Cleanup your OpenVZ Ubuntu image

[wlanboy]

Whenever I have to install a new vps I get rid of a lot of "default services" which are installed with enabled autorun.

If anyone want to add anything feel free to add a comment.

1. Get rid of apache, sendmail, bind and nmbd
   
   sudo su
   service apache2 stop
   service sendmail stop
   service bind9 stop
   service nmbd stop
   
   update-rc.d apache2 disable
   update-rc.d sendmail disable
   update-rc.d bind9 disable
   update-rc.d nmbd disable
   
   apt-get remove sendmail bind9 apache2 apache2-doc apache2-mpm-prefork apache2.2-bin \
   apache2.2-common samba
   apt-get autoremove && apt-get clean && apt-get autoclean
   
   PS: Yes I use apache2-utils to create/manage my password files.
    
   
2. Disable avahi daemon
   

   sudo nano /etc/default/avahi-daemon
   
   change line "AVAHI_DAEMON_START = 1" to "AVAHI_DAEMON_START = 0"

 

[SeriesN]

Don't your provider offers minimal OVZ templates with Core system files only?

 

[wlanboy]

Not all. You can only choose between 32bit and 64bit.

Even recursion was not turned off in named.conf.

 

[365Networks]

These are few of the many useless services that are tacked onto the images, good list and I'm sure once I remember some more I'll post them, I know CentOS has too many to count.

 

[TruvisT]

These are few of the many useless services that are tacked onto the images, good list and I'm sure once I remember some more I'll post them, I know CentOS has too many to count.

So true. This is why I use minimal or netinstall images.

 

[Sajan P]

Why don't you like sendmail?  I see sendmail as pretty necessary.  What happens if my server gets lonely and wants to send me an email?

 

[wlanboy]

Why don't you like sendmail?  I see sendmail as pretty necessary.  What happens if my server gets lonely and wants to send me an email?

I do prefer postfix for that.


PS: Never leave your vps alone!

 

[MarkusJack]

y not use slackware? its clean

 

[wlanboy]

No, I do use Ubuntu. It is easier for my head to run Ubuntu on all my pcs, laptops and servers.

 

[drmike]

Lots of providers do not have the minimal installs.   I hate the extra dance steps always to clean up the installs.

Good info here for folks new to VPS world.

Heck had one provider tell me I didn't need the Debian x64 that the 32 version wasn't any different. Mileage will vary with providers.

 

[wlanboy]

Yes they do have all the TurnKey App images but not a single minimal install...

 

[mikho]

I always use minstall on my VPS since there is module to clean unwanted services/applications.


Being developed for Debian it should work with ubuntu as well. Perhaps there are some things different between the two distros that won't work. If so, please enlighten me.

 

[Tux]

Virtually every provider I've used have provided minimal Debian images.

I should be thankful.

 

[nunim]

apt-get remove samba* sendmail* apache* bind9* sasl* | reboot

Works in 9/10 cases for me.  

 

[herbyscrub]

Can you remove /usr/share/doc without causing huge problems?  Also...is there a way to clean up /usr/share/locale?

I've got a EDIS 1GB KVM starving for diskspace.

 

[mojeda]

apt-get remove apache2* would remove absolutely any apache2 package installed with just one listed.

 

[wlanboy]

Can you remove /usr/share/doc without causing huge problems?  Also...is there a way to clean up /usr/share/locale?

I've got a EDIS 1GB KVM starving for diskspace.

Can you please show us the content of the file: bigfolders.txt? Created by following command:

du -x / | sort -rn > bigfolders.txt

 

[herbyscrub]

Can you please show us the content of the file: bigfolders.txt? Created by following command:

du -x / | sort -rn > bigfolders.txt

709M    /
347M    /usr
190M    /var
102M    /lib
37M     /root
20K     /home
19M     /boot
16K     /lost+found
8.0K    /media
6.0M    /bin
5.3M    /sbin
4.7M    /etc
4.0K    /tmp
4.0K    /srv
4.0K    /selinux
4.0K    /opt
4.0K    /mnt
0       /sys
0       /run
0       /proc
0       /dev
lolsex@ns1:~# df -h
Filesystem                                              Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
rootfs                                                  887M  726M  117M  87% /

lolsex@ns1:/usr# du /usr/share/ | sort -rh
214M    /usr/share/
63M     /usr/share/locale
26M     /usr/share/vim
24M     /usr/share/doc
20M     /usr/share/perl
13M     /usr/share/i18n
11M     /usr/share/man
7.9M    /usr/share/ssh
6.5M    /usr/share/terminfo

 

[wlanboy]

Thank you. So It is about locale and doc.


sudo apt-get install localepurge

After installing anything with apt-get localepurge will remove all translation files and translated manpages in languages you cannot read.

You can configure it with following file:


vi /etc/locale.nopurge

Just call it with "localepurge".

PS:
Sort installed packages by size:

dpkg-query -Wf '${Installed-Size}\t${Package}\n' | sort -n