Command line options¶

Help¶

Displays this help option.

A Post Installation Script for Ubuntu, Debian,
Linux-Mint, elementaryOS, Pop!_OS, MX Linux etc.

USAGE: 
  [sudo] ./after-effects [OPTION]... config-file|config-url

OPTIONS:
  -v,  --version      Display version info.
  -h,  --help         Display this help message.

CONFIGURATION:
  -A, --autopilot     Enables AUTOPILOT mode(No Prompts).
  -d, --purge         Enable Purging packages.
  -p, --pre-release   Use repositories for previous releases.
  --fix-mode-lts      Use previous LTS release as fallback when using --pre-release
  -k, --keep-debs     Do not invoke apt-clean after installing packages.
  -l, --delete-log    Delete the logfile. (./log/after-effects.log)

LOGS:
  --debug             Prints debug logs.
  --trace             Prints trace level logs.

DEBUG:
  -s, --simulate      Try not to make changes to system. See Docs for limitaions!
  --no-env-checks     Skip some env checks.
  --no-version-check  Skip checking for latest version.
  --nx                Just process config and exit.

DOCUMENTATION & BUGS: 
  Report bugs to      https://ae.prasadt.com/issues
  Documentation       https://ae.prasadt.com
  License             GPLv3

Simulating package installation¶

Usage

./after-effects -s <config-file|config-url>

OR

./after-effects --simulate <config-file|config-url>

This flag/option applies to following tasks

Installing apt packages.
Installing Debian package archives (DEBs).
Installing Python packages.
Upgrading system packages.
Purging unwanted packages.

Please do have a look at exceptions, as all tasks cannot be simulated.

This option will simulate installing packages mentioned in the config, using the apt-get's dry-run option.
This option can be used to check if the configuration and for testing.
Installation of DEB files also behaves in a similar way. It uses dpkg -i --dry-run to simulate installation.
Its a very good idea to simulate installation when you have reconfigured the apps and packages in the config to check what might be error prone.
DEB package files and binaries will be downloaded unlike apt-get package installs.

Exceptions - Not everything can be simulated

Simulate flag will not simulate adding Repositories or PPAs.
APT package upgrades and apt repository metadata updates cannot be simulated.
Snap package installation cannot be simulated
In case of static binaries, file will be downloaded, but installation will be skipped.

Skip Version Checks¶

Usage

./after-effects --no-version-check <config-file|config-url>

Script will warn you and exit if you are not running latest version of the script. You can skip that by using the above option.

Fix for Beta/Testing releases¶

Usage

./after-effects -f <config-file|config-url>

OR

./after-effects --pre-release <config-file|config-url>

Usually it takes a while for additional repositories (Docker,etc) to add support for Beta/Testing version of Ubuntu/Debian. However we can use the previous release for which packages might be available. Using packages built for previous release works fine most of the time.

Repositories like Spotify and Google Chrome do not use code names in their repository URLs. So the above workaround is not necessary.
This option applies only for the prerelease aka alpha/testing release and will be ignored if the release is not a prerelease.
This options cannot be applied for PPAs

Fix fallback to LTS¶

Usage

./after-effects --fix-mode-lts --fix <config-file|config-url>

Use LTS as fallback. This flag should be used in conjunction with --pre-release Otherwise it will be ignored. Instead of using previous Ubuntu release this will use the last LTS release. i.e if you are on 21.04 and 20.04 repositories will be used. Please use this with caution as it may not work. This has no effect on Debian and its derivatives.

Purge not required packages¶

Usage

./after-effects -d <config-file|config-url>

OR

./after-effects --purge <config-file|config-url>

Usually Ubuntu comes with some pre-installed games, packages which you might not need. This option is a switch to used in purging these packages mentioned in the subsequent sections.

Warning

This flag MUST be passed, if you intend to purge packages from system. Otherwise you will receive an error.
If you are using YML config file you MUST set purge_enabled: true under config.flags. See Example YAML file for more info.

Delete log file¶

Usage

./after-effects -l

OR

./after-effects --delete-log

Just a quick way to delete logs generated by this script.

Flag priority

If you pass -l rest of the commands will be ignored, as the script exits after deleting the log!

Keep downloaded DEB files¶

Usage

./after-effects -k <config-file|config-url>

OR

./after-effects --keep-debs <config-file|config-url>

Keeps packages cached by APT. Default behavior is to clean apt cache.

Version¶

Usage

./after-effect -v

OR

./after-effects --version

This will display version info. You do not have to be root to run this.

Autopilot Mode¶

Autopilot mode is designed to run the script in a non interactive manner. Please see Autopilot in tasks for more info.

Usage

./after-effect -A <config-file|config-url>

OR

./after-effects --autopilot <config-file|config-url>