You are about to enter the NEWBIE ZONE! And thank you for taking the time to do so.

I have just installed AGNULA DeMuDi 1.2.1 on a second drive (hdb) in a computer that already contained 2 working OSs - Win98SE on hda1 and Mandrake 10.1 official on hda5. I’m having difficulties with several things not working yet in AGNULA DiMuDi – modem and floppy to name the two most important at the moment. Currently working on getting the floppy to work, as this will allow me to load GNOME-ppp from floppy. To this end I checked /etc/fstab in Mandrake 10.1.
/etc/fstab for Mandrake 10.1 is:
<file system> <mountpoint> <type> <options> <dump> <pass>
/dev/hda5 / ext3 defaults 1 1
/dev/hda7 home ext3 defaults 1 2
/dev/hdd /mnt/cdrom auto umask=0,user,iocharset=iso8859,codepage=850,noauto,ro,exec,users 0 0
none /mnt/floppy supermount dev=/dev/fd0,fs=ext2:vfat,--,umask=0,iocharset=iso8859-1,sync,codepage=850 0 0
/dev/hda1 /mnt/windows vfat umask=0,iocharset=iso8859-1,codepage=850 0 0
none /proc proc defaults 0 0
/dev/hda6 swap swap defaults 0 0
/dev/sda1 /mnt/removable auto umask=0,user,iocharset=iso8859-1,sync,kudzu,codepage=850,noauto,exec,users 0 0
I compared the above with the /etc/fstab from A/DiMuDi and was surprised at the number of differences.
/etc/fstab for AGNULA DeMuDi is:
<file system> <mountpoint> <type> <options> <dump> <pass>
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
/dev/hdb1 / ext3 defaults,errors=remount-ro 0 1
/dev/hdb6 /home ext3 defaults 0 2
/dev/hdb5 none swap sw 0 0
/dev/hdd /media/cdrom0 iso9660ro,user,noauto 0 0
/dev/fd0 /media/floppy0 auto rw,user,noauto 0 0
Some questions: Should I be able to interchange the lines for the floppy and windows mounts given in the Mandrake fstab by typing them in as is? For example: add
/dev/hda1 /mnt/windows vfat umask=0,iocharset=iso8859-1,codepage=850 0 0
none /mnt/floppy supermount and substitute dev=/dev/fd0,fs=ext2:vfat,--,umask=0,iocharset=iso8859-1,sync,codepage=850 0 for the /dev/fd0 entry
to the A/DeMuDi fstab. I know that the A/DiMuDi fstab contains a line for a floppy, and a floppy shows up in nautilus, but it won’t respond.
Thanks for any help.

This is a Debian floppy line for fstab:

/dev/fd0 /floppy auto noauto,sync 0 0

This is what it looks like in fedora
/dev/fd0 /media/floppy auto pamconsole,exec,noauto,utf8,managed 0 0

The existing one in A/DiMuDi
/dev/fd0 /media/floppy0 auto rw,user,noauto 0 0

... should be fine.
insert floppy, type "mount /media/floppy0" and it should be up.

When the floppy icon appears - try to cd /media/floppy0

Supermount is a Mandrake thing, but the other one should be fine, just make sure you create the /mnt/windows directory for it if it doesn't already exist.

Thanks. That worked. I've got GNOME-ppp in my home directory and now just have to figure out how to get it to execute.

http://www.penguin-soft.com/penguin/...gnome-ppp.html

you want to do:... note: this is a front-end for wvdial.

Wvdial is set up in /etc/wvdial.conf (man wvdial.conf) and is very easy to do.

Thank you. I'll try this.
I have another question IRT mounting another device. I inserted the line from my mandrake /etc/fstab for my USB external drive (WD essentials 80GB. The line I inserted is:
/dev/sda1 /mnt/removable auto umask=0,user,iocharset=iso8859-1,sync,kudzu,codepage=850,noauto,exec,users 0 0
then mkdir /mnt/removable.
I rebooted and system load seemed to go ok, but when I attempted to access the drive from nautilus, right clicking the removable icon resulted in "Unable to mount the selected volume. The volume is probably in a format that cannot be mounted." Show more details returned "mount: wrong fs type, bad option, bad superblock on /dev/sda1. missing codepage or other error in some cases useful info is found in syslog - try try dmesg |tail or so"
dmesg |tail returned info that seemed ok until the last line "FAT: Unrecognizable mount option "kudzu" or missing value"
So it seems that "kudzu isn't something that A/DeMuDi understands (if I'm on the right track, here.) Is there another mount option?
Thanks again for the help.

I wonder if my installation did not go as it should. The reason I say this is that I seem to be missing files such as a dialer program for ppp. It seems logical that at least one would have been included, but I have been unable to find it. Perhaps (likely?) the problem is that I don’t know where to look, but I’ve gone back to the Synaptic Package Manager and examined the files listed in Base System and find no names such as wvdial, pon, minicom. Apt-get returns can’t find package (or text to that effect.) ppp is listed and I’ve used ppp-config to configure that … so maybe I already have the tool s need but don’t know it.

I downloaded wvdial_1.56-1_i386.deb and “floppied” it to my /home/glenn. When I did the folllowing:
debian:/home/glenn# chmod 755
debian:/home/glenn#./ wvdial_1.56-1_i386.deb
I got:
./ wvdial_1.56-1_i386.deb: line1: syntax error near unexpected token ‘newline’
./ wvdial_1.56-1_i386.deb: line1: ‘!<arch>’
I also tried similar for gnome-ppp and got similar results.
I’m running out of ideas to get connected to the net.
Direction for this newbie is needed. Thanks for any help.

