giving commands

blotch · 11-11-2001, 12:30 AM

Hi,

I've installed Mandrake 8.1 and selected Gnome. I then turned Gnome off to see what happened.

Trouble is, I now can't get get Linux to do anything. It accepts my username and password and then the cursor just blinks at me.

So, how do I give it a command? And how do I get Gnome back?

I'm going to need a good basic beginners book, obviously. Any ideas?

Cheers,

Blotch

isajera · 11-11-2001, 01:13 AM

what do you mean you "turned off" gnome? what exactly did you do?

blotch · 11-11-2001, 09:11 AM

Dear Isajera,

I went into Root and disabled Gnome by, I think, clicking on its startup button.

If I could get back into Mandrake I'd turn it back on again.

Thanks

Blotch

acid_kewpie · 11-11-2001, 09:19 AM

Dear blotch

so you basically just don't get the pretty windows thingy come up?

once you've logged in type: startx
to get into Gnome. Then you can change it back if you know how. If you need help on getting it back properly, come back. It's pretty easy to do in Mandrake tho

hmm isa, just realised i could call you isajerk... but that wouldn't be nice, so i won't.

blotch · 11-11-2001, 01:57 PM

Dear Chris,

I'm not worried about losing the pretty picture thingy, as you put it. In fact, I'd be happier typing in commands as I'm a fair typist. That's why I turned off Gnome in the first place......

Your command 'startx' has rescued the situation. Where can I learn about the rest of the commands so I can, for instance, use Abiword and all the other goodies available under Linux?

Know of a good beginners book?

Many thanks for helping out.

Blotch

webtoe · 11-11-2001, 02:05 PM

you can go to linux.org
to try one of their online course things. this should get you going with some basic commands.

Alex

taz.devil · 11-11-2001, 03:50 PM

When I first started with Linux I bought "Linux in a nutshell" It's been updated a few times since then but it has every useful command and it's tags/options that you would want, or even not want. It was a good getting started type book, although overwhelming since it's not written in a linux for dummies format. It dives right in.

acid_kewpie · 11-11-2001, 06:22 PM

hmm, i find learnign that way slow and annoying, without meaning to sound pompous or anything, cos i don't mean it like that...

when i learn a programming langauge i'm much happier just getting an API rather than a manual and diving in head first, and i never really used anything to suss linux out other than 'man -k' really. Less faffing around!

isajera · 11-11-2001, 06:53 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by acid_kewpie

hmm isa, just realised i could call you isajerk... but that wouldn't be nice, so i won't.

how sweet of you

... the english are so polite.

onryou · 06-22-2003, 04:13 AM

Quote:

the english are so polite

Ha... worthless post, but i had to laugh.