Primary issue: I'm a total newb that's just sorting this stuff out.
I'm using Debian 3.0r1. I downloaded the KDE 3.0.5a .deb binaries from kde.org. After some intial difficulties getting libarts removed and libarts1 stuck in, in its place, I got everything to install. But I have no freaking clue as to what I need to do from here to get KDE to run on my system. I had not previously installed KDE on this system, and I have no idea what I have to do/run/plead/beg/cajole to get KDE to work. If someone could link me to a manual installation thread, or FAQ or HOWTO, it would be greatly appreciated.


Thanks in advance.

Run "startx kde" from your term when you first boot up. Tell us what error messages that you get if any.

I presume that there was a install doc included with the Kde files, did it mention anything about modifying your PATH?

Also, in your home directory you will (should) have a ./xinitrc file. If so, then post it here.

So what's a total noob doing with Debian? There's easier ways of getting your feet wet


John

I'm not your archtypical noob. I've got 20+ years working in a dos environment, and wanted to learn linux. I was lead to understand that for many Debian is the product of choice, despite it being pretty steep in terms of a learning curve. That has never deterred me from teaching myself, so I figured if I was gonna learn it, I'd learn it the way I've learned everything of worth. Trial and error.

Anyway, I had my system all set up, but I decided that I had installed way more crap than I really needed. Now, my question is a bit different, but still KDE related. 3.0.5a requires the libarts1 package to be installed, but the media player it suggests (noatun) requires SDL1.2 which is libarts(!1) dependant. So how would I go about making everything coexist, or is there a better media player that I should look into?

Let apt-get take care of that. (the coexist issue)
apt-get howto:
http://www.debian.org/doc/user-manuals#apt-howto

No offense intended, I still use DOS

As for Deb, those of us who don't use it would contend that if it were the product of choice, then someone got shortchanged in the choices department.

Extremely shortchanged.

But that's just a SuSE user's opinion, and if you ask any Debian user they will correctly point out that there has to be something wrong with our heads to be using SuSE in the first place.


There's "Xawtv", no idea as to how well it works.

http://bytesex.org/xawtv/


And as iceman47 pointed out, apt-get will that care of all of these things for you.


John

Hahaha, okay, my wording there was extremely poor. I didn't mean that Debian was better. Gods know that'd kick off a verbal ragnarok. No, what I meant was that the larger number of people that I've met who use linux seem to prefer debian. Figuring that sometimes the masses can be right, I went after Debian. Plus, I've been told that Deb was hard to get up and running, not for noobs, etc. And that's exactly what I wanted. A challenge. Something that would force me to get to understand the underlying core of Linux. I installed SuSE (my former best-friends distro of choice) and it all went so smooth that I had no idea what to do with it, or what it could do, or how to use the CLI upon which it was built. So for me, there was no point in going after another copy of SuSE or Redhat or any of the other noob friendly distros. And Debian is what it was advertised. A royal pain in the ass. And frankly, I'm loving it.

I'm going through the apt-get HOWTO now, and I'll look into Xawtv. Thanks for your help, guys.

Anytime, and when you get a chance, check out Midnight Commander ("mc"). It's a Norton Commander clone for linux.


John