Hello, everyone:

First of all, I want thank the administrators for allowing me the opportunity to post to this site. I hope my "newbie" questions won't be too boring or annoying to all of you. Allow me to provide a little background about myself. I am a retired civil servant who enjoys using computers, having started with my very first system, a Commodore 64 back in the mid-80s. What little I have learned about how computers work and about programming is all self-taught, beginning with BASIC, in which I still enjoy occasionally writing code.

I have had the privilege of posting to the Linux Forums "Coffee Lounge", and they were both helpful and patient while trying to guide me through the intricacies of learning the bin/BASH commands. The people on the Scribus mailing list forum were equally helpful as I was learning to use that desktop publishing tool. I thought I would give this forum a try, so this is my very first post here.

Anyway, allow me to get right to my reason for contacting you. When one of my laptops began repeatedly shutting down while I was trying to use my Windows XP recovery discs, I decided to take a second serious look at a Linux distro. I suspect that my ROM-BIOS is corrupted, but I cannot use the erase-restore utility unless I'm already running Windows, since I won't work directly in MS-DOS. Anyway, since I already had a "tryout" disc with openSUSE v11.3 with the Gnome GUI I decided to install it on this system.

I actually have two issues that I want to address with this installation, and would appreciate any assistance that any of you can provide:

FIRST AND PRIMARY ISSUE:
I was hoping to get my WLAN drivers, which were written for Windows, to work in this Linux environment. I have been looking into using something called an "NDIS file wrapper", which is supposed to allow these drivers to be recognized and to communicate with my WLAN in Linux, but from what I have been reading, I will need to do some linux coding.

SECOND ISSUE:
I would like to get some applications to autorun when I boot up. I have discovered that I can right-click on the app in the applications tab in My "Computer" to add them to my "startup programs" list, but how can I, for example, get "gedit" to launch, open, and automatically display a text file? I've tried copying the text file that I want to automatically display directly into my startup folder [robert@linux-7uad/home/robert], but gedit displayed only a default blank document. Can I append a file name to the application in the terminal, as you can with .EXE files in MD-DOS?

Any advice that anyone can offer will be greatly appreciated, and thanks again for taking the time to read my post.

Bob

First of all, welcome to the forum. I'm an old retired guy too. Let me see if I can help you out.

Your second problem, probably the easiest to solve. Here is a link that should help.

-->http://en.gentoo-wiki.com/wiki/Autostart_Programs

There are different types of programs you may want to start on boot up. When you start them matters. A server for example should be started before the desktop ( window manager ). A program like gedit should be started after the desktop is running, and you log in. Part of the problem with linux is there are many desktops to choose from, Gnome, KDE, XFCE to mention the most popular. Each has its own method of starting an application. That is why I pointed you to a howto link. If you try another desktop, then another method is needed. Its all about choice.

Now on your primary issue. I would strongly suggest you use a linux driver. Most cards and chip sets will work with native linux drivers. In linux they are more reliable, and most card features will work. You should only go the Ndiswrapper route if there is no linux driver available.

That said, here is a link to help with Ndiswrapper.

-->http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawik.../index.php/FAQ

Now, to see if there is a native driver.

When you installed the system, the chip set may have been detected, and the driver may already be loaded. There are some command you can run to find out if the driver is loaded. If it is not loaded, we need to determine what chip set you have, then look to find the driver. Load it if necessary, and then configure it.

O.K. To find out what chip set you have, open a command window. There should be an icon somewhere to do that. Once opened, run the command '/sbin/lspci'. Type what is between the quotes only. You should get a list of devices on your pci bus.

Here is my ethernet device from the list on my system.

I do not have a wireless device on this desktop system, I do on my netbook.

If the device is a USB device, then the command would be '/sbin/lsusb'.

Post the results.

To see the modules ( drivers ) that are loaded, you can run the command 'lsmod'. It will show you all drivers that are now loaded. Only problem is we don't yet know what module you need for your card.

Have a look, post the results, and we can find out what driver, and if it is already loaded.

A command you can try is 'iwconfig'. If the correct driver is already loaded, ( it may be ), then in the output you will an interface with a name like wlan0. If that is there, all you need to do is configure the interface. It will then work.

Hope this helps.

also check linux mint, it comes with wireless drivers preinstalled and it has ndiswrapper pre installed also

Hi, all

I wanted to reply to both yooy and camorri in this post in order to save server space.

First of all, thank you both for your responses. I'm actually posting this using the "offending" WLAN mentioned in my original post. Wow! 'm I bad! My problem all along appeared to be that device was not pushed in far enough into my USB extension cable! When I noticed this, I re-booted, and the device was immediately recognized and I was online as soon as I entered my WEP password. I never had to use the terminal, although I intend to begin my bin-BASH lessons very shortly. [I was hoping that someone can recommend a good "newbie" tutorial for me to use to get started.]

I'll investigate the second issue--startup/autorun--at another time. Right now, I'm enjoying my success at being able to connect once again with this laptop, after nearly a week!

Anyway, thanks again to both of you, as well as to anyone else who may be planning to respond.

Bob Marma

You are most welcome. Glad to help.

Thanks for posting the reply.

Here's a good tutorial for the cmd line (aka cli) http://rute.2038bug.com/index.html.gz
Incidentally, as you are new-ish to Linux, this is worth a quick read as well http://linux.oneandoneis2.org/LNW.htm

I also recommend opening a terminal and running
which will tell you exactly which Linux distribution and version you have. If you add this to your profile (see 'Distribution' on the left here <--), then it will help us provide accurate advice in future.

Welcome to LQ

Hi, all,



I want to thank all of you who responded to my "newbie" queries, especially chrism01. That Rute User's Tutorial and Exposition at the link you kindly provided appears to be the most comprehensive Linux tutorial that I've come across so far! I was looking for an analog clock for my desktop [since I'm spoiled to having one on my Windows desktops], when I discovered Linux's own XClock command. I'm just trying to figure out how I can write this command into a tiny shell script to have the clock launch automatically when I boot up.

I had to re-install openSUSE 11.3 on my system because after I installed VLC my WLAN stopped working. VLC must have created a conflict with my WLAN drivers. After recovery, it started working again.

I ran the command you suggested, and Linux reported as follows:
openSUSE 11.3 (i586)
VERSION = 11.3


I'll undoubtedly be bothering all of you again real soon, and I appreciate your continued patience and understanding.


Regards,



Robert Marma

robert_marma, welcome to LQ. In future, please put unrelated questions in separate threads. This will make it easier to keep track of answers to a specific question.

Dear Nylex,
Sorry about that. I should have read the rules.
Cheers,
Bob