Okay i had windows but it was messy to many files and folders that i didnt need so i went to install LFS so i could keep order, but it was taking to long and i had work to do so i just went back to RH9. Well i updated some software like python and things and i wanna compile the new kernel but my question is, does anyone know of a good place or tutorial for cleaning up linux? Like how to find out what files and folders i dont need or uninstalling software.

--does linux have a folder like windows "Program files"
-- are there drivers or stuff i could clean up
-- if i recompile the kernel do i get rid of the old one and how?

Also is there a good tutorial on permissions (not how to set them i know that stuff) like which files or directories should have what permissions? Maybe thats a security question...

If non-messiness is what you want, don't bother with Linux - do it properly and get yourself BSD.

AHH *ack* *stab* *pulls knife from back* BSD!!!

Red Hat 9 does come with a lot stuff you probably won't want and installs by default. Even the minimal install is pretty portly.

Try Debian or Gentoo. I think those have the "only what you need" mentality. Then again, those have BSDish tendencies.

try core linux (i tryed lfs but i only had a root user so it failed for stupid reasons, this distro is small (you can even amke it smaller cuse the install is done by a shell scripts that only unpackes teh basic packages, all you ahve to do is unpack teh packages taht you want and u got a real small fast and all thats needed is a kernel ull need to compile), altho i do admit the frist time i tryed it it didetn work, so i reinstalled eery package from source now it works fine

What about College Linux? And can someone clear up what is the difference between BSD and linux aren't they the same pretty much?

Very similar in directory structure.
I believe BSD is based on Unix, Linux is an original operating system which uses the same type of directory structure but was built without using the original Unix code.

...I think....


Try Slackware if you want a lean, mean machine.

i used to spend days deleting files out of my linux installs to make it small.
deleting all the readme's and info files and man pages, and other language
documentation.
you can find stuff like find . -name spanish -print
and in that dir there will be stuff for a bunch of different languages. you can
delete the ones that aren't for yours.
i would always have everything backed up, and when i deleted something that
messed things up, i put it back. that sort of toying used to mess up windows
pretty bad, but linux could handle it. usually i just move the files into a nearby
directory for testing.
reminds me of the old days. making a 1 floppy geoworks version. i had a 2 5 1/4
inch disk windows 3.1 install that worked. and i made an os2 2.1 1 disk boot
floppy. that took a week. i had the floppy formatted at about 83 or 84 tracks and
probably 22 sectors per track and interleaved too.
now i have the same fun making custom knoppix disks with mame and other stuff
i want. i got the knoppix cdrom image down to around 430 megs compressed, so
that left me with loads of room to jam stuff in.


no programs files directory. a few big apps like to install in /usr/lib/ which sucks.
like mozilla sometimes. small binaries for general use are in /bin and /usr/bin/.
superuser binaries are in /sbin and /usr/sbin. thats for stuff that comes with the
distro. when you compile stuff yourself, /usr/local/bin is normal.
when i'm messing with something really big, that i dont' want to mess up other stuff,
i'll put it in opt, so i won't forget about it. and i can delete it later more easily.
like if i want to compile a new version of kde or try some new wine version, that's
where it's going to go.

As far as a "Program Files" directory...

In most Linux distributions, the executables that are system wide for users are installed in the /usr partition. Some distros (like SuSE for example) use /opt as well. It's not quite the same thing as most Linux programs are avaialble to all users and same their per-user settings in the user's /home partition subdirectory. Directory of Linux partitions and directory is as follows:

/ -- the root partition
/usr -- the user partition where user programs and library files are stored
/opt -- not on all systems also where certain user available programs and libraries are stored
/etc, /dev, /bin, and like directories -- where system settings, programs and devices are stored (everything, even physical devices are files in Linux)
/home -- the "home" of the users' personal accounts, where all their user settings, like their desktop settings are stored. Users can also install programs there that, are theirs alone to run.

Holy sheet! That's hardcore


When I used Linux, I used Debian, because once you get your head around dselect, it's really easy to build the system from the ground up, exactly the way you want it. I find Linux too chaotic for my liking these days, gimme my FreeBSD thanks

there was a dos tsr called fdread that let dos read unusually formatted floppies.
nobody could read any of my disks without that. i'm sure it drove people nuts.
i loved fdformat.exe. you could specify the tracks sectors and interleave and
such when formatting a floppy. back then floppy disks cost $1 so it was more
important to jam more stuff on a disk.
superstore had a utility called 2xon and 2xoff that enabled filesystem compression
for a floppy. i bet nobody remembers that stuff.