Setting up 1984.is VPS

If you decide to use 1984 instead of Bitlaunch or Namecheap for your VPS service (for instance when running a Matrix Synapse server) you will need to make a small change before beginning your journey. This is because 1984 only includes their own repositories in the sources.list file, so when using apt to install or update, the proper tools are not able to be pulled from the Debian repos.

Therefore this short blurb will highlight the change you will need to make, and then you may continue on following the directions of the rest of the guides on this site. It involves some command line maneuvering, but I will lay everything out in a copy/paste fashion to make this as painless as possible.

We will pick this up at the point where you have successfully used SSH to gain access to your new VPS, so your screen should look similar to this:

Copy paste the following command and press the enter key:

nano /etc/apt/sources.list

You should see something that looks similar to this picture:

Simply hold down the Delete key on your keyboard until all text is removed from the page, so it is completely blank. Once done, copy/paste the following text back in its place:

deb http://deb.debian.org/debian buster main contrib non-free
deb-src http://deb.debian.org/debian buster main contrib non-free

deb http://deb.debian.org/debian-security buster/updates main contrib non-free
deb-src http://deb.debian.org/debian-security buster/updates main contrib non-free

deb http://deb.debian.org/debian buster-updates main contrib non-free
deb-src http://deb.debian.org/debian buster-updates main contrib non-free

It should now look something like this:

If your screen looks correct, you will need to hold down the Ctrl button on your keyboard with one finger, then tap the letter X key with another. The bottom of your screen should change to look like this:

If this looks correct, tap the letter Y key on your keyboard, then hit the Enter key to save the file. You will be returned to your terminal screen, where it is now time to update the system using these new repos. So now copy/paste the following command, followed by the Enter key:

apt-get update

You should then see some activity, and in then end you should see something like this:

You are now set up and ready to continue following any of the guides on here to setup your own VPS and host public facing services!