfce. The reason is that Thunar file manager, which comes with xfce, recommends using gvfs and it serves two essential purposes:
GUI trashcan icon.
Automounting for USB drives, hard disks, and other devices, displayed in the Thunar GUI.
Therefore, I believe this is the only essential Gnome component (I’m not aware of any alternatives) that is necessary to have in combined with xfce.
