If you are interested...
If you are interested in becoming a Debian developer, start at the Debian Developers' Corner (www·debian·org/devel). That site acts as a guide to ways in which you can enter the Debian development community. There are Debian developers all over the world. The largest concentrations of Debian developers are in Europe and the United States, as you can see from the Debian Developer Location map (www·debian·org/devel/developers·loc).
Installing Debian GNU/Linux
The Debian CD image included with this book contains the most commonly used packages in the Debian system. Additional packages can be downloaded and installed from the Internet after the base system has been installed and an Internet connection established. For information about how to obtain additional Debian packages on CD or DVD, see www·debian·org/distrib/.
Hardware Requirements and Installation Planning
To run Debian, you need at least a 486 processor and 32MB of RAM. For a server or a graphical workstation (running the X Window System), you should plan on having at least 128MB of memory and a Pentium-class processor.
A minimal set of packages requires 250MB of disk space, and a normal installation of desktop applications can require a few gigabytes. Additional space will be needed to store any data files that you want to keep on the system.
Most ISA and PCI network cards are supported under Linux, although ISA models are not usually detected automatically by the installer. Inexpensive cards based on RealTek 8139 chipsets can be found at most PC dealers and will work fine for low-demand applications. Intel PRO/100 and PRO/1000 adapters are supported in Linux and will work well in high-demand applications, as will cards based on the "tulip" chipsets and most 3Com network cards.