Running executables
 

Heya,

I have just installed MDK10 community over my old under-used Fedora insatllation. I dont get much use of Linux cos no-one has made any working drivers for my modem yet and I host my houses' network.

But aside from that, how the heck do you run executable files? I dont mean .exe's or anything like that, I mean just programs.

For example, I just installed Omnistudio. In the Linux dir there is a 'setup' program. Double clicking in KDE didnt work, nor did /path/setup in the cli. So I did it via the rpm's.

Now, omnistudio is there in /local/usr/rainingdata/os32/omnis or something like that, it says the file is executable, but running it in the gui or cli just doesnt do anything. I mean ANYTHING at all. Mandrake just carries on as if I hadn't typed anything or clicked anything.

This was happenening in Fedora too, which makes me pretty certain that its me that doing things wrong.

I dont think I am stupid, but could someone please help me with a simple straight answer?

Cheers in advance :D

A lot of times when you click an icon in a GUI (KDE, GNOME, etc.) and it looks like something is happening and then nothing happens, I've usually found the reason is that something isn't set up right. If you run it manually from the CLI, a lot of times you will get some type of output telling you why the program couldn't start (missing library, broken link, etc.).

Now I know you said that you tried launching this program from the CLI. Did it give you any type of output back on the screen? Did it just hang there? Did it return you back to the prompt?

Also, I've found that some programs will not appear to run correctly under particular user names. For instance, when logged on as root, to start firefox, I have to type

sh firefox &

but when I am logged in just as myself, I can start firefox with

firefox &

Just some thoughts.

It's extremely unlikely that the problem is in system itself, probably your applications are starting correctly and then crashing silently. Unless you specify the '&' symbol at end of line, when the prompts appears the executable has either detached from shell (if it's a daemon, eg a server) or finished executing.
Maybe you'll even find a lot of core.nnnn files in your home, if your account is configured to create them.
I can't help you find out why an app crashes, since I dropped mdk year ago 'cause it was too messy, with different overlapping libraries and package managers.

->Tino27 : Just a tip: if a program refuses to run as root, there's often a good reason related to security. It's not a good idea to try forcing it.

I couldn't agreed more with you, ac1980. And normally I only runs things as root that should be run as root. I was only trying to point out that depending on who Dill is logged in as may affect the syntax required to start the application.