im new to linux, i am using mandrake 10. i cant do anything. before anyone says "read some docs" ive done that, they dont tell you anything if you dont know what you are looking for to begin with. i downloaded a .bin and cant make it do anything, i downloaded teamspeak and followed its directions for intalling it but then have no idea how to run the program. ive done google searches and find what sounds like something close to what i need but they just say to "type" this or that. where? in terminal?

Hi Deno521,

Linux (or just plain Unix) is confusing at first, but stick with it! You'll find it's one of the most rewarding systems once you've mastered a few key concepts. To that end, you might find this document more useful than others http://doc.mandrakelinux.com/Mandrak...and-Line.html/.

Generally when someone tells you to type something, they mean in a terminal - the terminal (command line) is where the 'power' is. For instance, to make your .bin file do something, you need to do something like this (two commands):

chmod u+x File_I_Downloaded.bin
./File_I_Downloaded.bin

The document I linked to will help unravel what these two commands actually mean, but essentially you are telling the system it is allowed to run it, and then running it.

I don't know much about teamspeak, but a good guess would be to just type teamspeak into a terminal. If that works, you can create a menu shortcut for your GUI that executes the command 'teamspeak'.

that is the most help ive gotten from anyone (even my brother-in-law!) thanks

Hey Deno521,
To start with the basics, Mandrake is designed to use "rpm"
to install packages. (programs)
A good place to get them is "PLF"

http://plf.zarb.org/

Go to packages, then choose a mirror (planetmirror is good),
then go to Mandrake, then 10.0 or 10.1 (whichever is relevant),
then i586.

Grab a package that you want, download it, open a terminal, cd to the
directory where you downloaded the package (if you downloaded to
your home directory you will be there already),
Type:

su

Enter your root password

then install the package with:

rpm -ivh whateverpackage.rpm

exit to your normal user and type the name of the package.
(if the package is soandso-0.1.3, the name is just soandso)

If this works for you, then you can start using the Mandrake Package Manager.

Somewhere you will have a directory called RPMS.
It may be /usr/src/RPM/RPMS but I'm not exactly sure.
Find it though. Inside this directory will be subdirectories called:
i386, i486, i586, i686, noarch, and so on.
Open the Mandrake package Manager and choose the option to "set sources".
you should be able to set all of your Mandrake discs as sources and then,
under "local" I believe, you can set the directories:
/usr/src/RPM/RPMS/i386, i486, i586 and so on.
Now whenever you download an rpm, if it's an i586 you can put it in
/usr/src/RPM/RPMS/i586.
Now whenever you go to install rpm's with the Mandy Package Manager,
it will list those rpm's.

Whew! that's enough for now.
I'm going on memory anyways as I haven't run Mandrake since 9.0

ive allways heard that linux doesnt need to be restarted over and over like windows and it doesnt crash like windows. well now i know its true, it crashes so much more. i have had to hit the reset button more times in the last few hours than i have in the last 3 years. i cant do a simple thing like install americas army. the first one downloaded was "corrupt", so i DL'ed another, and a third all with the same result "verifying archive integrity" then freezing up. i thought i was supposed to be able to shut down or restart the part that was froze instaed of the whole OS but either thats not true or nobody and no google search knows how.
i dont feel like spending hours reading doc's to find out that they dont come close to even explaining my problem, but that is the common reply to any "how to" question.
am i the only person to find this much trouble with linux and see absolutely nothing good about it?

To kill a crashed X session, there are a few options. One is to try ctrl-alt-backspace, but if the dead process has grabbed control of your keyboard, this often won't work. The system is usually still working, but there's little evidence of this for the poor user.

If you have another computer, you can often connect over the network, then from the command line you can kill the bad process. This is not much comfort if you only have the one computer

The thing you have to remember is that this system was initially created by people experienced with Unix to do what they needed done (and often not much more). It's only recently that any attempt at user friendliness has been made, so some things are still going to be rough around the edges. The more you learn, the less rough those edges become. Unfortunately, one of the roughest edges currently is game software If you were hoping to build a gaming machine with Linux without having to learn too much, now is definitely not the time. Getting a game running under Wine can be an exercise in frustration, and there are not many native ports of commercial games.

how do i edit my "inittab"?
im trying to in stall nvidia drivers. this is what i get when i try
The document could not be saved, as it was not possible to write to file:/etc/inittab.
Check that you have write access to this file or that enough disc space is available.

You need to be logged in as root to make changes to /etc/inittab. Type "su -" into a terminal, and enter the root password, then start your editor. Once done, type 'exit' to leave su mode.