Ok I guess I just don' t get it....I switched from xp to mepis. The only software I would like to continue using is Limewire. I downloaded the linux version and saved it to desktop. Someone told me that i needed to install from konsole. I simply do not understand or either it has not been fully explained. I guess what i need is a step by step guide. Could someone please help me?

I guess what they mean is that you must take the installation file, unpack, compile and install it.

Let say the file you got downloaded is called limewire.tar.gz (just as an example).

1. On your desktop, start a console. This is done in KDE by clicking Run Command... on the start menu, then typing xterm in the box that pops up and hitting ENTER. If that does not work, try konsole instead of xterm. One of the two should pop up a window on your desktop that is called a terminal or console.

2. Click on this window and type su and press ENTER.

3. Give your root password.

4. Now you need to know where you put the installation file. If your Linux username is something like abcd, you might want to look in /home/abcd/limwire.tar.gz to correctly specify the file location.

5. You should be in the /home/abcd (or whatever your username is) directory. Type pwd and press ENTER if you are unsure.

6. If the file is called limewire.tar.gz (as I describe here) now type

tar zxvf limewire.tar.gz

and press ENTER to "unpack" it. You should now see lots of stuff scroll upward on the screen.

7. If the file is called limewire.tar.bz2 do

bunzip2 limewire.tar.bz2 [ENTER key]
tar xvf limewire.tar

and press ENTER to "unpack" it.

8. When the screen stops scrolling, note the directory name that was created by the unpack - it should be something like "/home/abcd/limewire_source" or whatever.

9. CD into this directory:

cd limewire_source

10. Now you need to compile the software (if you got a source distribution):

./configure [ENTER]
make dep[ENTER]
make [ENTER]

11. LOTS of stuff should scroll upward, maybe taking a few minutes (even half an hour) depending on how fast your system is.

12. Now type

make install [ENTER]
/sbin/ldconfig [ENTER]

13. The package should now be installed.

Since I've got no idea what LimeWire is, I don't know how you start it - most of the times the executable that got made by compiling the software (step 10) goes into the /usr/local/bin directory, so go look there for a "limewire" file or something and try to run it.

Hope this helped - very generic and simplified.

Oh yeah if you copied to desktop, you somehow need to find the desktop directory, or use the GUI to move the downloaded file into your /home/????? directory (substitute the ????? for your username) for my explanation to be applicable.

Kind Regards

Some simple advice from a fellow newbie. You will have no chance of learning Linux by trying to transfer your Windows knowledge. Under the surface each OS is a very different beast. Invest in a book or two. I got the Fedora bible, and others swear by the O'Reilly series. A worthy investment, trust me.