OK, so I managed (with a mountain of assistance from one of the blokes from my LUG) to get debian Sarge installed (it was woody on the dvd, but I/we found that the nvidia driver would only work on the 2.4.xx kernels and so he showed me how to upgrade the distro).

Anyhow, I am now trying to sus out how to upgrade the kde 2.2 that I have got installed, to the 3.1.3, and am getting very bloody confused about this !?


I probably need to get a new "sources" thing to add to the list - How should I do this ? I have tried to look at the /etc/apt/sources.list but get "permission denied" (as root), though I installed "synaptic" and can see the resources listed there, but am unsure of what needs to go into what box to add an extra/new source. Do I actually need to just get an appropriate source and then add it>apt-get update>apt-get install kde or something like that, or is there more too it ???

Sound - I haven't got any sound. How would I go about finding out what I need to do or get to get the sound working. It's a soundblaster live! 5.1 digital card and the only hint that I have had so far is that I get told that there is no /dev/dsp (and I have only been told that when logging in as root).

Fonts - I leave this till last as I figure it's more important to get the kde 3.1.3 and sound first. Though it would be great to be able to use the MS fonts (tahoma is SOOOOO much more readable -IMO). Any ideas ???

regards

John

Hi Jon,

I'm not sure why you can't edit your sources.list at the moment. Its very odd if you are definitely logged in as root and can't edit them. Maybe someone else will be able to help you with that one...

But at the moment you have Sarge installed. To get the version of KDE you want you can do two things. Either upgrade to Sid (Unstable) or use pinning.

I would advise you to pin. This would allow you to have Sarge as your base system and install KDE 3.1.3 from Sid. Two helpful links on how to pin are here:
http://jaqque.sbih.org/kplug/apt-pinning.html
http://www.argon.org/~roderick/apt-pinning.html

Once you have the Sid entries in your source list and your preferences file created, you should be able to install the KDE base by typing:
apt-get update
apt-get -t unstable install kdebase

Did you install the necessary kernel module for your sound card when upgrading your kernel? If not that would by why you don't have any sound. Also you will need to add users to the audio group when you get the sound-card functioning. By default root is part of the audio group.

To install MS fonts its pretty easy, just:
apt-get update
apt-get install msttcorefonts

That will download and install the font for you.

Hope thats some help

Cheers for that polar,

I've managed to get the "corefonts" now. I don't suppose that you would know if getting "tahoma" is just a case of searching my mandrake install and copying it from there ? (as it was much easier to get the windows fonts with mandrake - it just copied them and does whatever it does to get them installed i.e. and it did all of the MS fonts on my system, as opposed to just the corefonts package).

Now I'm off to find out about that pinning stuff you mentioned.

regards

John

p.s. Ha, I just love it when I get results with this "linux lark" - I had quite a few disasters when I first started - so good results are such a blast!!! (though that's just a blast, not an MS blast )

So, when I look at the /etc/apt/sources.list in konqueror, it looks like this (I still don't know why I get the "permission denied" response from bash)

deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian sarge main contrib non-free
deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian-non-US sarge non-US/main non-US/contrib non-US/non-free
deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian woody main contrib non-free
deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian-non-US woody non-US/main non-US/contrib non-US/non-free
deb http://security.debian.org/ woody/updates main contrib non-free

but after having read the two links about pinning, I still can't work out exactly what I should put to add a source "thing", or how I would add the info to do the "pinning".


For the sound snag, my "lsmod" output looks like this

debian:~# lsmod
Module Size Used by Tainted: P
agpgart 29472 3 (autoclean)
mousedev 3776 0 (unused)
hid 17632 0 (unused)
usbcore 48160 1 [hid]
input 3296 0 [mousedev hid]
nvidia 1628160 11
natsemi 14536 1
af_packet 11400 0 (unused)
rtc 5336 0 (autoclean)
ext2 30400 1 (autoclean)
ide-disk 6592 3 (autoclean)
ide-probe-mod 7968 0 (autoclean)
ide-mod 129420 3 (autoclean) [ide-disk ide-probe-mod]
ext3 56544 1 (autoclean)
jbd 34968 1 (autoclean) [ext3]
unix 13316 83 (autoclean)

as i can't see any reference to sound, I am presuming that I didn't manage to select the sound module.

How can I do this ???

I am now also not sure why the "lsmod" output says "Tainted: P" would this have anything to do with the nvidia driver - as the version that I have had to use for my geforce4 MX 420 graphics card isn't "open source" ?

I will probably have more questions later, but the delivery man has just arrived with the new venetian blinds, so "er indoors" will expect me to put them up "yesterday"


regards

John

for my soundblaster compatible, i had to
apt-get install sndconfig
then run sndconfig to identify my card and insert the module.

hope you don't have to re-compile your kernel, but the above worked fine for me.

