LinuxQuestions.org - How do you work this thing?

- Linux - Software (https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-software-2/)

- - How do you work this thing? (https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-software-2/how-do-you-work-this-thing-201207/)

How do you work this thing?

I am new to Linux. I am a PC and Mac user. I have Red Hat 9.1 installed on a spare Gateway laptop I had lying around. It installed very easily and was a no brainer, however, now that the OS is installed I am wondering what to do next. I have used Open Office since I have that on my iBook with OS X Panther. That is about it. Oh, and surf the net. I played around with some Terminal commands checking things out. I am trying to get this thing more graphic friendly through use of windows instead of major typing or coding. Any suggestions on how to get started with getting some programs installed on this thing? Possibly some references and some links to download some graphic programs and some mp3 player maybe?

Thanks.

What GUI did you install? Install KDE or GNOME for a good time :) They both come w/ audio player gui's if you installed them. As to a site that just has a bunch of things to download?? try http://www.freshmeat.net/ this site has some media players if you can't find one already installed http://linux.tucows.com/

I am not sure really how to check. I am new to Linux. I have a GUI....however, I have no idea about anything with Linux. That's why I am requesting some newbie knowledge.

Thanks.

Does the start menu button look like a foot (gnome) or a K (kde)?

I know absolutely NOTHING about linux. Can you tell me what to look for in IDIOT terms?

I am looking at my Add Or Remove Packages screen and it looks like 35/35 of Gnome is installed. 0/16 KDE....is there any real difference or is it just personal preference between the two?

Sorry, I though I was already being too 'user-friendly' :)

Okay, when you are in the gui - do you have a start bar at the top or bottom of the screen. If so, is there a button with a FOOT on it or a K? If it's a foot, it's gnome. If it's a K, you are using KDE.

If you have some other bar without those buttons, you are using something else. If you have no bar, you are using something else.

What happens if you click the left or right mouse button anywhere on the middle of the screen? Ar there any menus pop up?

We are flying blind here as linux can be running any number of dozens of different gui's and they are all, well, different.

We can't even start til we have some idea what you are using... :)

hmm...Well I believe w/ Red Hat if you installed GNOME the "start menu" should be a foot, and if you did KDE it is actually a red hat, not a K like usual. Do you have a start menu like thing? If so then you probably installed KDE or GNOME, if alot of programs are called Kwhatever, Kuser, Kaudio, Kmail, or if they are called Gtoaster or things w/ G's then you know if you have KDE or GNOME also. (K's are KDE, G's are GNOME). Other than that you can go to the add/remove programs part and see if you have GNOME or KDE checked. When you login it also tells you under the username which GUI you are going to start with, you can change it by clicking session down at the bottom.

edit: didn't see your previous post. I see you are using GNOME.

Quote:

is there any real difference or is it just personal preference between the two?

Yes, KDE is better :-P lol okay okay, it is just a personal preference (bet you can't figure out what mine is! lol) If you have the disk space install KDE also and try it out. One GREAT thing about KDE is if you press Ctrl-Esc it brings up a task manager like alt-ctrl-del in windows. Gnome has an audio player, but I don't know what it is. I think KDE's is called Kaudio. If you look in the add/remove programs thing there is a media section in red hat and you should look for programs in there.

I am looking at my Add Or Remove Packages screen and it looks like 35/35 of Gnome is installed. 0/16 KDE....is there any real difference or is it just personal preference between the two?

However...you mention that KDE has a Red Hat. I have a Red Hat on my taskbar. But as I said above and earlier....the GNOME shows 35/35 installed. I just copied a file to the desktop and saw the status box come up and say something about GNOME.

This is weird.

You have GNOME for sure, I was wrong about the hat...I was basing it off of Fedora...which is almost red hat, but obviously not quite. If you want to give KDE a try then install the packages in add/remove packages log out and click on "session" and change it to KDE.

I was looking on Gnome.org and KDE.org and really cannot find a reasonable difference. Any suggestions?

