What is Debian?
Debian is a free operating system (OS) for your computer. An operating system is the set of basic programs and utilities that make your computer run. Debian uses the Linux kernel (the core of an operating system), but most of the basic OS tools come from the GNU project; hence the name GNU/Linux.
Debian GNU/Linux provides more than a pure OS: it comes with over 25000 packages, precompiled software bundled up in a nice format for easy installation on your machine.
Getting Started
The latest stable release of Debian is 5.0. The last update to this release was made on September 5th, 2009. Read more about available versions of Debian.
If you'd like to start using Debian, you can easily obtain a copy, and then follow the installation instructions to install it.
If you're upgrading to the latest stable release from a previous version, please read the release notes before proceeding.
To get help in using or setting up Debian, see our documentation and support pages.
Users that speak languages other than English should check the international section.
People who use systems other than Intel x86 should check the ports section.
News
[08 Oct 2009] Robotic Submarine Running Debian Wins International Competition
[07 Oct 2009] Debian pushes development of kFreeBSD port
[23 Sep 2009] First Debian Mini Conference to be held in Taiwan
[05 Sep 2009] Debian GNU/Linux 5.0 updated
[06 Aug 2009] 2009 Annual International Debian Conference finished successfully
[30 Jul 2009] Debian GNU/Linux 6.0 Squeeze
release goals
For older news items see the News Page. If you would like to receive mail whenever new Debian news comes out, subscribe to the debian-announce mailing list.
Security Advisories
[21 Nov 2009] DSA-1937 gforge - insufficient input sanitising
[17 Nov 2009] DSA-1936 libgd2 - several vulnerabilities
[17 Nov 2009] DSA-1935 gnutls13 gnutls26 - several vulnerabilities
[16 Nov 2009] DSA-1934 apache2 - multiple issues
[10 Nov 2009] DSA-1933 cups - missing input sanitising
[08 Nov 2009] DSA-1932 pidgin - programming error
[08 Nov 2009] DSA-1931 nspr - several vulnerabilities
[07 Nov 2009] DSA-1930 drupal6 - several vulnerabilities
[05 Nov 2009] DSA-1929 linux-2.6 - privilege escalation/denial of service/sensitive memory leak
[05 Nov 2009] DSA-1928 linux-2.6.24 - privilege escalation/denial of service/sensitive memory leak
[05 Nov 2009] DSA-1927 linux-2.6 - privilege escalation/denial of service/sensitive memory leak
For older security advisories see the Security Page. If you would like to receive security advisories as soon as they're announced, subscribe to the debian-security-announce mailing list.