Hi Jon

When running Sarge (testing) as my base system and wanting the option to install from Sid (unstable) my source.list is:

#Debian Testing
deb ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian sarge main contrib non-free
deb http://non-us.debian.org/ sarge/non-US main contrib non-free

deb ftp://security.debian.org/debian-security sarge/updates main contrib non-free
deb ftp://security.debian.org/debian-security stable/updates main contrib non-free

#Debian Unstable
deb ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian unstable main contrib non-free
deb http://non-us.debian.org/ unstable/non-US main contrib non-free

My preference file is:

Package: *
Pin: release o=Debian, a=testing
Pin-Priority: 900

Package: *
Pin: release o=Debian, a=unstable
Pin-Priority: 800

The font you mention "tahoma" I don't have installed on my system and to be honest I have never heard of it, so I'm not gonna be able to help you much on that one. But if you have it under Windows on Mandrake then you'll be able to copy it over.

I'll get back to you on the sound card, my girlfriend is getting moody cause Im on the computer. I think you need the emu10k1 module loaded. Have a search on these forum, I bet someone else has had the same prob.

Well, since the last post,

I have done even more digging around, and sort of understand, what I need to do, in regard to the "pinning" thing.

Yes, I have found a place that will give me the info to get the debs from sid. Yes, I know that I need to have the pinning details in /etc/apt/preferences, but, how do I make the directory or file or whatever it is called /etc/apt/preferences ?

Sound. With this, I have done lots of digging around. Firstly, I tried the stuff that penguin_warrior suggested. but I get this

debian:~# apt-get install sndconfig
Reading Package Lists... Done
Building Dependency Tree... Done
Some packages could not be installed. This may mean that you have
requested an impossible situation or if you are using the unstable
distribution that some required packages have not yet been created
or been moved out of Incoming.

Since you only requested a single operation it is extremely likely that
the package is simply not installable and a bug report against
that package should be filed.
The following information may help to resolve the situation:

Sorry, but the following packages have unmet dependencies:
kde: Depends: kdebase-audiolibs but it is not going to be installed or
kdebase3-audiolibs but it is not installable
E: Sorry, broken packages
debian:~#

It seems that I have the latest kdebase-audiolibs.

So I try the next one and get this

debian:~# apt-get install kdebase3-audiolibs
Reading Package Lists... Done
Building Dependency Tree... Done
Package kdebase3-audiolibs has no available version, but exists in the database.This typically means that the package was mentioned in a dependency and
never uploaded, has been obsoleted or is not available with the contents
of sources.list
E: Package kdebase3-audiolibs has no installation candidate
debian:~#

So, I try the lspci command and get this

02:00.0 Multimedia audio controller: Creative Labs SB Live! EMU10k1 (rev 07)
02:00.1 Input device controller: Creative Labs SB Live! MIDI/Game Port (rev 07)


So I know that thesystem can see the soundcard.

I then tried the modbrobe sound and modprobe emu10k1

then with lsmod, get this

debian:~# lsmod
Module Size Used by Tainted: P
emu10k1 52096 0 (unused)
ac97_codec 9376 0 [emu10k1]
sound 52268 0 [emu10k1]
soundcore 3524 7 [emu10k1 sound]
agpgart 29472 3 (autoclean)
mousedev 3776 0 (unused)
hid 17632 0 (unused)
usbcore 48160 1 [hid]
input 3296 0 [mousedev hid]
nvidia 1628160 11
natsemi 14536 1
af_packet 11400 0 (unused)
rtc 5336 0 (autoclean)
ext2 30400 1 (autoclean)
ide-disk 6592 3 (autoclean)
ide-probe-mod 7968 0 (autoclean)
ide-mod 129420 3 (autoclean) [ide-disk ide-probe-mod]
ext3 56544 1 (autoclean)
jbd 34968 1 (autoclean) [ext3]
unix 13316 79 (autoclean)
debian:~#

Which, as I understand it, means that I can force it to see the sound "things". Which drops off when I have re-booted to from whatever

If I then do dmesg, I can see the card at the bottom of the output like this

Creative EMU10K1 PCI Audio Driver, version 0.18, 11:47:54 Aug 2 2003
emu10k1: EMU10K1 rev 7 model 0x8064 found, IO at 0xc000-0xc01f, IRQ 16
ac97_codec: AC97 Audio codec, id: 0x454d:0x4328 (Unknown)
emu10k1: SBLive! 5.1 card detected

and yes, the onboard audio is turned off at the BIOS.

So what next ???

As for the fonts, I have posted a question
here because although under mandrake, I have all my opera and desktop fonts set to "tahoma", so I know it's there, but do you think I can find it? can I f**k. The fonts in the msttcorefonts package are in (I haven't tried to use any of them yet, been a bit busy putting up the venetian blinds and trying to sus the sound and kde3 things).

So at the moment, I'm basically, "buggered"


regards

John

Hello Jon,

Ok, have you installed KDE yet? Have you changed your sources.list file yet?

Ok to make the preferences file you can just use a text editor. Either type out the file but hand or copy and paste it into the text editor then save it in /etc/apt/ with the file name preferences (notice there is no file extension, eg preference.txt).

