blog/Quicker_Debian_installations_using_eatmydata.html

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   6     <title>Petter Reinholdtsen: Quicker Debian installations using eatmydata</title>
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  14  <h1>
  15      <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/">Petter Reinholdtsen</a>
  16
  17  </h1>
  18
  19 </div>
  20
  21
  22     <div class="entry">
  23       <div class="title">Quicker Debian installations using eatmydata</div>
  24       <div class="date">25th November 2016</div>
  25       <div class="body"><p>Two years ago, I did some experiments with eatmydata and the Debian
  26 installation system, observing how using
  27 <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Speeding_up_the_Debian_installer_using_eatmydata_and_dpkg_divert.html">eatmydata
  28 could speed up the installation</a> quite a bit.  My testing measured
  29 speedup around 20-40 percent for Debian Edu, where we install around
  30 1000 packages from within the installer.  The eatmydata package
  31 provide a way to disable/delay file system flushing.  This is a bit
  32 risky in the general case, as files that should be stored on disk will
  33 stay only in memory a bit longer than expected, causing problems if a
  34 machine crashes at an inconvenient time.  But for an installation, if
  35 the machine crashes during installation the process is normally
  36 restarted, and avoiding disk operations as much as possible to speed
  37 up the process make perfect sense.
  38
  39 <p>I added code in the Debian Edu specific installation code to enable
  40 <a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libeatmydata">eatmydata</a>,
  41 but did not have time to push it any further.  But a few months ago I
  42 picked it up again and worked with the libeatmydata package maintainer
  43 Mattia Rizzolo to make it easier for everyone to get this installation
  44 speedup in Debian.  Thanks to our cooperation There is now an
  45 eatmydata-udeb package in Debian testing and unstable, and simply
  46 enabling/installing it in debian-installer (d-i) is enough to get the
  47 quicker installations.  It can be enabled using preseeding.  The
  48 following untested kernel argument should do the trick:</p>
  49
  50 <blockquote><pre>
  51 preseed/early_command="anna-install eatmydata-udeb"
  52 </pre></blockquote>
  53
  54 <p>This should ask d-i to install the package inside the d-i
  55 environment early in the installation sequence.  Having it installed
  56 in d-i in turn will make sure the relevant scripts are called just
  57 after debootstrap filled /target/ with the freshly installed Debian
  58 system to configure apt to run dpkg with eatmydata.  This is enough to
  59 speed up the installation process.  There is a proposal to
  60 <a href="https://bugs.debian.org/841153">extend the idea a bit further
  61 by using /etc/ld.so.preload instead of apt.conf</a>, but I have not
  62 tested its impact.</p>
  63
  64 </div>
  65
  66       <div class="tags">Tags: <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu</a>, <a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english</a>.</div>
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  69     </div>
  70
  71
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  74     <div id="sidebar">
  75
  76
  77
  78 <h2>Archive</h2>
  79 <ul>
  80
  81 <li>2016
  82 <ul>
  83
  84 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/01/">January (3)</a></li>
  85
  86 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/02/">February (2)</a></li>
  87
  88 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/03/">March (3)</a></li>
  89
  90 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/04/">April (8)</a></li>
  91
  92 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/05/">May (8)</a></li>
  93
  94 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/06/">June (2)</a></li>
  95
  96 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/07/">July (2)</a></li>
  97
  98 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/08/">August (5)</a></li>
  99
 100 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/09/">September (2)</a></li>
 101
 102 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/10/">October (3)</a></li>
 103
 104 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2016/11/">November (8)</a></li>
 105
 106 </ul></li>
 107
 108 <li>2015
 109 <ul>
 110
 111 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/01/">January (7)</a></li>
 112
 113 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/02/">February (6)</a></li>
 114
 115 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/03/">March (1)</a></li>
 116
 117 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/04/">April (4)</a></li>
 118
 119 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/05/">May (3)</a></li>
 120
 121 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/06/">June (4)</a></li>
 122
 123 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/07/">July (6)</a></li>
 124
 125 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/08/">August (2)</a></li>
 126
 127 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/09/">September (2)</a></li>
 128
 129 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/10/">October (9)</a></li>
 130
 131 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/11/">November (6)</a></li>
 132
 133 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2015/12/">December (3)</a></li>
 134
 135 </ul></li>
 136
 137 <li>2014
 138 <ul>
 139
 140 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/01/">January (2)</a></li>
 141
 142 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/02/">February (3)</a></li>
 143
 144 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/03/">March (8)</a></li>
 145
 146 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/04/">April (7)</a></li>
 147
 148 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/05/">May (1)</a></li>
 149
 150 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/06/">June (2)</a></li>
 151
 152 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/07/">July (2)</a></li>
 153
 154 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/08/">August (2)</a></li>
 155
 156 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/09/">September (5)</a></li>
 157
 158 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/10/">October (6)</a></li>
 159
 160 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 161
