LinuxQuestions.org - Perseverance is everything!

So, I graduated from a University with a Unix network, and bought a cheap Windows 98 machine.

Several years of crashes later, I finally decide I've had enough, and want to get Linux. Even if it DOES mean trying to install it myself!

So, I try it with a CD of Red Hat I have lying around. Hampered by the fact I don't actually know what hardware I have in my machine, it doesn't go too well. Slow, not particularly functional, and crashes regularly.

So I decide on a different distro. I look around, and figure Slack is the way to go. Get hold of the 9.1 CDs, and fire up the 'newbie' install.

Which crashes. Right near the end.

Screw it, I'll just do the full install this time.

Which crashes.

Right, fine, I'll just install the 'a' package, and then install everything series by series until it's all installed.

Just about manage it this time. Get it set to about the right things, fire up X. Which crashes regularly. *sob*. Must have screwed up the install.. right..?

Decide to have a go at this "compiling a kernel" thing, in hopes that a new kernel might help the stability. Go through the menu, tell it to compile the kernel, and watch it crash.

Not having much luck here, eh?

And then, at last, a ray of light. A link on the linuxquestions forum to the "Signal 11 FAQ". That's funny, I think, that's the error message I keep getting when X crashes. And when gcc crashes. And pkgtool crashes...

Finally, the problem is solved. My hardware is defective! It isn't ME screwing up, and it isn't the SOFTWARE screwing up! It's the computer itself!

At long last, an excuse to buy myself a new computer! :)

After several years of running a bloatware OS on a machine with 64MB of RAM and a K6 processor, I decide that for once I want overkill on the hardware, instead of 'making do' again. So I buy myself some new components (as described in my sig), put them together, and install Slack again.

Very fast install, with no crashes. And since I know exactly what the hardware is, and checked its compatibility with Linux already, there are NO problems with configuring everything to run. At long last, I have a properly configured Linux computer.

Pilot-link put up a stubborn fight but finally agreed to talk to my PDA over USB, and then even Jpilot started to work. The Java plugins for the browsers, especially Firefox, also held out long and hard, but finally I've got them working too.

I've got FVWM2 as my default WM, and have been hacking away at the rc file, and it's starting to work the way I want it. I found out how to make the XDM login screen more interesting, though I had to redo it when I downloaded a security patch that reset it to default.

I plugged in an ADSL router and I'm online just like that! A few downloads from linuxpackages, and I'm getting closer and closer to having my computer do all the basic things I want. I've never had a multimedia *nix machine before..

Of course, I still have many things to do - compile my own kernel, learn how to manually install from source, get transparency working on the GUI, configure the firewall the way I want it, get my gf's XP machine to talk to mine over the LAN, get writing capability set up on my CD-RW, get a backup facility working, etc etc.

But I at least feel confident that I CAN get all these things done. I'm not fighting against a dodgy computer with a crappy OS any more: I'm using a good machine with a rock-solid OS, and I know that the only thing stopping me from getting things done now is my lack of knowledge of HOW to do it.

And with two O'reilly books, access to Google, and linuxquestions.com, that problem is going away as well. It's just a matter of time, now...

Mwahahahaha!