Hi, my name is Jess and I'm new to Linux -- I recently bought one of the new laptops from Dell that were preloaded with Ubuntu 7.04. I was trying to learn how to install a program using the terminal, and one of my friends recommended Tilda. I managed to get it installed (with lots of help from the internet) and everything seemed to work fine. But when I started up the computer again, Gnome (I guess?) doesn't load and all I get is a black screen and a cursor. By pressing CTRL+ALT+F1 I get the terminal, and when I enter the commands:

sudo killall gdm
startx

it starts me back up, but it doesn't fix the problem. What is the problem, and what can I do to fix it?

Also, I'm not sure if it's Tilda's fault or just something stupid I did. Alternately, how could I uninstall the program? (I've looked for the commands on the internet but I can't seem to find anything to help.)

I really appreciate any help I can get.
Thanks.


Sorry if this all sounds kind of dumb, I really am very confused.

Well, how did you install this program? With Ubuntu you should be using pre-complied .deb files that can be easily upgraded or uninstalled from your system. That is what the package management system is there for...to keep track of what software is present and prevent any conflicts from occuring that might cause a problem. If you for some reason bypassed all these safeguards then please describe specifically what steps you did follow.

I didn't use the package manager for installing this -- I wanted to learn how to install using the terminal, and my friend thought that this program would be a good introduction (he is familiar with Linux and has been using it for years). I followed these instructions:



Extract the source:
- tar xvf tilda-0.09.3.tar.gz
Install required software:
- sudo apt-get install libconfuse-dev
- sudo apt-get install libvte-dev
- sudo apt-get install libgtk2.0-dev
- sudo apt-get install gcc
- sudo apt-get install libc6-dev
- sudo apt-get install make
Change to the tilda source directory
Install tilda
- ./configure
- make
- sudo make install


I tried installing and then uninstalling through the package manager, but it didn't get rid of Tilda. Frankly, I just didn't forsee there being a problem with me doing it, especially since my friend didn't say anything about it.

And the README doesn't have information on unintalling, nor can I find specific instructions online, but I'll keep looking just incase. If I can just get rid of the Tilda that I installed manually, I can just install through the package manager.

Thanks.

Go back into the source install path (where you did ./configure, make, etc)

$ sudo make uninstall