 162 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2014/12/">December (5)</a></li>
 163
 164 </ul></li>
 165
 166 <li>2013
 167 <ul>
 168
 169 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/01/">January (11)</a></li>
 170
 171 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/02/">February (9)</a></li>
 172
 173 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/03/">March (9)</a></li>
 174
 175 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/04/">April (6)</a></li>
 176
 177 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 178
 179 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/06/">June (10)</a></li>
 180
 181 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/07/">July (7)</a></li>
 182
 183 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/08/">August (3)</a></li>
 184
 185 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/09/">September (5)</a></li>
 186
 187 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/10/">October (7)</a></li>
 188
 189 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/11/">November (9)</a></li>
 190
 191 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2013/12/">December (3)</a></li>
 192
 193 </ul></li>
 194
 195 <li>2012
 196 <ul>
 197
 198 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/01/">January (7)</a></li>
 199
 200 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/02/">February (10)</a></li>
 201
 202 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/03/">March (17)</a></li>
 203
 204 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/04/">April (12)</a></li>
 205
 206 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/05/">May (12)</a></li>
 207
 208 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/06/">June (20)</a></li>
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 210 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/07/">July (17)</a></li>
 211
 212 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/08/">August (6)</a></li>
 213
 214 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/09/">September (9)</a></li>
 215
 216 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/10/">October (17)</a></li>
 217
 218 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/11/">November (10)</a></li>
 219
 220 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2012/12/">December (7)</a></li>
 221
 222 </ul></li>
 223
 224 <li>2011
 225 <ul>
 226
 227 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/01/">January (16)</a></li>
 228
 229 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/02/">February (6)</a></li>
 230
 231 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/03/">March (6)</a></li>
 232
 233 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/04/">April (7)</a></li>
 234
 235 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/05/">May (3)</a></li>
 236
 237 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/06/">June (2)</a></li>
 238
 239 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/07/">July (7)</a></li>
 240
 241 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/08/">August (6)</a></li>
 242
 243 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/09/">September (4)</a></li>
 244
 245 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/10/">October (2)</a></li>
 246
 247 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 248
 249 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2011/12/">December (1)</a></li>
 250
 251 </ul></li>
 252
 253 <li>2010
 254 <ul>
 255
 256 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/01/">January (2)</a></li>
 257
 258 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/02/">February (1)</a></li>
 259
 260 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/03/">March (3)</a></li>
 261
 262 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/04/">April (3)</a></li>
 263
 264 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 265
 266 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/06/">June (14)</a></li>
 267
 268 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/07/">July (12)</a></li>
 269
 270 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/08/">August (13)</a></li>
 271
 272 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/09/">September (7)</a></li>
 273
 274 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/10/">October (9)</a></li>
 275
 276 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/11/">November (13)</a></li>
 277
 278 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2010/12/">December (12)</a></li>
 279
 280 </ul></li>
 281
 282 <li>2009
 283 <ul>
 284
 285 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/01/">January (8)</a></li>
 286
 287 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/02/">February (8)</a></li>
 288
 289 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/03/">March (12)</a></li>
 290
 291 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/04/">April (10)</a></li>
 292
 293 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/05/">May (9)</a></li>
 294
 295 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/06/">June (3)</a></li>
 296
 297 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/07/">July (4)</a></li>
 298
 299 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/08/">August (3)</a></li>
 300
 301 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/09/">September (1)</a></li>
 302
 303 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/10/">October (2)</a></li>
 304
 305 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/11/">November (3)</a></li>
 306
 307 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2009/12/">December (3)</a></li>
 308
 309 </ul></li>
 310
 311 <li>2008
 312 <ul>
 313
 314 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/11/">November (5)</a></li>
 315
 316 <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/archive/2008/12/">December (7)</a></li>
 317
 318 </ul></li>
 319
 320 </ul>
 321
 322
 323
 324 <h2>Tags</h2>
 325 <ul>
 326
 327  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/3d-printer">3d-printer (13)</a></li>
 328
 329  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/amiga">amiga (1)</a></li>
 330
 331  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/aros">aros (1)</a></li>
 332
 333  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bankid">bankid (4)</a></li>
 334
 335  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bitcoin">bitcoin (9)</a></li>
 336
 337  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bootsystem">bootsystem (16)</a></li>
