Is Zenwalk For Linux Noobs???
 

the title says it all.....also, how is the hardware support for zenwalk....

I'd say so. It took to my laptop perfectly (wireless too) so that should tell you something about the hardware support.

wat type of wifi card do you have

PRO/Wireless LAN 2100 3B Mini PCI Adapter

Zenwalk for noobs?

Well it's based on slax so you'll have to get used to the package manager or install programs from source.

Also, installing isn't something that may be easy for noobs compared to installations like Fedora that are pretty much click and install, as it's one that is text based so some experience of installing an OS would be useful.

Just my :twocents:

"base on slax" is wrong, it's based on Slackware (slax is a liveCD nased on Slakware)

anyway, could you explain why "based on sla*" means (for you) "get used to the package manager or install programs from source" ?

A package manager is mostly specific to 1 distrib (or 1 type of distrib), as apt* is for *buntu and debian.
By the way graphical netpkg is really close to synaptic (in fonctionnalities i mean).

and "compile from sources" = depend if you particularly want to use 1 specific app you like/you're habit or if you're just looking for a functionality.
In this case, ZW as most distrib, has a tool/app for it (except a really specific demand, in this case, peoples at zencommunity/on forum could [help to do/have already done] a package).



i don't see why "install in text mode" = "not for noobs" ...

Well i must say that it is a rather 50/50 thing.
The installer is rather complicated for first-time-users, but powerful for advanced users.
The distro itself is orientated at "ese of use" as you have grafical frontends for most tasks (just check the "zenpanel" und "system").

Since it comes with most apps needed preinstalled (for a normal desktop user) it should be pretty easy to mantain and use.

what thing let you think that ?
I just want to know, if possible we'll try to do something better ;).
But we already have:
- auto-partitioning (or not, as you like)
- no questions about which packages install
- ...

What can be improve, except a "graphical install", that will offer exactly the same options, but that can support mouse too for clicking (not a realy big improvement imo, as using mouse when there is only 1 window is pretty useless...).

i don't know really. if the box works straight away after intallation, then great!! it's even for noobs. BUT, what if it doesn't (like in the case of mine). i didn't even get to wifi connection. it even didn't set up ethernet config to connect up to the internet, which is a big aargh!! for me.

and no supporting drivers/detecting properly widescreen/nividia graphic card i got. i think auto configuration of zenwalk can be pretty bad sometimes. it worked almost perfectly on my old computer, while it's not working very well on my new laptop. my laptop was perfectly configured by knoppix and sabayon. so it just tells me that one failing in zenwalk lies in this crucial first configuration stuff. of course, i can dig into config files manually, but most people don't have time for that.

i don't care about whether the installation of zenwalk is graphical or not. i agree with guth, and really, it's such a petty point to make that "lack of graphical installation stuff" is one big put-off factor.

so at the moment, i have to choose other distros that does better job in detecting/config my laptop automatically than zenwalk does.

of course i will come back to zenwalk as soon as this "problem" is resolved... coz i loved zenwalk so much on my old laptop...

try looking on support.zenwalk.org, there's a lot of howtos and stuffs...

Can you open a thread with your problems (and hardware), like which wifi card, how do you connect on ethernet, ...

It might be really easy to solve, if peoples don't tell us we can't help/improve.

cheers guth... i've already done that. but i am not really complaining about my problems with zenwalk here. you see... i am talking about something more general. that detection stuff should not be "problems" from the first place. i know that some other distros can do better detection and stuff, and i asked myself "why not with zenwalk?"

and i know this kind of things are not easy on noobs (even with helpful hands of the community). :) i guess many people don't stay on one distro long enough (or have the patience) to fix their problems. it's much easier to move on to some other distro that works "out out of the box" than to solving the problems.

anyway, that's my opinion. there are many people who give up because of bad auto config, and they don't even bother to report to the community. when i am tired, i am one of them. now after a nap, i got back my spirit, so yeah, i intalled zenwalk again, with the renewed spirit of "this time i will make this thing work!"

in short, if works, zenwalk is good for everyone - that's how i came to love this distro. but if it doesn't work well, then better for busy noobs to find some other distros.

i got your point tsuren,
i asked you to report as you seemed not to be a noob, so the information/correction/experience of your problems might be great help/improvement for us :)