My main reason for writing these posts is in hopes of finding out if there is a more (and excuse me for saying this) Microsoft Windows based way of installing applications and working inside of Linux? I find it very difficult to use other than the basic icons you get straight out the box. I have went through and added a few more apps from the Packages but nothing external has been installed. I am pretty much lost at this point.

well Like I said there is the Ctrl-Esc feature in KDE. KDE is a bit more customizable and has a lot more GUI's than GNOME, but I think it requires more computer power.

overall I just find KDE more stable and better. I know someone will post that advocates GNOME, that's why I say just try both and choose.

As for easy installations, that is up to the people who make each program, for instance Open Office has a nice installer, as does mozilla. But most programs don't. How about you tell us what kind of program you are looking for, we'll find one (or you can) and we'll try to guide you through the install. http://www.rpmfind.net is a good place to find a bunch of programs as are the two a linked to earlier.

Well working this OS seems a bit difficult under Gnome. I guess I can uncheck Gnome and select KDE and probably restart and all will be changed.....As for programs, I do a lot of graphic design, web page design, things of that nature....and of course listen to mp3's while I work. Thats about it...and and I have MSN, and AIM on my pc's. Any suggestions?

Graphic Design - The Gimp (command: gimp), OpenOffice.org Draw (command: oodraw), SodiPodi (command: sodipodi), Sketch (command: sketch), Karbon14 (command: no idea, just read this one does SVG like SodiPodi and Sketch, but never used it)
Web Page Design - Mozilla Composer (command: mozilla -edit), OpenOffice.org Writer (like MS Word you can create HTML pages through this word processor as well, command: oowriter), Bluefish (command: bluefish), Quanta Plus (command: quanta), KWrite (this is a plain text editor with syntax highlighting and other kewl features for working with code, including HTML, command: kwrite)
Media Players - XMMS (command: xmms), Noatun (command: noatun), MPlayer (command: gmplayer [for GUI]), Xine (command: xine).

This is just a quick list I banged up from memory. In reality there's still much more software out there for this. Some of what I've listed is KDE specific (since I'm a big KDE user), but there are plenty of GNOME and DE-independant alternatives, and that is actually the majority of what I have listed. A good distro will most likely include all of the listed software and much more; it just depends on what you've chosen during install. I do a little bit of webdesign myself (http://apluspc.cjb.net), and very simple graphic design (i.e logo generation via Gimp's plugins), and I play all sorts of media all the time. One little trick I have to point out while I'm thinking about mp3s is Ogg generation in KDE. If you get around to installing KDE, try out the "audiocd:" protocol in Konqueror. You can use it to rip and encode Ogg's from your audio CD's through a simple drag-n-drop process. Ogg is a superior format technically and philosophically, and I think for legal reasons RH may still not include mp3 support by default in their distro (pretty simple to patch this if you look into it).

Anyhow, have fun. If you need any further help, I'd suggest logging onto FreeNode (irc.freenode.net) via X-Chat (command: xchat), and check out their numerous support channels for Free Software. Also, lookup your local LUG (Linux User Group) for your town (most major cities have one), and check them out some time. Most LUGs have good online forums, mailing lists, etc., and best of all, in-person support :-).

In Red Hat 9, they excluded the mp3 features for some odd reason, but you can download the latest version of xmms (it's just like WinAmp in Win, but not associated with them in any way). When you get that, you'll probably have to get some libraries, etc, but trust me, it works once it's in. As far as AIM and MSN, you can go to http://www.aim.com and go to their linux section to download the RH9 version. MSN might have it too, but I've never used it, but it never hurts to look. Also, RH comes with Gaim, which can substitute AIM if you don't mind a couple sacrifices.

"Windows-like" doesn't quite exist, but learning more about linux can help greatly and is a really good experience. I'd have to say that my favorite way to learn about any distro of Linux is to get a cup of coffee, a few bottles of asprin, and sit down to do a lot of reading. Of course, this is just my opinion. I also enjoy just playing around with it. If you screw it up royally, you can call it a learning experience and reinstall if you have to. I haven't seen a hard drive catch fire from stuff like this... at least not yet.

tk31337 has some very good suggestions too. If you're looking for a web design program that is more like FrontPage, I'm looking to that too. If there is a program like it for Linux out there, I'd really like to know... other than Netscape/Mozilla and basics like that. FrontPage is pretty much the only reason I keep Win on my computer.

Good luck with linux, and you certainly came to the right place to get more information about it. LQ has been great for me.