 338
 339  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/bsa">bsa (2)</a></li>
 340
 341  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/chrpath">chrpath (2)</a></li>
 342
 343  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian">debian (141)</a></li>
 344
 345  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/debian edu">debian edu (158)</a></li>
 346
 347  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/digistan">digistan (10)</a></li>
 348
 349  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/dld">dld (16)</a></li>
 350
 351  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/docbook">docbook (23)</a></li>
 352
 353  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/drivstoffpriser">drivstoffpriser (4)</a></li>
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 355  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/english">english (333)</a></li>
 356
 357  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fiksgatami">fiksgatami (23)</a></li>
 358
 359  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/fildeling">fildeling (12)</a></li>
 360
 361  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freeculture">freeculture (29)</a></li>
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 363  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/freedombox">freedombox (9)</a></li>
 364
 365  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/frikanalen">frikanalen (18)</a></li>
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 367  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/h264">h264 (20)</a></li>
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 369  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/intervju">intervju (42)</a></li>
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 371  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/isenkram">isenkram (13)</a></li>
 372
 373  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/kart">kart (19)</a></li>
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 375  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ldap">ldap (9)</a></li>
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 377  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lenker">lenker (8)</a></li>
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 379  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/lsdvd">lsdvd (2)</a></li>
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 381  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ltsp">ltsp (1)</a></li>
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 383  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/mesh network">mesh network (8)</a></li>
 384
 385  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/multimedia">multimedia (39)</a></li>
 386
 387  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nice free software">nice free software (8)</a></li>
 388
 389  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/norsk">norsk (283)</a></li>
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 391  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/nuug">nuug (182)</a></li>
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 393  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/offentlig innsyn">offentlig innsyn (26)</a></li>
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 395  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/open311">open311 (2)</a></li>
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 397  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/opphavsrett">opphavsrett (62)</a></li>
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 399  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/personvern">personvern (95)</a></li>
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 401  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/raid">raid (1)</a></li>
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 403  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reactos">reactos (1)</a></li>
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 405  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/reprap">reprap (11)</a></li>
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 407  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rfid">rfid (3)</a></li>
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 409  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/robot">robot (10)</a></li>
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 411  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/rss">rss (1)</a></li>
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 413  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/ruter">ruter (5)</a></li>
 414
 415  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/scraperwiki">scraperwiki (2)</a></li>
 416
 417  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sikkerhet">sikkerhet (52)</a></li>
 418
 419  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sitesummary">sitesummary (4)</a></li>
 420
 421  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/skepsis">skepsis (5)</a></li>
 422
 423  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/standard">standard (49)</a></li>
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 425  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stavekontroll">stavekontroll (5)</a></li>
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 427  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/stortinget">stortinget (10)</a></li>
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 429  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/surveillance">surveillance (43)</a></li>
 430
 431  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/sysadmin">sysadmin (2)</a></li>
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 433  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/usenix">usenix (2)</a></li>
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 435  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/valg">valg (8)</a></li>
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 437  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/video">video (59)</a></li>
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 439  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/vitenskap">vitenskap (4)</a></li>
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 441  <li><a href="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/tags/web">web (38)</a></li>
 442
 443 </ul>
 444
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