Well I'd consider myself a newbie (only just this month installed ubuntu for the first time and gotten rid of windows) Now I've taken it upon myself to test a few of the distros that are out and "about" last night I installed the latest Zenwalk onto a spare computer the install was easy enough (even though the install was not a *click, click* type of install and I actually had to read some of the menus a bit) I still managed to get Zenwalk up and running in about thirty minutes. Maybe this linux thing isnt as bad as a lot of people make out. Or maybe im just really lucky :D

I have been using Zenwalk for over 6 months now, and a couple of "Linux for noobs" distros before that.
I would say Zenwalk is good for noobs with over few months of experience. I would highly recommend it to those who want to learn a proper Linux OS instead of just another distro.

Sure the installer is text based, but it is pretty much straight forward. And after that all you need to do is have ability to access to the internet (to ask questions or what not).
Other Zenwalkers are very responsive and supportive- but search first before asking. Hope you give it a try!

FYI- I've just recently gone over 1 yr of using Linux.

i have taken to zenwalk easily. i managed to get it installed through the text interface without a hitch and it configured my dual boot no probs. i have not had a lot of expereince with linux and this is the first distro that i had sucess with and found satisfying. i was using it to learn shell and understand linux while keeping my windows for doing my regular tasks.

i cant access it at the moment as i reinstalled XP and it has cleared grub. any advice re this would be great?

you can use a boot CD and mount+chroot your zenwalk system.
after that "grub-install" or "lilo -v" to have your bootloader back :)
(you can google on it, there's a lot of howtos about repairing bootloaders)

I found it easy enough to install, but then I wasn't bothered about configuring wi-fi. It's a good little distro.

I think Zenwalk is a good OS for noobs or people with slow computers and don't have the money to buy a new pc... the only problem I had with Zenwalk is the Dutch language support. I installed Zenwalk on someones computer but she can't read/understand English so I had to reinstall windows 98... sad but true :( now I'm searching for a Linux OS that fully supports the dutch language and work well on a slow system???

Grtzz DM

I'd say Zenwalk is noob friendly (in fact very friendly) but then, the noob also has to occasionally be willing to study the manual/wiki/forum if he encounters some difficulty along the way.

Of course then, he wont be a noob very long ;)

I was (am? ;) ) still quite a noob when I got more involved with Zenwalk a bit less than a year ago & in this time, I learned to recompile the kernel, create a LiveCD, create simple bash scripts, the basics of packaging & this & that...

Zenwalk community & its main developper JP is very much noob friendly, but the biggest friends of all noobs (& the one who tought me the most) is guth... most faithful poster here at LinuxQuestions Zenwalk section...

:)

As someone who is a complete linux noob, I have found Zenwalk to be just what I was looking for to learn linux on.
An old Dell Optiplex came my way (free at the town dump :D ), and I knew that I wanted to try out linux; so I looked around at a bunch of distros, and ZW matched my needs. Install was a breeze, the community has been wonderful when it comes to solving problems, and there is a wealth of information in the forums.
The biggest obstacle I've had to overcome-as a noob-has been doing coding type stuff in terminal, but I'm getting better ;).
I have found ZW so comfortable that I have a dual boot on my main computer with ZW and Win2k (linux still scares the wife :o

You guys may be interested then:
I just installed Zenwalk 4.2 onto a PII (yes, I know) machine (64MiB RAM, 4GiB HDD, intel chipset) for a 68yr old granny what really only wanted to be able to write stuff and look at photos.

The first trial was ubuntu - which wouldn't run on this machine. Next was DSL - which worked OK and verified the hardware. Granny enjoyed herself with it so I considered installing that or maybe some subset of Debian... got a look at zenwalk answering another question and thought: hmmm...

She loves it (and we're talking about someone who has trouble using the "start" menu in windows!) and finds it (gasp) intuitive to use.

The install went kinda OK - but it wouldn't accept lilo.conf unless the filesystem was ext3. Don't know what that's about. But I found the partitioning step to be very painless and even "fun". his also makes the first time I've used LiLo.

Didn't detect the soundcard (legacy ISA card of unknown provenance).

