Mandrake 10.1 questions...
 

Okay, I just installed my first linux distro, mandrake 10.1 dual boot with MS Windows XP home. First off, on the start-up, it failed to install like maybe five or six programs that were set to install, so I may be missing a few essential applications. Immediately after installing, I ran into the problem of how do I install things using mandrake? I am not quite sure what to do with that ark utility, or even sure if that is the right utility at all to be installing tar.gz files. I did somehow manage to install firefox, and get it running (not even sure how I did that), but now it is miraculously gone (kind of confused about that). I have tried to install yahoo messenger for linux on mandrake with no luck at all, and a lot of confusion. I have a lot of software that I am very partial to, most of which runs in linux, which means I have a lot of installing to do. Yahoo has instructions on how to install on a few other distros, but mentions nothing of Mandrake. I think that is the first thing I want to install, since for some odd reason (probably due to partition errors :( ) messenger just crashes every time I run it in XP. I think if I can figure out how to install these tarball files, I can figure out most of the rest on my own...

As a second question though, I would like to know if it is possible (pretty darned sure it is) to move files (lots of them) from XP to mandrake, and if so, then how do I do that. I am pretty sure that XP was kind of jostled in a bad way by the partition operation, so I would like to just get all my music, documents, and videos off that partition, and reformat it, and reinstall XP there.

Third question: Does anyone have any recommendations for some software that will help me learn to navigate mandrake better, or aid me in my navigation of it? I am using that "gnome" interface right now, but a lot of people dislike that, so maybe I need something else. Also, what does tar.gz stand for?

Thank you all ahead of time for your help, it is much appreciated...

Ben

Yahoo Messenger: same problem:
 

I also have the same problem, I am working on it currently. When I run ymessenger, it brings up a window to setup yahoo messenger and then crashes, saying Segmentation Fault.

Let me know if you got the solution.

Yes, it works finally. Uncheck all the options (default), that asks to place icon in the desktop (kde as well as gnome), and you will be able to run it successfully. gaim also works good. now I have to choose between these two.

I assume, you have installed the yahoo messenger correctly and getting segmentation fault like I do.

GAIM and Kopete do the job fine, so its not really necessary to install the client from yahoo unless there is a specific feature you need.

I was referring to windows when I said yahoo messenger was crashing, I am running dual boot. I still have not figured out how to install yahoo messenger correctly. And yes there IS a specific feature that I need in yahoo. That feature is that everyone else I know has it!

This is obviously a Linux/Unix site, so problems with applications running on Windows, should be asked in appropriate forums or on sites that are windows specific.

It wasn't a question involving windows, I never asked how to correct that problem if you read my post.

I asked these things:

How do you install yahoo messenger on mandrake 10.1 , or any of those tar.gz files for that matter

What does Tar.Gz stand for?

Can I transfer files (lots of them) from my windows partition to my linux partition, and if so how?

Short and to the point. I guess this forum runs differently then other help forums I have visited. many others want as much information about your problem as you can give them...

Just because *everyone* is using Yahoo Messenger doesn't mean you have to run the Yahho client. ;) Try gaim, or kopete. They will both talk to yahoo, as if they were YM clients themselves. They also talk to MSN, AIM, ICQ, and IRC. One client, multiple protocols. :D

And to install gaim, just go to the Mandrake Control Center ("Star --> System --> Configuration --> Configure Your Computer"), select Software management from the left side of the panel, then select "Install" from the new panel that comes up. Enter "gaim" in the search box, and press "Search". select the file(s) that come up in the lower left box, and click "Install" at the bottom. It should ask you to enter your installation CD (one or more), and when it's done, voila! You have gaim installed, and it *should* be in your menus to use.

You posted while I was replying. ;)

"tar.gz" files are files that have been "tarred" (tar is a *nix-standard packaging method) and then "zipped" using the gzip utility. They are *source code* collections, which you need to compile and install. Mandrake newbies should almost never use tar.gz files. Use the Mandrake repositories to get software. Set up your urpmi repositories using Easy Urpmi (link is in my sig). Then use the Mandrake Control Center to download and install whet you need almost as painlessly (or even more so) as you do in Windows.

As for your files on Windows, just use your file manager (Nautilus? -- I don't use Gnome, myself) to browse to "/mnt/win_c" (or a similar name - your Windows partition as mounted in Linux), and copy them to yout home directory just like you would using Windows Explorer.

Excellent! Thanx for that! I am glad I don't have to run yahoo anymore! Though I DO play with the IMvironments sometimes... maybe one of those messengers will run the IMvironments too?

