I'm a very very new in Linux.As I never use this OS before.Juz explore myself to Linux due to the whole company change the OS from Windows to Linux.
I face 2 problem here.
1st problem,is there any possiblities for me to use OpenOffice Spreadsheet to print mailing labels like what i did with Lotus 1-2-3? If yes,what step do I need to do.
2nd problem, I can view the chinese wording with the mozilla web browser. but I couldn't key in the chinese input in OpenOffice.What software should i download n install?and is that all need to use programming by type in the command?
really sorry for trouble u guys....but i have no idea where else i can serach for the help.

Thanks alot....

helpless sue

Hi,

Welcome to Linux. I am not sure about your first question, but I can help with your second. Type in "chinese input" in this forum's search bar and read through the various postings on the subject. If you can read Chinese in the browser then you probably already have the software for inputting Chinese available, type the folowing to test this out :-

$ whereis chinput

this command will give a location similar to /usr/bin/chinput to tell you that "chinput" (one of the few Chinese input programs available for Linux) is installed on your system.

next try this :-

$ locale

this command will list a whole lot of language environment variables, if they have zh_CN or zh_TW then you running under a Chinese environment, if it lists en_US or something similar, then you are running under English and "chinput" won't work. So, in a Konsole window type the following :-

$ LANG=zh_CN
$ LC_ALL=zh_CN
$ LC-CTYPE=zh_CN
$ XMODIFIERS=@im=chinput

then type again :-

$ locale

and your locale environment settings should have changed (but for this Konsole window)

now, to test out chinput with Open Office, type the following (in the same terminal window) :-

$ chinput & oowriter

This will start the chinput input server in the background, and start Open Office Writer (hopefully it will show Simplified Chinese menus etc - you are in Malaysia, you may want Traditional Chinese - up to you!).

Select a nice Chinese font from the font selection bar in Writer and then press the CTRL + SPACE keys to activate/deactivate the input window...et voila!

Hope this works, if not, feel free to post your questions, and we will try to help you get it going...

for your first question, OPen Office does quite a lot so I imagine there should be some way of doing mail merging, have a look in the Open Office help files...

cheers,

jdw

suetan, on your first question, Click on File -> New -> Labels.

Hey Thanks for the wonderful tips.. i manage to key in every instruction and change my linux to chinese enviroment but still a lil bit problem.. when i pressed the CTRL + SPACE nothing happen.

Could u guys please advise me on this.

Thanks so much again for the help.

Hi,

Yeah, my apologies, I gave you slightly incorrect information yesterday...the procedure I told you won't enable the input window for Chinput...I don't know why but I will find out (eventually).

Anyway, the simplest (short-term) solution is that when you log into Fedora, when you are at the GUI screen which asks you for a username and password, in the bottom left-hand corner of the screen is a setting for "Language"...press that and select Chinese (either Simplified or Traditional, whatever mood you are in!), and then type in your username and password and hit Enter. I don't know if you prefer KDE or GNOME, I use KDE...

You will notice that the messages, menus and icons are (mostly) in Chinese, but judging by your name I don't think that will be a problem for you to read...

Then you can start a Konsole window, and type

$ chinput & oowriter

and then when it's loaded up you can select one of the Arphic fonts (I like the Kaiti font myself) and then press CTRL + SPACE...press ALT + SHIFT to toggle through the input methods, i.e. smart pinyin, Cangjie, Wubi etc.

this will work, I did this on my laptop on the train this morning...

try again, and hopefully it should work without a problem.

cheers,

jdw

thanks alot,JDW
at last,i manage to view and key in chinese word in my computer...sometimes really feel fedup with the linux...make my life so miserable...but luckily get the help from u...really help me alot
owe u a meal,okie?
hahahah

Hi,

Glad to see it worked. Linux can be very frustrating, in order to really make it live up to its potential you have to read read read...I wouldn't want it any other way myself.

I prefer yum cha too! )

Have a nice day and if you get stuck with anything in Linux again, LQ is IMHO THE best place to ask...

jdw

heheheh...so pai seh...
now i have another doubt....
is there any step for me to follow in order to change the user name of my pc in linux OS?juz like wat i normally did in Window.....
okie...JDW,mana u mau yum cha?where u stay?
thanks again...

Sue

Joe sun***,

"so pai seh" and "mana u mau" - what does that mean? is that Malay? pls forgive my ignorance...

to add/edit/delete usernames on your PC in Fedora, you can go to Menu/System Settings/Users & Groups - I'm telling you this from memory, it could be "System Configuration" on the menu...it's one of them anyway...you will need to know the root (administrator) password in order to start the program. There you can make new Users etc., I actually make a separate user each for Simplified and Traditional Chinese, and have them set up with all the correct settings...

"where u stay" - in sunny Melbourne, Australia...

cheers & have a nice day,

jdw

*** I assume from you're a Cantonese speaker by your name!

here is my new doubt...the technician who install the Linux in my pc already install the chinese language in my pc,so i juz need to activate the chinese input as wat u teached me in the previous msg.
Now,i need to help my colleagues to install the chinese language in their pc..as i know that i need to extract the chinese rpm file from the installer.but i dunno which file should i extract.coz i have 3 CD wif me now.n how to extract n install the chinese language in the pc?is it the same way as we do in window?
please advice...thanks alot

Hi,

For Fedora Core 1, you should start by checking to see whether the following packages are installed by doing this on the command line (in Konsole, xterm etc.) :-

$ rpm -q (package-name)

CD One :

openoffice.org-i18n-1.1.0-6.i386.rpm
redhat-config-language-1.0.16-1.noarch.rpm

CD Two :

kde-i18n-Chinese-3.1.4-1.i386.rpm
kde-i18n-Chinese-Big5-3.1.4-1.i386.rpm
libtabe-0.2.6-6.i386.rpm
miniChinput-0.0.3-53.i386.rpm
ttfonts-zh_CN-2.13-0.noarch.rpm
ttfont-zh_TW.2.11-22.noarch.rpm
xcin-2.5.3.pre3-17.i386.rpm
taipeifonts-1.2-23.noarch.rpm

CD Three :

bitmap-fonts-cjk-0.3-2.noarch.rpm

Maybe not all these packages are totally necessary but you might as well make sure they are there, I am pretty sure these include the ones you need anyway. If any are not installed, you may need to ask your suystems administrator to install them for you.

You might also want to give SCIM a try, you can download the few rpms needed from here and this is a very nice looking input method with all the good input methods. It is also Unicode-based so that you can easily type in Simplified, Traditional, Korean, Japanese etc in the same document in Open Office...

Good Luck!

hahaha,it's me again.encounter another problem.
Recently my company purchase new printer,Brother HL1430. I have no idea y we can't share the printer on the network.I use the normal sharing method in the properties,but it doesn't work.
Please advice..thanks....

hi,

it's probably a good idea to start a new thread for something that is completely different to the original context of this post, but anyway, try searching in LQ for "network share printers" or something like that, I'm sure someone else has had this as an issue before...but firstly I would check for Linux driver support/compatability at the Brother website...

cheers,

jdw