When you log into Debain do you log in as root or as another user? If you log in as another user, type the following out:
su
adduser *username* audio

This will allow the none root user to use the soundcard.

I'' check back to see how your getting on. Hopefully before the England match!!!

I've just read your post, and will have a go later - we are just finishing off putting up the new venetian blinds (I had to do a little more joinery than I expected + putting up three new "uplighter" wall lights!

But, I must be getting somewhere, because I have just booted into root to do the stuff, and I got the "start up jingle". this is the first time that I have had anything out of the debian install.

Before I go and finish the "DIY" downstairs, a quick question, as I managed to load the modules by hand with "modprobe", do they "switch off" when I reboot i.e. will I have to do modprobe every time until I have sussed out a premanent solution ???

regards

John

Well if you hear the startup jingle then your soundcard must be working!

To get it to load up automatically each time when you boot up open the file /etc/modules in a text editor and add a new line with emu10k1 on it. Hopefully that should do it.

Time for me to get back to the footy!

Last time I heard the score, Clare said it was 2-1 to england.

for an interim post, I have managed to get the soundcard working by doing exactly what you suggested.

The only downside, is that I can't get the bloody cd player (kscd) to play a disc. When I watch the boot dialogue, it says that my cdrw is hdc and the dvd is hdb. So I open the kscd options and change it from /dev/cdrom to /dev/hdc and promptly get a SIGSEGV 11 error and the kscd crashes. I have changed the default device in the kde control centre so it should look at /dev/hdb but that doesn't seem to make any difference.

I installed alsa, but again the boot dialogue says that it isn't running - not sure what difference it would make anyway.

So I'm now off to try the /etc/apt/sources.list thing and the pinning thing.

Will report back.

thanks for the continued assistance.

regards

John

Yeah it was a 2-1 win to the lads!

With the CD player, log in as root and change the settings to point to /dev/hdc and then see if you can play a CD. It maybe because other users then root dont have rights to the hdc.

I think by default the Debian installer only gives root rights to CD/DVD ROM drives.

2-1 a good win, seeing how many of the main team where injured.

I have tried changing the device to /dev/hdc (from /dev/cdrom) in the "audio I/O slave" facility in the kde control centre (as root) and in the kscd options (again as root), and when I try to start it, I am still getting the SIGSEGV 11 error.

Also, I have managed to get the preferences file done

Package: *
Pin: release o=Debian, a=testing
Pin-Priority: 900

Package: *
Pin: release o=Debian, a=unstable
Pin-Priority: 800

Thank god for "copy and paste" facilities.

At the moment, my /etc/apt/sources.list still looks like this -

deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ sarge main contrib non-free
deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian-non-US/ sarge non-US/main non-US/contrib non-US/non-free
deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ woody main contrib non-free
deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian-non-US/ woody non-US/main non-US/contrib non-US/non-free
deb http://security.debian.org/ woody/updates main contrib non-free

I have tried using the instructions that I found here but I get errors about not being able to open or parse the file (not that I know what "parsing a file" is anyway).

So I have returned it to the same as above.

I'm about to try the "unstable" sources that you posted earlier.

Will post back

regards

John

Ok, so I had the sources.list looking like this

deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ sarge main contrib non-free
deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian-non-US/ sarge non-US/main non-US/contrib non-US/non-free
deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian/ woody main contrib non-free
deb ftp://ftp.uk.debian.org/debian-non-US/ woody non-US/main non-US/contrib non-US/non-free
deb http://security.debian.org/ woody/updates main contrib non-free
deb ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian unstable main contrib non-free
deb http://non-us.debian.org/ unstable/non-US main contrib non-free


I do the apt-get update thing and it starts looking good until the end when I get this

Fetched 2796kB in 52s (53.5kB/s)
Reading Package Lists... Error!
E: Dynamic MMap ran out of room
E: Error occured while processing kerberos4kth-kdc (NewVersion1)
E: Problem with MergeList /var/lib/apt/lists/ftp.debian.org_debian_dists_unstable_main_binary-i386_Packages
E: The package lists or status file could not be parsed or opened.
debian:~#

So now I'm totally lost.

regards

John

p.s. I was just thinking, would you know why, I still seem to have the "woody" sources in my .list? after all, your list only shows the stable stuff from the security site - would it all still work if I commented out the other woody references ?

Hi Jon

If you are running Sarge(testing) you can get rid of the woody (stable) entries.

In the sources.list file I showed ignore
deb ftp://security.debian.org/debian-security stable/updates main contrib non-free
thats a mistake on my behalf.

So your sources.list should look like:
#Debian Testing
deb ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian sarge main contrib non-free
deb http://non-us.debian.org/ sarge/non-US main contrib non-free

deb ftp://security.debian.org/debian-security sarge/updates main contrib non-free

#Debian Unstable
deb ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian unstable main contrib non-free
deb http://non-us.debian.org/ unstable/non-US main contrib non-free


At the moment you are getting that error cause apts cache memory cant handle all the packages contained within all three debain distrobutions.