You are on the right track. Kudzu is the redhat auto-configuration manager. Just remove that option, it isn't needed. The entire fstab line is wildly overwritten...

/dev/sda1 /mnt/removable auto umask=0,user,iocharset=iso8859-1,sync,kudzu,codepage=850,noauto,exec,users 0 0

Do you understand what all these options do?

umask is a fat option which sets the bitmask of permissions that are not present. So umask=0 gives everyone rwx permission to everything. You don't really need this.

user allows ordinary users to mount the volume - wanted. "owner" is another possibility.

iocharset is for fonts - you don't really need it.

sync does all IO synchronously - wanted for short-life media like some flash drives. You don't need it.

kudzu is redhat only - you don't have kudzu installed, so you don't want this.

codepage is a fat option. It is for converting their short filenames. Only needed if page 437 (the default) is not available.

noauto tells the kernel not to try mounting the volume when it boots - this is needed because the drive may not be plugged in at boot time.

exec permits the execution of binaries - needed if you want to be able to run programs from the removable drive. If it is just a storage unit, you don't want this.

users allows anybody logged into your system to mount or unmount the volume ... not a good idea.

So the fstab options should really be:

/dev/sda1 /mnt/removable auto user, noauto 0 0

... which is much cleaner.

That is because this is a .deb package. The debian equivalent to rpm. The equivalent manager is called dpkg. (man dpkg)

To use: dpkg -i wvdial_1.56-1_i386.deb
... this installs wvdial.

Often, Debian based systems are configured to run dpkg when you double-click the icon of a deb package.

You can check the installed packets with dpkg -l

Note: on dialer - there is likely a gui dialer hidden in the menues somewhere. Probably under something labelled "network" or "network devices". For eg. In Ubuntu it is in system > administration > networking, and in fedora it is in main > system tools > network device control ... see the pattern? (The same dialog will control all your network devices, not just the modem.)

pppd controls the ppp connection and the handshake program is usually called "chat". But wvdial is good. It is configured from a text file called /etc/wvdial.conf (edit it in a text editor - see man wvdial.conf for details)

Is this an external/hardware modem or an internal one?
(For an easy life, use an external serial modem.)

Now - I'm putting this in a seperate post to grab your attention...

1. You cannot transplane configuration things between different distributions.

2. Read the man pages for the commands you want to use
i.e. man fstab, man mount, man dpkg, man apt-get ... you will learn so much so quickly if you get into this habit.

3. Read the man pages ...

4. use apt-get ... the repository file for this is a text file called: sources.lst normally in the /etc directory. Open it with a text editor, and you will likely find lots of extra repository entries commented out. Uncomment them then run apt-get update ... there will now be many more packages to choose from.

5. Read the man pages ...

Yes I know 2,3,5 are the same ... it's just that it is so important that I felt I had to list it three times.

Curious - especially about the missing packages - I looked up this distro in distrowatch.
http://distrowatch.com/table.php?distribution=DeMuDi this it?

Have you looked through the wiki page:
http://demudi.alioth.debian.org/

... you know this project is finished? Looks like it was never actually completed. The principal aims are redundant or self-contradictory too...

It fails to be a reference because itself referrs to redhat or debian.
It cannot be completely devoted to professional and consumer audio applications and multimedia development and be completely based on Free Software because major commercial multimedia formats are proprietary. (Except is a strictly political sence I guess.) So it won't play mp3 avi wma dat mpeg4/divX etc etc. Is MS Wav format free? That kinda leaves ogg/vorbis (was theora video around in 2004?).

I think you'll find your experience a little dissappointing. What lead you to choose this particular distro?

However: if you enjoy the glipse of the Debian Way - you may like to install Ubuntu (or... even... <drum roll> Debian). It'll be more up to date and have everything you need at your fingertips insead of having to fight for everything in a legacy, incomplete distro.

I thank you for the posts. As you can tell from my questions, I know very little about the nuts and bolts of a linux system. I'm learning slowly and reading, but examples such as those you provided are much more understandable to me.
As to A/DiMuDi and what lead me to it .... I'm a hobbyist musician. I had been using Audacity under Mandrake and I wanted to expand my toolkit to include Ardour but was unable to get jack to run. In my search for solutions to my jack problem, I ran across the A/DiMuDi pages. The idea of a purpose built kernel appealed to me and so I ordered a disk (no fast access where I live, so downloading is not an option). Jack does run! I don't regret the experience and I'm not throwing in the towel yet, but if you have suggestions for a distro that is aimed at sound production I'd like to hear about it.
As an aside, I tried dpkg for wvdial and it did indeed unpack it. I ran into dependency problems, but I know how to go about collection the various packages I need to make it work and so that's my next few hours of work.
Again, my sincere thanks for your help.

Ardour is available in the apt-get repositories for Ubuntu. the jack audio connection daemon is also available, and supported, along with plugins and tools. (So is audacity.)
You can order a disk for free from www.ubuntu.com - suggest you order the live version as well.

There are also open source proffessional audio mixer/editors etc out there.

You'll be interested in the ogg/vorbis site then?

Have you seen the magnatunes site? Though there are creative commons web groups around for musicians - these guys are commercial and non-evil.

Thanks to all the help I've been given, I'm posting this using Firefox from within A/DiMuDi! wvdial is installed and working (gnome-ppp still has dependency problems - but wvdial works so well, I'm not going to fool with gettin the gui going.) Still much more to do, but now that I'm connected, getting the updates I need is doable! Thanks once again!