Setting up a new Debian 12 server fully remotely (I have no physical access to the machine).

I’d like to be extra sure that I don’t mess up. I’d like to turn on ufw but keep the service disabled. So that in case I mess up, I can reboot and the system will reboot with ufw turned off again.

I’ve searched and all Google turns up is people troubleshooting why it does NOT turn on on reboot.

Gemini says systemctl start ufw, but that immediately exits:

root@server:/etc# journalctl -u ufw
Jul 24 13:19:23 server systemd[1]: Starting ufw.service - Uncomplicated firewall...
Jul 24 13:19:23 server systemd[1]: Finished ufw.service - Uncomplicated firewall.
root@server:/etc# ufw version
ufw 0.36.2
Copyright 2008-2023 Canonical Ltd.
root@server:/etc# systemctl status ufw
● ufw.service - Uncomplicated firewall
     Loaded: loaded (/lib/systemd/system/ufw.service; enabled; preset: enabled)
     Active: active (exited) since Wed 2024-07-24 13:19:23 UTC; 1min 34s ago
       Docs: man:ufw(8)
    Process: 1054133 ExecStart=/lib/ufw/ufw-init start quiet (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
   Main PID: 1054133 (code=exited, status=0/SUCCESS)
        CPU: 1ms