Useful Ubuntu packages

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This page lists some useful Ubuntu packages to install so that upgrades go relatively smoothly.

[edit] ubuntu-* packages

These packages pull in the dependencies required to make a standard Ubuntu install work.

ubuntu-minimal: this depends on the real basics. init scripts, console tools, networking, that kind of thing. Essentially every Ubuntu install should have ubuntu-minimal installed. Every time you upgrade, check that ubuntu-minimal is *not* being removed.
ubuntu-standard: this depends on many useful but not totally absolutely necessary packages. It's a good idea to have it installed just to grab the packages that most tutorials and helpers will assume you have installed.

You can install these packages by running: "aptitude install ubuntu-minimal ubuntu-standard" as root.

If apt-get shows very few packages, you may need to run

apt-get update
apt-get dist-upgrade

first.

Also see the instructions for debian as they're about the same. If you're installing ruby from source see http://blog.fiveruns.com/2008/3/3/compiling-ruby-rubygems-and-rails-on-ubuntu or you'll get zlib errors searching for gems