I’m more of a casual/newbie Linux user and I want to know if a specific Brother model is compatible with it. For reference, it’s the HL-L2465DW monochrome laser printer.
I’m more of a casual/newbie Linux user and I want to know if a specific Brother model is compatible with it. For reference, it’s the HL-L2465DW monochrome laser printer.
Please don’t encourage Linux noobs to paste random shit into their terminal and type in their password. It’s the absolute easiest way to get hacked on Linux.
I certainly wasn’t trying to “encourage” anything. I agree, blindly trusting commands is dangerous.
In this context I present a specific explanation of how the install works. This adds to the novice’s knowledge, and allows them to begin to understand what my one-liner does.
I think that without the context of instructions on how to do it manually, yes, you could make the case i’m enabling beginners to form/reinforce bad habits.
As a Linux noob I like your oneliner but I agree with @[email protected]
A more approachable way to do that would be to use
wgetand then manually runapt installwith the downloaded file. That’s what I’ve been doing. :) Yours is “magic” ;)Fair enough. Let me quickly go through the one-liner, command-by command
# Joined by `&&`, bash runs these commands in sequence (as if run individually in shell), but exits/stops execution early if any command fails (return nonzero) TMP_DEB=$(mktemp --suffix=.deb) && curl -sSL "https://support.brother.com/g/b/downloadend.aspx?c=us&lang=en&prod=hll2465dw_us&os=128&dlid=dlf106036_000&flang=4&type3=10283" -o "$TMP_DEB" && sudo apt install -y "$TMP_DEB" && rm -f "$TMP_DEB" # Going command by command: # First, we create a local variable in the shell, named `TMP_DEB` # We assign the value to `$(...)`. This stores the string output (to stdout) of running the command `mktemp ...` to `TMP_DEB` # `mktemp` creates a temporary file and prints its name, which uses the name template `tmp.XXXXXXXXXX` # `--suffix=.deb` flag appends `.deb` to the name template TMP_DEB=$(mktemp --suffix=.deb) # At this point, we've created a temporary file, and saved the name to a variable in bash # Next, we download the file using curl. `-s` makes output silent, `-S` shows errors in output, and `-L` follows redirects # note the url doesn't end in `.deb`, implying that we will be redirected by the web server to the file path. without -`L` curl will download a page that stores the redirection response from the web server, not the .deb package # `-o "$TMP_FILE"` forces curl to store the downloaded file to the tmp file we created # note the quotes around the variable expansion. `$TMP_FILE` would also resolve the string stored in the variable, but we use quotes to avoid string globbing (google this) curl -sSL "https://support.brother.com/..." # Next, we install the package with apt # note: we use the string stored in the variable `TMP_DEB`, the filepath to the temp file we created, and downloaded the deb package # `-y` flag skips the confirmation question "install package [y/n]: ` sudo apt install -y "$TMP_DEB" # Finally, to clean up we delete the tmp file rm -f "$TMP_DEB"