NVIDIA DRIVER ERROR: You appear to be running an X serve
 

Hi im new to this forum so first things first.

Hi all :D

This is my seccond time running linux, im just learning the ropes, im currently running ubuntu 5.04.

first apon installation of latest NVIDIA drivers i receved this error

ERROR: You appear to be running an X server; please exit X before installing. For further details, please see the section INSTALLING THE NVIDIA DRIVER
in the README available on the Linux driver download page at nvidia.c0m.

1) what is a X Server
2) how do i close it
3) how do i know what is running

next question i have, i downloaded alien package manager? and its in souce format, how do i re-compile it so install the package..

thanks in advance

are you trying to install it via gnome-console? if so logout of out gnome
type
and it will bring you to the command line
then do
and it shold stop the X server.

As for how you know what is running try
that will list all of the things running. Did you download the binary for alien? Alien is not a package manager, it changes rpm's to .debs(what you need for ubuntu). Hope this helps:)

I acknowledge this has practically been said, but

ps aux | less

will help you find the PID of the xserver process

and

kill PID

will kill the process

Just to give a little more info...

X is the term used to refer to the X window system. In a nutshell, you can basically think of it as your desktop/windowing environment. X is the basic framework that allows the computer to display application windows, and other things. Environments like Gnome and KDE are built on top of X. The "server" bit just describes that when X is running, multiple separate users can use the X system to display desktops. For a one-person computer, it's really not important. But it's a layer of flexibility that can be useful in some situations.

EDIT: Only I would use 50+ words when a concise paraphrase will do: It's your GUI

Re: NVIDIA DRIVER ERROR: You appear to be running an X serve
 

Hi there.

Some quick answers:
X is the graphical server. It's called a server not because it's this big PC in the server room, but because it 'serves' graphics to your PC.

You are trying to install a driver that your graphical user interface server (the X server) is using. Therefore you must exit the graphical mode to a console, so that X doesn't run any more.
You can do that by opening a terminal session, switching to root by typing 'su' then the root password and once you get a prompt, type 'init 3'. All these commands must be entered without the wrappping apostrophes.
So, to recap, once you get the terminal (it's like the DOS prompt box):
su
yourpassword
init 3

Warning: this will kill your graphical environment and you will see something like the old DOS mode. You need to log in, then try to re-install the nvidia driver.
If you want to get back into the graphical interface, type 'startx' and X will start ;)

For your third question, you need to be more precise. You can see what processes are running by typing 'top' in a terminal session (also known as a shell). Hit 'q' to exit the top program.

One more thing, you seem to be quite new to Linux and that's why my post attempts to give you more info thatwould normally be needed. I don't wish to offend you.
As a word of advice, although I encourage you to try the nvidia driver installation, I feel that I should warn you that this is no small thing. Especially since you must do most of the work without the aid of a graphical environment.
That being said, good luck. This is the only way to learn Linux - getting your hands dirty.

I hope this helps.

Sorry didnt work but i found this
 

Q: How to install Graphics Driver (NVIDIA)?

1. Read General Notes
2. Read How to add extra repositories?
3.

4. Insert the following lines into the new file

[Desktop Entry]
Name=NVIDIA Settings
Comment=NVIDIA Settings
Exec=nvidia-settings
Icon=
Terminal=false
Type=Application
Categories=Application;System;

5. Save the edited file (sample)
6. Read How to restart GNOME without rebooting computer?
7. Applications -> System Tools -> NVIDIA Settings


but i still dont know how to install alien, i downloaded the file alien_8.56.tar.gz, contains mainly perl files

look for the documentation on the site you downloaded it from. In debian you can 'apt-get install alien', and you don't need to mess w/ source. I don't know what the ubuntu repositories have in them though.

Thanks worked a beauty...
now to get cedega up and running :D
thanks for all the help gy's

sure, glad we could be of assistance :)