You don't actually have to transfer the files to the Linux system, if they are files like music, for instance. Your Windows file system, which is NTFS type, is mounted so you can read from it, but not write to it. This will mean that you can listen to music, watch video files, which is as it should be. If you have documents, you should copy or move them, since projects you work on don't make much sense being read-only...

I had no idea what IMVironemnts were, so I went googling. I found this: "NOTE: IMVironments are currently available only for Windows users at this time."

That didn't work... it said that the signatures didn't match. I told it to finish the install anyway, and it said there was a problem during installation, and that it needed some files (about 4 or 5 of them)...

also, I am going to download easy Urpmi, but I have no idea what "architechture" I am running. Does it matter what I put there?

Set it up as 10.1 Official, and I assume i586 architecture (the default). (Unless you are running something really strange. ;) )

Actually... I DO need to move them, since I think I need to reformat windows. I think the partition utility on mandrake screwed it up. Messenger no longer works there, and some files are now in the wrong places. That means that reformatting is probably a good idea...

Hi M O L8ingN2dust

You dont have to download anything from there, just enter your mandrake distribution and architecture (i assume i586), and you will get the commands that you should type in console as a root. Then it will do the same job as the software manager do. Its going to repeat the same thing, if there are conflicting versions of software. So figure out these conflicting packages and update them, afterwards update the main package (inthis case, gaim). Also you can remove all the links in the software manager and add new links using easy urpmi (base, update_source, and contribs), and update whatever you see (previously as conflicting with the gaim), it will do good for you.

I STILL haven't gotten this thing downloaded!

bash: urpmi.addmedia: command not found

Am I supposed to try it one line at a time, or enter it all at once... I suppose it doesn't matter since I tried both. They should make it so you can copy and then paste to the command prompt...

also, when someone says type in the console as a root, does that mean my default user account? If not, how do I log into root?

Well, you should work as root. This means you open a command terminal, type
su
- you will then be asked for your root user password, which you enter. You are then working as the administrator, who is obviously the only one who should be allowed to change these system settings. Then you paste the addmedia commands, and it should work. You usually copy the entry by copying from the webpage, and you paste by middle-clicking in the command line terminal.

To expand a little on what OSourceDiplomat said:

Unless you are an experienced "guru" and know the risks, and are willing to take them, always log on to your Linux box as a normal user. There will be some things you cannot do, though. (This is a *good* thing! ;) ) "urpmi" is one of them. To do these things, you open a terminal window ("Konsole" in KDE) and enter the command "su". You will then be prompted for your root password. Once that is entered, you will see your prompt changes from "$" to "#", indicating you are "root". You may now do anything that root can do, within that terminal window. You are still just "you" everywhere else on your screen!

So to update your urpmi sources, you open a terminal window, type "su", and then the root password when prompted, and then paste (middle mouse button is the standard paste command in a terminal window) the output from easyurpmi. Either paste the whole thing at once, or paste one *command* at a time -- everything from one "urpmi.addmedia..." to the next "urpmi.addmedia..." -- on my system it usually fills two to three lines. Wait for it to finish. For each uprmi.addmedia command, it has to go out to the net and download the hdlist file for that repository and update your internal list of sources. When you are all done, type "exit", and you will be logged out from the root account in that terminal, and returned to normal user status.

Then you can either use the "urpmi" command (as root ;)) to install/update applications, or you can run "rpmdrake" (as root ;)) or just start the Mandrake Control Center/Software Management utility (which is just "rpmdrake" ;)), and you will be prompted for your root password in a dialog box. :)

Okay, I installed it I think, but I can't find it anywhere! I looked all through the star menu, and nothing. Is there some easier way to browse your files on mandrake? I tried searching, but it found nothing

What exactly are you looking for? gaim? urpmi? "It" isn't very descriptive. ;)

as for urpmi:to get to the mcc, just follow the menu: Star --> System --> Configuration --> Configure Your Computer.

okay, so I suppose it is listed as "media manager". If that is the case then how in the heck do you use that thing? It doesn't seem to do anything except configure the software itself...

I was looking for easy urpmi...

I guess it is a console program then?

Ok... I am going to have to get used to the console thing. Does it run the same commands as DOS? I know how to operate DOS.

"Media manager" is used for configuring the software, correct. there should be three *other* options, though: Install, Remove, and Update. Those are for managing the software on your system.

"Easy Urpmi" is just a web-based tool to help set up your sources. The actual install/remove/update of applications is either done through the rpmdrake gui (above) or from the console, using "urpmi" commands.