Even on this extreme legacy hardware - Zenwalk creaks not at all. In fact, the machine behaves as zippy as my notebook on Ubuntu (though I see the cpu gets maxed out quite a bit more often)... and much more dolphin-like than the old Win95 that was there before.

kpkg is not a problem... so far there has been nothing needing an actual source install (though I got a query about the kernel the other day... so I think I'll be doing some basic programming tutoring soon.) and you could say this granny has taken to zenwalk like, well, a dolphin to water.

There seems to be this thing that happens to people who move over to linux - after they get used to the fact that it is a different operating system, they start expecting far more from their computer that they thought possible.

Here, someone who put updating windows via MSN in the "too hard" basket, is now thinking about kernel upgrades and shell scripts. I think it's the freedom: when you spend your life on your knees, and finally stand, the altitude goes to your head.

On a general note:

I do linux installs and support for home users and the odd smaller business.
I think most thoughtful newcomers would have little problem with the installer - it is well explained right up to the network part (which can always be altered post-install) - and has a curiously friendly feeling to it which is quite a trick for a text interface.

However - the user would have needed some technical knowledge of computer hardware, partitioning, networking and so on.

So long as the hardware is not bleeding edge, however, there should be no problem.

(Note: 4.2 came out recently and has quite a recent kernel an all... so there are unlikely to be any major issues with anything a month or so old. Major headaches seem to come when some hardware configuration becomes popular right after the major release... anyone tried this with dual core?)

The usual headaches with linux remain:

proprietary media formats
pci modem setup
wireless setup
DRI 3D accel.

I'd consider Zenwalk to be at least as well set up to cope as the big boys, and better than some. This is an adult distribution: not a toy.

Hmmm... has anyone installed Enlightenment to Zen?

The default Zenwalk kernel doesn't offer isa support...
however you can find one that does here: http://users.zenwalk.org/user-accoun...sz/kernel-isa/

Some work is being done on a Zen package which you should be able to install simply via netpkg. It is now in testing & should be available to all very soon...

Yeah - I sorta found that out. There are quite a few "How do I get my Isa soundcard going?" threads in support.zenwalk.org

It is probably better to rip out the isa soundcard and install a PCI one, cheap second hand and I may even have one in one of these boxes... (If I cared, I'd have put it in a thread of it's own... but you weren't to know: sorry.)

I note: the isa modem goes fine. There is a dialog in the post install sequence that asks if I want to attempt to detect legacy ISA soundcards (no soundcard detected, do you want to... etc). I figure the repeated questions about this on the forums could be users thinking this means that their card may be detected?

This lady has a scanner which comes with an isa card (guess: scsi scanner - this is a Genius I). So if she ever wants to fire it up, mayhap she will need the isa kernel?

Try supergrub!
http://supergrub.forjamari.linex.org/

SGD is still a wee bit spotty when the system has 2 or more HDDs. Otherwise it basically just automates the "grub install" method. What the hey - yet another live disk to the collection.

Zenwalk has a slightly steeper learning curve than, say, the Ubuntus. But then, if you're really interested in GNU/Linux, who wants things to be too easy?
(Me for one, obviously, since I've re-installed Xubuntu.)

This was my problem too. I have Zenwalk on an old desktop that I fart around with and love it, but I have to use Mepis on my laptop because it worked "out of the box." It seemed too difficult to get everything up and running properly with Zenwalk. One suggestion to Zenwalk developers would be why not include Madwifi with the installation? It seems that there is a high percentage of Atheros-based wlan cards out there... Just my thoughts on the subject. I just haven't had the time to learn to compile from source yet, but it is on my to-do list. ;)

most (all?) wifi driver(or more often firmware only) missing aren't there because of some license problem. However some driver/firmware (mad wifi is one of them i think) were packaged by users and who provided a like on the forum.

Each distro has its way to solve this problem (pay or not, ...).

Then, if it doesn't, it means that graphical setup tools failed to configure a feature. This can happen on any operating system.

In this case : the only difference between Zenwalk and any other Linux OS is that zenwalk has a simpler design, so it should be easier to solve any problem not covered by Graphical tools on Zenwalk.

Cheers

JP

Zenwalk is excellent learning distro but I wouldn't say it's n00b distro, being bit of a n00b self.

Zenwalk is OK for anyone, as long as you don't race through the installer like I did; I completely skipped xconfig and netconfig somehow...