Edit: The *nix command line is "similar" to DOS (DOS is really rather crippled). The same commands will not necessarily work.

ok... I thought the install, remove, and updates was RPMdrake... I guess that is now easy urpmi...

PS I edited my post above and asked a question: Does the console follow the same commands as DOS? I know a good bit of DOS, so that would make that easy for me...

lol - cross-editing. :)

ok... the install interface doesn't seem any different to me at all. It still only wants to install programs off of the mandrake disc. So if I want to install gtkhtml-0.8.tar.bz2 (located on my desktop), then how do I do that?

Word of advice to all linux programmers and designers... Make the console act like DOS. To someone who is unfamiliar with linux like me, this is a nightmare! There is nothing wrong with making software that is easy to learn.

As soon as I begin college and get my computer science degree, I plan to come back to this and design some software that is easy to use as windows or at bare minimum DOS. I don't see any reason why this can't be done. Maybe there is a distro that is already like this, and I am just missing it...

Think I need a tutorial, anyone know where to find a good one?

To make it *not* use your cds, go tto the "media manager" you saw before, and *un*check the cd items.

To install gtkhtml-0.8, Open the "Install" window, and see if you can find it in a "Search". If so, just select it, and click the "Install" button. If you can't find it in rpmdrake, then you need to use your tar.bz2 file you downloaded, and compile it from source. This is a decidedly more complex process, so try the rpmdrake step, first.

Linux documentation


Try that for guides, not been through it yet but it looks good.

The console doesn't act like DOS because it is based on UNIX, which existed for years before DOS. (DOS took the UNIX command line, and crippled it for it's own use.) Every computer scientist I have ever met, has had at least some passing knowledge of unix. Some hate the unix command line, others love it, most are indifferent - it does the job. It is *much* more powerful than the DOS command line, which is why it is unlikely to be "devolved" to that level.

FWIW, I think Linux *is* as easy to use as DOS/Windows. In many ways, easier. ;)

Well if by easier to use, you mean it doesn't crash, or do clandestine activities on your computer, and leave you vulnerable to hijackings, viruses, etc. by allowing a series of security bugs, then yeah it's easier then windows. If you mean that it is easier for someone who knows nothing about the computer to sit down and learn, not even close. I like the efficiency of linux, and the fact that it doesn't record every keystroke I enter on my hard drive, and the fact that hijacking it is nearly impossible, but learning it is not a cinch. The rest of my family knows very little about computers. For these people I am "tech support". If I have trouble learning linux, they sure as hell would too. Lots more trouble. I still don't think it is right that my family and millions of other computer-users are forced to use unethical software designed by corporate crime mafias because they don't have a computer science degree. People should be allowed easy access to OS's that are easy to use that are not products of corporate criminals (albeit ones who are expert at finding loopholes). You shouldn't need a computer science degree to operate your computer without being spied on... All there is to it. Some people are just not willing to invest that kind of energy into computers. They want to use the computer as a media device to communicate, or play a couple games, and that is it. There is nothing wrong with that, what there is something wrong with is corporations such as M$ who take advantage of these people, and their lack of understanding of the computer. That is what I am looking to put an end to, and that is why I am learning linux, so I can get myself, and the rest of my family away from the M$ corporate giant who is constantly gathering and collecting the largest database in the world on people's personal lives and selling the information for proift. M$ doesn't make money by making good software, they make money by buying everyone out, or finding loopholes to cut companies out of their own business, and steal their profits, just like they did to java sun when they stole the java language by finding ways to get around patents. I hate all they stand for, and I think the non-computer savy world should have alternatives to contributing to that mess.

I love open-source, and I strongly believe it is going in the right direction away from the corporate pigs. That is why I will be totally stubborn in learning linux, and overcome all the barriers, and help redesign it so people have better options to M$...

*Bows* Thank you, I am done with my evangelical rapture, we can continue talking tech now!

PS: Thanx everybody in here for all their help!

If you are old enough to remember DOS commandline, you are old enough to learn Linux/Unix command line.
I put a box together for my father a while back - he couldn't get a grip on Windows' installation, so I did that. He has no trouble using it. Isn't it an issue that most people don't care for system maintenance? I mean, it can be tricky to install Linux distros, but for a lot of people, so is Windows. If I have put SuSE 9.2 on a complete from-scratch, ui-only, PC beginner's box, it will be just as easy to use as Windows - the only difference is that most of the programs you'll need are already there.

That would sure be a step in the right direction... It seems one of the hardest things with linux is installing things... even now, I am having trouble installing the programs I like, such as soulseek...